DEV Community: Sumit Raghuwanshi

Your Side Projects Are Dying in Private Repos. Here's a 3-Step Plan to Save Them.

Sumit Raghuwanshi — Mon, 04 May 2026 18:15:51 +0000

Every developer has a "folder of shame."

You know the one. It's filled with half-finished projects. You spent weeks on the auth, set up the database, but then... nothing. You lost interest or couldn't figure out the business side.

That code represents hundreds of hours of your life. Letting it rot is a huge waste. As a dev myself, I wanted to create a system to prevent this. Here's a simple framework to give your projects a second chance.

The "Validation First" Rule
Before git init, validate. Post your raw idea on a platform built for feedback. The Startalks feed on Startives is designed for this. Get a "go" or "no-go" from other builders. If you get crickets, you just saved yourself a month of coding.
The "Micro-Exit" Strategy
Let's be real: not every project will be a unicorn. But a project making $200/mo is still a valuable asset. Instead of abandoning it, sell it.

Platforms like the Startives Marketplace let you list smaller projects for sale with zero commission. Someone else might have the time and energy you lack. A $1,000 exit is infinitely better than a dead repo.

The "Power of a Partner" The most common reason dev-led projects fail? We hate marketing. The solution is simple: find someone who loves it.

Stop looking for "employees." Find a true co-founder. On Startives, we've created a system to match "Builders" (us) with "Visionaries" (the business/marketing folks). They handle the growth, you handle the code. It’s a win-win.

Conclusion: Stop the Waste
The problem isn't your code; it's the friction in the ecosystem. By using a unified platform, you can seamlessly move from idea to validation to finding a partner to a potential exit.

You can check out the platform I built to enable this workflow here:

link https://www.startives.com/

What's the most interesting project you've abandoned? Share it in the comments!

API Documentation is a Failed Concept. Here's What's Next.

Sumit Raghuwanshi — Mon, 04 May 2026 18:04:58 +0000

Let's start with a controversial opinion: API documentation, as we know it, has failed.

Think about it. Docs are:

Static: They can't adapt to your specific question or use case.
A Burden to Maintain: Which is why they're almost always outdated.
One-Size-Fits-All: They treat a senior architect and a beginner the same way.
We spend hours translating a static document into dynamic code. It's an inefficient, frustrating workflow that our industry accepts as "normal."

It's time for a new paradigm: Interactive API Intelligence.

Instead of pulling information from a dead document, what if we could query the knowledge in a conversational way?

This isn't just a theory. I've spent the last few months building this exact concept into my API marketplace, Apives.

I created Apives AI, an assistant that sits between you and the documentation.

You don't read the docs anymore. You ask the AI.

JavaScript

// The Old Way:
// 1. Open docs.
// 2. Find the "Create User" section.
// 3. Read about the body parameters.
// 4. Manually write the JSON structure.
// 5. Hope you got it right.

// The New Way (with Apives AI):
// You ask: "What's the JSON to create a new user?"
// AI responds:
{
"name": "string",
"email": "string (unique)",
"status": "string ('active' or 'pending')"
}

This isn't just a wrapper around GPT. It's a system designed to understand the structure and intent behind API endpoints, giving you reliable answers so you can stay in your creative flow.

The original Apives helps you find a good API. Apives AI helps you use it in seconds.

I believe this is the future of how we interact with developer tools. But maybe I'm crazy.

I'd love for you to challenge this idea. Try it out and tell me where it falls short.

👉 Experience the "post-documentation" era here: https://Apives.com

Is conversational AI the future, or are we stuck with PDFs forever? Let's discuss in the comments.

I Got Tired of Wasting Hours on Bad APIs, So I Built a Small Fix

Sumit Raghuwanshi — Sun, 12 Apr 2026 16:54:31 +0000

Hey everyone,

Let's be real for a second. How many hours have you wasted on an API that looked perfect in the docs, only to get back... well, junk?

For the past few weeks, while hacking on a few side projects, this became my personal nightmare. The cycle was always the same:

Find a promising API on a giant marketplace.
Read through beautiful, well-structured documentation.
Write the code, make the call, and... 404, or a response structure from a parallel universe.
Repeat steps 1-3 until I either give up or find something that barely works.
It felt like I was spending more time vetting APIs than actually building my app. The big marketplaces feel too crowded, and "top-rated" often just means "most popular," not "most reliable."

After my third project stalled because of this, I decided to stop complaining and start coding.

Introducing Apives: A Curation-First Approach
I built Apives.com with one simple, selfish goal: create a place I would actually use to find APIs.

This isn't another massive directory. It's the opposite. The entire philosophy is curation over volume.

My approach is pretty straightforward:

Manual Checks: Every API submitted goes through a basic manual check. Does it work? Do the docs match the real-world response?
Use-Case Driven: Instead of just listing categories, I'm trying to focus on what you can build with an API.
No Fluff: Just the essential info, quick code integration snippets, and clear pricing.
It's still super early, very much a work-in-progress, and probably has a few rough edges. But it's born from a real developer's frustration.

[GIVEAWAY] Let's Build Something Cool - 500 Free SerpAPI Credits
To celebrate this small start and to get this into the hands of real builders, I've teamed up with the awesome folks at SerpAPI.

We're giving away 500 Free SerpAPI Credits to the first 30 builders from the DEV community. If you don't know, SerpAPI is a fantastic tool for getting real-time Google search results, perfect for SEO tools, research projects, or AI agents.

How to Claim Your Free Credits:

Make sure you have a SerpAPI account (if not, sign up on their site).
Shoot an email to contact@serpapi.com.
Just mention the code Apives500 in your email.
Their team will manually add the credits to your account.
Quick Heads-Up:

This is for the first 30 people only.
First come, first served!
I Need Your Honest Feedback
This project is nothing without the community. I would genuinely love to hear your thoughts:

Does this problem resonate with you?
How do you currently find and evaluate APIs for your projects?
What's the one feature that would make a tool like this a no-brainer for you?
Drop a comment below. Let me know what you think, or what you'd build with the SerpAPI credits!

Happy building, everyone.
— Sumit