DEV Community: Vlad Dyachenko

I Stopped Asking Guests to Email Me Photos After Using Juntafotos

Vlad Dyachenko — Sat, 26 Sep 2026 09:30:19 +0000

I've been to a ton of weddings and birthday parties where everyone takes photos on their phones but then they're scattered everywhere — some on Instagram, some in random group chats, most never seen again. Last month I used JuntaFotos for a family gathering and it actually solved this problem. You create an album, generate a QR code, and guests just scan it with their phones. No app install, no complicated steps. They upload photos and videos right there, and everything ends up in one place instead of lost in someone's camera roll.

What surprised me most is how simple it is for guests. I was worried people would get frustrated, but they just scanned and uploaded. After the event, I downloaded everything at once — all the photos, all the videos. It's built specifically for the Brazilian market and works in Portuguese, which made it feel natural to use with our group. Whether you're planning a wedding, graduation, corporate event, or just a casual party, this saves so much time compared to asking people to send you photos individually or trying to find everything afterward.

Check it out: Juntafotos.com.br

I Made a Document My Family Actually Reads If I Die

Vlad Dyachenko — Thu, 24 Sep 2026 17:10:20 +0000

My mom called me last week asking where Dad keeps the passwords to their bank accounts. Turns out he's the only one who knows how everything works — the Wi-Fi, the cloud backups, which email connects to what. I realized if something happened to him, the rest of us would be completely stuck. I started looking into If Required because it actually handles this exact problem instead of just being another password manager.

What makes it different from something like GoodTrust is how practical it is. You write down the stuff only you know — where the family photos are backed up, how to access the computer, which subscriptions matter, where important documents live. But you're not storing the actual passwords or safe combinations directly. You just explain where to find them. Then you choose exactly who gets each message and set it up so trusted contacts have to confirm before anything gets delivered.

I set up a message for my mom with the basic information she'd need, and left another one for my sister. Knowing my family has access to this information if something happens to me is honestly a relief. It's not fancy, but it actually solves the problem.

Check it out: If Required

How I Finally Made Sense of My Research With Visual Notes

Vlad Dyachenko — Wed, 23 Sep 2026 12:18:40 +0000

I've been wrestling with how to organize research for presentations, and most tools either trap me in tiny notes or throw me into a blank canvas with no structure. Loose Thought actually solves this. It's a hybrid that lets you build a proper research notebook with visual layout—you can see how your ideas connect—while keeping the depth you get from actual note-taking. The paper-like feel matters more than I expected. When you're trying to distill weeks of research into a two-minute pitch, you need to see the whole picture at once, not scroll through disconnected fragments.

What makes it different is that it's keyboard-driven but visual. You can work fast and think deeply without switching between tools or fighting with formatting. I use it for client work now where I need to gather messy research and turn it into something I can actually explain. The layout forces you to be intentional about what matters, which sounds annoying but honestly helps you figure out what's actually important. If you're doing any kind of research, writing, or planning where you need both depth and clarity, it's worth your time.

Check it out: Loose Thought

How I Stopped Manually Extracting Data From PDFs With OpenParser

Vlad Dyachenko — Tue, 22 Sep 2026 12:08:18 +0000

Our legal and compliance team was drowning in document review work. We'd spend hours pulling contracts, policies, and reports just to answer basic questions, and then we'd have to manually verify everything. We looked at Glean and Harvey since those are the obvious choices in this space, but the pricing felt steep for what we actually needed, and the setup looked complicated for our mixed environment where we've got everything from SharePoint to SQL databases to random PDFs.

We ended up trying OpenParser AI as an alternative, and it's honestly been solid. You just ask it questions in plain English and it pulls answers straight from your documents with citations showing exactly where it found the information. That part matters to us because nobody wants to trust an answer that's just floating around somewhere. We've set up a few of their pre-built agents for contract review and compliance checks, which handles a lot of what our team was manually doing before. The fact that it connects to Google Drive, SharePoint, and our databases all in one place means we don't have to move stuff around to make it work.

The enterprise stuff is there if you need it—role-based access, audit logs, the whole thing—but it doesn't feel like you're paying for a ton of features you'll never touch. For teams actually doing the work instead of just evaluating tools, it's worth checking out.

