DEV Community: yanan yu

UK Tax Calculator 2026/27: Estimate PAYE, National Insurance and Take-Home Pay

yanan yu — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 02:01:02 +0000

If you work in the UK, compare job offers, or just want a quick salary-after-tax estimate, I built a small browser-based tool for this:

Mini Tools UK Tax Calculator

It is designed for quick salary planning rather than formal payroll work. You enter your income, choose the pay period and UK tax region, then the calculator estimates annual, monthly and weekly take-home pay.

What it can estimate

PAYE Income Tax for the 2026/27 tax year
Employee National Insurance
Salary sacrifice pension deductions
Student Loan Plans 1, 2, 4 and 5
Optional Postgraduate Loan deduction
England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland tax regions
Annual, monthly and weekly take-home pay breakdowns

When it is useful

This is useful when you want to compare a new job offer, check what a salary increase might mean in monthly take-home pay, plan a budget, or understand how pension sacrifice and student loan deductions affect salary.

Because the calculation runs in the browser, the salary amount is not uploaded to a server or stored in a database.

Tool link

Try it here: https://mini-tools.uk/tax

Search terms it may help with

UK tax calculator, UK income tax calculator, salary after tax UK, take-home pay calculator, PAYE calculator, National Insurance calculator, UK salary calculator, student loan deduction calculator, salary sacrifice pension calculator, Scotland tax calculator.

Note

This is an estimate only. Actual payslips can differ because of tax codes, benefits in kind, bonuses, pension scheme rules, payroll rounding and employer-specific deductions. For official decisions, check GOV.UK, HMRC guidance or a qualified adviser.

Hospedagem grátis de imagens: converta imagens em URL, Markdown, HTML e BBCode

yanan yu — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 01:33:54 +0000

Ao escrever issues no GitHub, documentação, README, tutoriais ou respostas de suporte, muitas vezes você precisa de uma URL direta para uma imagem.

Mini-Tools Image Hosting é uma ferramenta grátis para fazer upload de imagens e transformar uma imagem em links prontos para compartilhar.

Depois do upload você pode copiar:

URL direta da imagem
link em Markdown
código HTML
BBCode para fóruns

A ferramenta é útil para fluxos rápidos: relatórios de bug, documentação, fóruns, README e mensagens de suporte onde você só precisa hospedar uma imagem e copiar o link.

URL: https://mini-tools.uk/upload

Palavras-chave: hospedagem grátis de imagens, upload de imagem, converter imagem em URL, criar link de imagem, imagem em Markdown, código HTML de imagem, BBCode.

Hosting gratuito de imágenes: convierte imágenes en URL, Markdown, HTML y BBCode

yanan yu — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 01:33:24 +0000

Cuando escribes issues en GitHub, documentación, README, tutoriales o respuestas de soporte, muchas veces necesitas una URL directa para una imagen.

Mini-Tools Image Hosting es una herramienta gratuita para subir imágenes y convertirlas en enlaces listos para compartir.

Después de subir una imagen puedes copiar:

URL directa de la imagen
enlace Markdown
código HTML
BBCode para foros

Está pensada para flujos rápidos: reportes de errores, documentación, foros, README y mensajes de soporte donde solo necesitas una imagen alojada y un enlace que puedas pegar.

URL: https://mini-tools.uk/upload

Palabras clave: hosting gratuito de imágenes, subir imágenes, convertir imagen a URL, crear enlace de imagen, imagen en Markdown, código HTML de imagen, BBCode.

무료 이미지 호스팅: 이미지를 URL, Markdown, HTML, BBCode로 변환

yanan yu — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 01:32:50 +0000

GitHub 이슈, README, 기술 문서, 포럼 글을 작성하다 보면 이미지를 바로 공유할 수 있는 URL이 필요할 때가 많습니다.

Mini-Tools Image Hosting은 브라우저에서 이미지를 업로드하고 공유용 링크를 빠르게 만들 수 있는 무료 이미지 호스팅 도구입니다.