Check it out: OpenParser AI

Why I switched to Statjolt to stop worrying about cookie consent laws

Vlad Dyachenko — Sun, 20 Sep 2026 22:29:19 +0000

I switched to StatJolt because I got tired of the cookie banner situation. Google Analytics basically forced me to add one to my site, and honestly it felt gross asking visitors to accept tracking when I didn't really need to know who they were specifically—I just wanted to see traffic patterns and where people were coming from. StatJolt doesn't collect any personal data, so there's no banner at all. Everything stays in the EU and gets anonymized in a way that actually makes sense instead of being theater.

The setup was genuinely two lines of code. I dropped the script tag in, picked a spot for the optional badge, and it just worked. The dashboard shows me what matters: visitor count, traffic sources, pages, Core Web Vitals, conversion funnels, and it even tracks JavaScript errors so I caught a broken form button before anyone complained. All of that is built in, which is nice because other tools like Plausible or Fathom charge extra for features that come standard here. It's also tiny—about 15 KB—so it doesn't slow anything down like Google Analytics does.

Best part? It's actually free until 2027 with no credit card. After that it stays free for low-traffic sites. I'm not sure how they're sustaining this, but they're independent, EU-based, and have no investors pushing them to monetize aggressively. If you're running a site in Europe or just sick of the privacy theater, this thing does exactly what it promises.

Check it out: statjolt.com

How I got my indie app discovered using LaunchScaler's SEO automation

Vlad Dyachenko — Sat, 19 Sep 2026 20:52:53 +0000

I launched a SaaS product last month and realized about two weeks in that having something good isn't the same as people being able to find it. My site technically worked but I had no idea if search engines could actually parse what we do, whether our metadata was right, or if an AI looking at our page would understand our value prop. The whole launch felt like I was flying blind.

LaunchScaler basically audits your live site against nearly 200 real checks and then uses what it finds to write your product listing automatically. You paste your URL and it scans the way a search engine, an answer engine, and a new visitor would. It tells you exactly what's broken, where it is, and what to fix. The listing gets pulled from the same scan so there's no filling out forms about yourself. I claimed my domain, corrected a couple things I disagreed with, picked a launch day, and we went live free. It's the first time since launch that I actually felt confident people could find us.

The part that keeps paying off is the monitoring after launch. It watches for when things break or go offline and emails you the diff. The content engine drafts blog posts based on queries you're almost ranking for and publishes them to your CMS. This is useful if you're tired of your product being invisible but your site is actually pretty solid technically.

Check it out: LaunchScaler

How I Validated My Product Idea Before Writing a Single Line of Code

Vlad Dyachenko — Fri, 18 Sep 2026 17:24:19 +0000

I had this idea I was pretty sure people wanted, but honestly I had no clue if anyone actually cared enough to pay for it. The problem was obvious to me, but that's not the same as real demand, right? I spent weeks arguing with myself about whether to build it, which was a waste of time.

Demand Discovery AI just runs a report that finds actual people online right now saying they need what you're thinking about building. It pulls real quotes from Reddit threads, competitor reviews, forum posts—wherever people are complaining about the problem. Every single quote links back to the source so you can verify it's real. The whole thing takes minutes instead of weeks of research. It also maps out who actually has this problem so you know if you're building for the right people.

What sold me was being able to run this before writing a single line of code. I got my proof in a report with sourced evidence, then used it to start actual conversations with people who said they needed this stuff. That part alone saved me from building something nobody wanted. If you're sitting on an idea and you're not sure, this is genuinely the fastest way to find out.

Check it out: Demand Discovery AI

I tried ChatToAnyone when I was tired of not knowing who I was talking to

Vlad Dyachenko — Wed, 16 Sep 2026 00:24:20 +0000

I've been using ChatToAnytime for a few weeks now and what grabbed me immediately was how dead simple it is to actually start talking to someone. No account required, no email confirmation emails sitting in your inbox forever—you just pick whether you want to chat with a real person or an AI companion, select your language and interests, and you're in. It genuinely takes seconds.

The thing that made me stick with it is the honesty about what you're getting. The AI conversations are clearly labeled so you know exactly what you're talking to, which sounds basic but most platforms are weirdly cagey about this. If you want to keep conversations going or get rid of ads, the Plus tier adds resumed conversations with AI companions and more chat history, though the free version covers most of what I needed.