업로드 후 복사할 수 있는 형식:

직접 이미지 URL
Markdown 이미지 링크
HTML 이미지 코드
포럼용 BBCode

복잡한 파일 관리 도구라기보다, 문서 작성이나 버그 리포트, README, 지원 답변에서 이미지 링크가 빠르게 필요할 때 쓰기 좋은 도구입니다.

URL: https://mini-tools.uk/upload

검색 키워드: 무료 이미지 호스팅, 이미지 업로드, 이미지를 URL로 변환, 이미지 링크 만들기, Markdown 이미지 링크, HTML 이미지 코드, BBCode.

無料画像ホスティング：画像をURL、Markdown、HTML、BBCodeに変換

yanan yu — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 01:32:15 +0000

GitHub Issue、README、技術ドキュメント、フォーラム投稿で画像リンクが必要になることがあります。

Mini-Tools Image Hosting は、画像をアップロードして共有用リンクをすぐに作れる無料の画像ホスティングツールです。

アップロード後にコピーできる形式：

直接画像URL
Markdown画像リンク
HTML画像コード
BBCode（フォーラム向け）

アカウント管理や大きなアセット管理ではなく、README、Issue、ドキュメント、サポート返信で画像URLをすばやく使いたい場面に向いています。

URL: https://mini-tools.uk/upload

検索キーワード：無料画像ホスティング、画像アップロード、画像をURLに変換、画像リンク作成、Markdown画像リンク、HTML画像コード、BBCode。

免费图床：图片上传后生成 URL、Markdown、HTML 和 BBCode

yanan yu — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 01:31:15 +0000

如果你经常需要把图片放到 GitHub issue、README、论坛帖子、技术文档或客服回复里，一个轻量的图床工具会很省时间。

Mini-Tools Image Hosting 是一个免费的图片托管和图片转链接工具。上传图片后，可以复制：

图片直链
Markdown 图片语法
HTML 图片代码
BBCode，适合论坛

它更适合快速分享图片链接，而不是复杂的素材库管理。比如写 bug 反馈、整理 README、发论坛教程、写技术文档时，只需要一个能直接访问的图片 URL。

使用地址：https://mini-tools.uk/upload

常见搜索词：免费图床、图片托管、图片转 URL、图片转链接、图片上传保存、Markdown 图片链接、HTML 图片代码、论坛 BBCode。

Free Image Hosting for Markdown, HTML and BBCode Links

yanan yu — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 01:22:16 +0000

A quick note for anyone who needs a lightweight image-to-link workflow:

Mini-Tools Image Hosting lets you upload an image in the browser and copy a direct URL, Markdown, HTML, or BBCode. It is useful for GitHub issues, READMEs, documentation, forums, support tickets, and small sharing workflows.

中文

免费图床和图片托管工具。上传图片后生成直链、Markdown、HTML、BBCode。关键词：免费图床、图片托管、图片转 URL、图片转链接、图片上传保存。

日本語

無料画像ホスティングツールです。画像をアップロードして、直リンク、Markdown、HTML、BBCode をコピーできます。

한국어

무료 이미지 호스팅 도구입니다. 이미지를 업로드하고 직접 링크, Markdown, HTML, BBCode를 복사할 수 있습니다.

Español

Herramienta gratuita de hosting de imágenes. Sube una imagen y copia la URL directa, Markdown, HTML o BBCode.

Português

Ferramenta grátis de hospedagem de imagens. Faça upload e copie a URL direta, Markdown, HTML ou BBCode.

URL: https://mini-tools.uk/upload

Free No-Signup Image Hosting for GitHub README, Markdown and Blogs

yanan yu — Wed, 13 May 2026 03:27:26 +0000

I Built a Free No-Signup Image Hosting Tool for Markdown, GitHub README, and Blogs

When writing a GitHub README, Markdown document, technical blog, tutorial, or forum post, one small problem appears again and again:

You have an image, but you need a direct image URL.

That is why I built Mini-Tools Free Image Hosting, a simple no-signup image hosting tool that helps you upload an image and instantly turn it into a usable image URL.