I appreciate that safety and privacy feel like actual priorities here rather than checkbox features. There's moderation built in, age guidance, and the ability to report issues if something feels off. It's nice having a place to have real conversations without feeling like I'm being harvested for data or dealing with weird stuff.

Check it out: ChatToAnyone

How I stopped dreading tax season after switching to TaxBowl

Vlad Dyachenko — Mon, 14 Sep 2026 16:04:19 +0000

I was drowning in spreadsheets and tax deadlines kept sneaking up on me. I'd tried the usual suspects like Pilot and Bookkeeper360, but they felt like I was paying for a service that checked in once a month and disappeared. What I actually needed was a team I could reach when questions came up, someone who understood my cash flow situation in real time instead of looking back at it weeks later.

TaxBowl is different because you're working with actual people, not just a platform. They handle the bookkeeping basics, sure, but they're also doing tax planning before you hit April and spotting deduction opportunities I'd miss on my own. The monthly packages start at $149 and they don't lock you into some bloated service tier. I got payroll support, cash flow visibility, and someone who can give me CFO-level guidance when I'm making decisions about hiring or expansion.

If you're tired of the arms-length approach from firms like Xendoo, inDinero, Collective, or Zeni, this is worth checking out. They've got options for solopreneurs or growing teams, and they actually keep your books current instead of letting things pile up until year-end panic mode. I can finally see where my money is going and what's actually coming in.

Check it out: TaxBowl

I Saved Money on FastMoss By Actually Reading Their Promo Codes

Vlad Dyachenko — Sun, 13 Sep 2026 16:02:23 +0000

I've been running a TikTok Shop and spending way too much time hunting for working discount codes on Fastmoss. Half the ones I found were either expired or didn't work at checkout, which is incredibly frustrating when you're trying to save money on analytics tools you actually need. That's when I found FastMoss Promo, and it's genuinely solved that problem for me.

What makes it different is that someone actually tests every code before posting it. Like, they go to checkout and verify it works. They even re-check everything monthly to make sure nothing's gone stale. The FAST50 code has been solid for me—I got about 40% off my annual plan, which added up to real money. They also show you the exact pricing breakdowns by plan tier, so you can see your savings before you commit to anything.

If you're using Fastmoss for analytics, it's worth checking out. You'll save actual dollars instead of wasting time digging through sketchy coupon sites. They've got a decent review of the platform too if you're new to it, and the redemption guide walks you through everything step by step.

Check it out: FastMoss Promo

I finally found a Discord server directory that actually works

Vlad Dyachenko — Fri, 11 Sep 2026 21:56:19 +0000

Finding a decent Discord server used to feel like throwing darts blindfolded. You'd search around, join something random, and half the time it was either dead or not what you needed. I kept running into the same problem over and over—wasting time sifting through Discord itself to find communities that actually matched what I was looking for.

That's where Best Discord came in handy for me. It's basically a directory where someone's already done the legwork of organizing servers, bots, templates, and tools by category. Instead of guessing, you can actually see what a server's about before joining, check out ratings and tags, and find bots for specific things like music, moderation, or games all in one place. The listings are straightforward and searchable, which sounds simple but makes a real difference when you're trying to find something specific.

If you run a server or made a bot, it's worth listing there too. You get actual visibility in front of people who are actively looking for what you've built, rather than hoping someone stumbles across your invite link somewhere. For anyone managing Discord communities or constantly looking for new tools to make their server better, this place actually saves time.

Check it out: Best Discord

I Started Using Drukarnia.Blog to Write Without the Platform Drama

Vlad Dyachenko — Thu, 10 Sep 2026 21:54:18 +0000

I've been writing longer pieces lately and getting frustrated with how they get buried on social media or lost in email drafts. Drukarnia is actually a solid place to publish these things without worrying about algorithms burying your work or fighting for attention against corporate content.

What makes it different is that it's built specifically for Ukrainian content and creators who want their writing to actually be discoverable. The text editor is genuinely good—I can format things properly, embed videos and images, add code blocks if I need to, and save drafts while I'm working through ideas. The platform gives each piece its own Google-indexed page, so your articles aren't just sitting in a feed somewhere, they're actual web pages that search engines can find.

The process is straightforward too. You sign up, fill out your profile, and start writing. I like that you can pin your best work to your profile and share across other platforms when you're ready. If you write in Ukrainian or want to support more Ukrainian voices online, this feels like the right place to be doing it.

Check it out: Drukarnia.Blog