Try it here:

https://mini-tools.uk/upload?utm_source=dev&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=free_image_hosting

What problem does it solve?

Many developers, bloggers, and documentation writers need a fast way to convert an image into a URL.

For example, when you are writing a GitHub README, you may want to add a screenshot like this:

![project screenshot](https://your-image-url.webp)

Or when you are writing an HTML page, you may want to use:

<img src="https://your-image-url.webp" alt="image">

The problem is that not everyone wants to create an account, open a complex dashboard, configure storage, or use a full media management platform just to host one image.

Sometimes you only need a quick image link.

That is the idea behind this tool:

Upload an image, get a direct URL, copy the format you need, and use it anywhere.

Main features

Mini-Tools Free Image Hosting currently supports several common output formats:

Direct image URL
Markdown image syntax
HTML image code
BBCode
Shareable image link

It is designed for lightweight use cases such as:

GitHub README images
Markdown documentation
GitHub Issues and Discussions
Technical blog screenshots
Forum image sharing
Tutorial images
Quick image-to-URL conversion

No-signup image hosting

One of the main goals is to keep the workflow simple.

You can upload an image without creating an account.

This makes it useful for quick tasks such as adding a screenshot to a README file, sharing an image in a forum, or preparing an image URL for a Markdown document.

For many small use cases, a no-signup image hosting workflow is faster than using a full storage platform.

Free image hosting

The tool is also designed as a free image hosting option for lightweight image sharing.

It is not trying to replace advanced cloud storage or enterprise media platforms. Instead, it focuses on simple image hosting needs:

Upload an image
Generate a direct image URL
Copy Markdown, HTML, or BBCode
Use the image in your content

For developers and writers, this can save time when creating documentation, tutorials, or README files.

Image to URL

The core feature is image-to-URL conversion.

After uploading an image, the tool gives you a direct image link that can be used in different places.

For Markdown:

![image](https://your-image-url.webp)

For HTML:

<img src="https://your-image-url.webp" alt="image">

For forums that support BBCode:

[img]https://your-image-url.webp[/img]

This makes the tool useful not only for GitHub, but also for blogs, forums, documentation websites, and other publishing workflows.

Useful for GitHub README and Markdown

A common use case is adding images to a GitHub README.

GitHub supports Markdown, so once you have an image URL, you can simply paste it into your README.md file.

Example:

![demo screenshot](https://your-image-url.webp)

This is useful for:

Project screenshots
App previews
Diagrams
Tutorial images
Documentation illustrations
Before-and-after examples

The same workflow also works for GitHub Issues, GitHub Discussions, Wikis, and Markdown-based documentation tools.

Is there an API?

Right now, the tool focuses mainly on the web upload experience.

However, a free image hosting API is a possible future direction.

For developers, an image hosting API could be useful for:

Uploading images from Markdown editors
Returning a direct image URL
Returning Markdown image syntax
Returning HTML image snippets
Integrating image upload into internal tools
Building documentation workflows

The current version is intentionally simple, but API support is one of the features I am considering.

For Chinese users

This tool may also be useful for people searching for:

free image hosting
no-signup image hosting
image to URL
image-to-URL converter
Markdown image hosting
GitHub README image hosting
direct image URL
image hosting API

In Chinese, many users describe this kind of tool as a free image hosting service, an image-to-URL converter, or a no-signup image hosting tool.

The goal is to provide a simple option for users who need to upload an image and quickly get a usable link.

Why I built it

I built this because I often see people needing a simple image link for README files, Markdown documents, blog posts, and forum content.

There are many image hosting platforms, but some are too complex for quick use. Some require registration. Some focus on social sharing rather than direct image links. Some are not convenient for Markdown users.

I wanted something simpler:

Open the page.
Upload an image.
Copy the direct URL or Markdown format.
Paste it into README, Markdown, HTML, or a forum post.

That is all.

Try it

You can try the tool here:

https://mini-tools.uk/upload?utm_source=dev&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=free_image_hosting

I would love to hear feedback from developers, technical writers, bloggers, and Markdown users.

If you often need to turn images into URLs for GitHub README files, documentation, blogs, or forums, this tool may be useful for your workflow.

A Simple Temporary Image Hosting Tool for Fast Sharing

yanan yu — Fri, 24 Apr 2026 06:52:56 +0000

When you only need to share an image quickly, most tools feel heavier than they need to be.

Sometimes you do not want to open cloud storage, create a folder, manage permissions, or send a full file-sharing page just to share one screenshot, one preview image, or one temporary visual asset.

That small friction is exactly why I built a simple temporary image hosting tool.

The problem

There are plenty of ways to store images online, but many of them are designed for long-term file management, team collaboration, or media libraries.

That is useful in some situations, but not all.

A lot of the time, the real need is much simpler:

upload one image
get a shareable link
send it immediately
let it expire later

This is especially common when sharing:

screenshots for bug reports
temporary design previews
product mockups
image assets in chat
visual references for clients or teammates
quick demo content for forums or blog drafts

For these cases, a lightweight image hosting tool makes more sense than a full storage workflow.

What I wanted from the tool

The goal was not to build a full media platform.

I wanted something much smaller and more practical:

simple upload flow
clear retention choices
fast link generation
minimal friction
honest explanation that the file is uploaded to a remote service

That last point matters.

A lot of web tools today market themselves in vague ways, but users should know whether a feature is local-only or server-backed. If a page is creating a hosted image URL, then the file is being uploaded somewhere, and the interface should say that clearly.

What the tool does

The tool is built for temporary image hosting.

You upload an image, choose how long it should be kept, and then receive a shareable link. It is designed for short-term usage rather than permanent asset management.

The current version supports:

temporary retention choices
remote hosted image links
anti-bot verification
optional long-term storage access for approved use cases

That means the tool works well for quick sharing, while still making it clear that the upload is not purely local.

Why retention matters

One of the most useful features in temporary image hosting is retention control.

Not every uploaded image needs to stay online forever.

In fact, many should not.

Temporary retention is useful because it helps match the tool to real usage:

one-day sharing for short conversations
one-week sharing for active work threads
one-month sharing for lightweight project references

This keeps the workflow simple and more intentional. It also avoids turning a quick-share tool into an unstructured permanent archive.

Why I prefer this kind of workflow

What I like about temporary image hosting is that it reduces the gap between “I have a file” and “someone else can see it.”

That gap is often where unnecessary friction appears.

A good quick-share workflow should feel like this:

choose the image
upload it
copy the link
send it

That is it.

No extra dashboard. No account friction for basic usage. No overbuilt media management when all you need is one hosted image URL.

Good use cases

This kind of tool is especially useful for developers, indie makers, support teams, and solo builders.

For example:

1. Bug reporting

If you are reporting a UI issue, a screenshot is often the fastest way to show the problem.

2. Product feedback

Founders and designers often need to send temporary previews without building a whole asset-sharing workflow.

3. Documentation drafts

Sometimes you want to insert a temporary image into a blog draft, internal note, or forum reply before deciding whether it belongs in permanent documentation.

4. Quick client communication

If a client just needs to review a visual, a direct image link is often easier than a full file-sharing interface.

A small but important detail: clarity

I think simple tools still need clear communication.

If a page uploads files to a remote service, that should be stated clearly.
If files are temporary, that should be stated clearly.
If anti-bot checks are in place, that should be stated clearly.

The goal is not only to make the tool easy to use, but also easy to understand.

That kind of transparency matters more than people think, especially for utilities that deal with user uploads.

What I would improve next

If I continue improving this tool, the areas I would care about most are:

clearer result actions after upload
better link-copy UX
stronger preview feedback
more visible upload status
lightweight management for recently uploaded files
clearer guardrails around temporary vs approved long-term storage

I still want to keep it small, though.

The value of the tool is that it solves one specific problem well: temporary image sharing with minimal friction.

Final thoughts

Not every image needs a permanent home.

Sometimes you just need a simple temporary image hosting tool that lets you upload a file, generate a link, and move on.

That is the gap this tool is meant to fill.

Small utility tools are at their best when they remove steps, not add them. For image sharing, that usually means making the path from upload to link as short and obvious as possible.

Finally found an AI Token Calculator that doesn't steal your system prompts 🕵️‍♂️

yanan yu — Mon, 13 Apr 2026 02:20:05 +0000

If you are building any kind of RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) application or complex LLM pipeline right now, you know the struggle of trying to estimate your API costs.

Our team has a massive, highly proprietary system prompt. It contains our core business logic, database schemas, and custom few-shot examples.

Last week, I needed to figure out exactly how much this behemoth was going to cost us per 1,000 runs if we switched from GPT-4o-mini to Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

The Problem: I started Googling "Claude token counter" or "LLM cost estimator". Almost every single tool on page one either:

Asked me to paste my actual API key so it could "ping the model for me" (Absolutely not).

Was a sketchy single-page app that clearly sent whatever I pasted in the to some random backend server.

You DO NOT paste your company's proprietary source code or system prompts into random cloud text boxes. That is a massive security breach waiting to happen.

The Find:
I stumbled across this site: Mini-Tools.uk AI Token Calculator.

It looks like a standard utility site, but the main reason I am sharing it here is the architecture: It runs 100% locally in your browser. I actually tested it—I loaded the page, turned off my Wi-Fi, pasted our massive 4,000-word prompt, and it instantly calculated the tokens and the exact USD cost. No network requests. No data leaving my machine. It uses a client-side heuristic algorithm to estimate the tokens for English and CJK characters.

Why it earned a permanent bookmark for me:

It factors in Output Costs: A lot of devs ignore that output tokens cost 3x-5x more than input tokens. This tool lets you plug in your "Expected Output" and calculates the blended total.

Up-to-date 2026 Pricing: It has the exact pay-as-you-go rates for GPT-4o, Claude 3.5 (Opus/Sonnet/Haiku), and Gemini 1.5 pre-loaded.

Bulk Projection: It has a neat little box at the bottom that instantly scales the cost to 1,000 API calls, which is super helpful when you are trying to price your SaaS tiers for users.

If you are tired of doing mental math to figure out your OpenAI or Anthropic bills, or if you are paranoid about leaking your prompts, definitely check it out.

Does anyone else have good offline/local tools they use for their AI workflows? Drop them below! 👇

Stop Pasting Your System Prompts into Sketchy Token Counters (So I Built a Secure One)

yanan yu — Mon, 13 Apr 2026 02:17:51 +0000

If you’re building AI apps in 2026, you’ve probably experienced one of two things:

You got your OpenAI or Anthropic API bill and nearly had a heart attack because you miscalculated the output token ratio.

You wanted to estimate a massive, proprietary system prompt, but hesitated to paste it into random-token-counter-xyz.com because you have no idea where that text is actually going.

I got tired of both.

System prompts are essentially the source code and business logic of modern AI apps. Pasting them into a cloud-based text area without an API key just to count words is a massive security vulnerability.

So, I built a 100% client-side alternative: The Zero-Trust AI Token & Cost Calculator.

The Problem with Most Token Counters
Most tools out there either require you to paste your actual API key (hard pass), or they send your text payload to a backend server to run it through an official tokenizer library like tiktoken.

But for simple cost estimation and budgeting, making a network request is overkill and a privacy nightmare.

The Solution: A Local Heuristic Algorithm
I wanted something that runs instantly in the browser memory and gives me a 95% accurate cost projection for GPT-4o, Claude 3.5 (Opus/Sonnet), and Gemini.

Instead of bundling a heavy WASM tokenizer, I wrote a lightweight heuristic engine in vanilla JavaScript. It works entirely offline:

English/Latin text: It splits by whitespace and applies the standard industry heuristic: 1 word ≈ 1.33 tokens. It also separately counts punctuation marks, as LLMs usually tokenize them individually.

CJK (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) Support: CJK characters are notorious for eating up tokens. The script uses Regex (/[\u4e00-\u9fa5...]/g) to isolate them and applies a conservative 1.5 tokens per character multiplier based on modern 2026 tokenizer behaviors.

It’s not byte-for-byte perfect to OpenAI's exact tokenizer, but for financial modeling and prompt-trimming, it’s completely frictionless and instantly accurate enough.

Cost Projection is More Than Just Input
The biggest mistake junior devs make is looking at the "$5 per 1M tokens" sticker price and ignoring the output. Generating text is computationally expensive, and API providers charge 3x to 5x more for output tokens. (Looking at you, Claude 3.5 Opus, with your $75/1M output rate).

The tool allows you to:

Paste your giant prompt to get the Input Cost.

Set your expected Output Tokens length.

Select the model (GPT-4o, Claude, Gemini).

Instantly see the exact USD cost for a single run, AND a bulk projection for 1,000 API calls to help you price your SaaS tiers.

Try it out (Safely)
You can test it out here: Mini-Tools.uk AI Token Calculator

Turn off your Wi-Fi, paste your most highly classified, NDA-protected system prompt into the box, and watch the pricing calculate instantly. Your data never leaves your .

Let me know what you guys think, or if there are any obscure open-source models whose pricing tiers I should add to the dropdown!

The nightmare of UK sprint planning (and the working days calculator that fixes it) 🇬🇧🗓️

yanan yu — Fri, 03 Apr 2026 09:18:01 +0000

If you are a tech lead, project manager, or contractor working in the UK, you know the struggle of calculating exact "working days" for a project sprint or client SLA.

In theory, the math is easy: Total Days - Weekends = Business Days.

But in the UK, we have Bank Holidays. And this is where almost every standard global date calculator (and half the date-math npm packages out there) completely falls apart.

Why? Because the UK isn't just one calendar. England & Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland all have different statutory public holidays. * Planning a release with your Edinburgh team in August? Scotland has a Summer Bank Holiday weeks before England does. Plus, they take St Andrew's Day off.

Working with a Belfast client? Don't forget St Patrick's Day and the Battle of the Boyne.

If you use a generic online business day calculator, it usually defaults to US holidays or lumps the whole UK together, which is a guaranteed way to miss a regional delivery deadline.

While mapping out my Q2 deliverables, I found a tool that actually understands this geographical mess: the Mini-Tools Working Days Calculator.

Why this tool belongs in your PM stack 🛠️
As a dev, I don't just want a tool to be accurate; I want it to be built properly. Here is why I bookmarked this one:

Hardcoded Regional Logic
It doesn't just ask for "UK". It forces you to select your region (England & Wales, Scotland, or Northern Ireland) and uses hardcoded 2026/27 statutory dates to instantly strip out the correct regional Bank Holidays from your date range. It’s finally accurate.
Zero-Trust Architecture (Privacy First)
Your project timelines, sprint dates, and HR payroll periods are sensitive corporate data. Most business calculators send your inputs to a backend server to process the date math.

I checked the DevTools Network tab on this one: Zero POST requests. The calendar mathematics and holiday cross-referencing happen instantly via vanilla JavaScript directly in your browser's RAM. Your project data never leaves your machine.

Deep Linking via History API This is the ultimate collaboration feature. As you select your start date, end date, and region, the tool uses the History API to dynamically update the URL (e.g., ?start=2026-04-01&end=2026-04-30&region=sc&bh=true).

I don't have to argue with clients about how many billable days are in the month. I just configure the parameters, copy the URL, and drop it into Slack or Jira. When they click it, the exact breakdown (Total Days, Weekends Excluded, Bank Holidays Excluded, and Final Working Days) loads instantly on their screen. No database lookups, just clean URL state sharing.

The Bottom Line
If you are managing teams or calculating day-rate invoices across different parts of the UK, stop guessing the Bank Holidays. Use a fast, local tool that actually respects the regional differences and your privacy.

Check it out here: https://mini-tools.uk/working-days

How do you guys handle regional holidays when planning sprints with distributed teams? Does anyone else have war stories about missing a deadline because of a surprise Scottish Bank Holiday? Let me know below! 👇