When I started building HYNA-Stage, I thought I was just building a tool.
A tool does the job. It takes your code, puts it in a cloud sandbox, and gives you a URL. But yesterday, while staring at my terminal on a $150 Android phone, I realized I needed to stop building a tool and start building a product.
The difference? Developer Experience (DX). A product makes the developer feel powerful while using it.
So today, I stopped focusing on just making the API work, and started focusing on how it feels. Here is what shipped in v2.1.0.
✨ 1. Hot Reloading (hyna-stage watch)
The Old Way: Edit file → Run hyna-stage up → Wait → Refresh browser. Repeat.
The New Way: Run hyna-stage watch test.html → Edit file → Save → Auto-deploys in 800ms.
I integrated fs.watch with a debounce timer so the CLI watches your local files and redeploys instantly. No more command spamming. Just code, save, and watch it live.
2. Enterprise Spinners
No more boring, static console.log("Loading...").
Now, when you deploy, you see smooth, animated spinners:
- ⏳ Authenticating...
- ☁️ Provisioning Firecracker MicroVM...
- 🚀 Deploying to E2B...
It's a small detail, but it makes the CLI feel like a premium macOS tool, not a weekend hackathon script.
⏯️ 3. Interactive Browser Opening
The CLI now pauses and says: "Press Enter to open the live URL in your browser..."
Hit Enter, and it instantly launches Chrome using termux-open-url. No copying and pasting URLs from the terminal. Just pure flow.
🗝️ 4. Quick Access (hyna-stage open)
I added local config storage (~/.hyna-stage). Now, you can just run hyna-stage open and it reopens your last deployed URL instantly. No need to re-run the whole deployment pipeline.
🛠️ THE 502 BAD GATEWAY ERADICATOR
The biggest technical headache this week was the "502 Bad Gateway" error.
The Problem: E2B MicroVMs sometimes take 2-3 seconds to boot the Python HTTP server. The CLI was returning the URL too early, so users would click the link and hit a dead port.
The Fix: I wrote a Deno polling loop inside the Supabase Edge Function.
Before returning 200 OK to the CLI, the Edge Function now:
- Generates the E2B public URL.
- Pings that URL every 500ms using
fetch(). - Waits up to 10 seconds for the server to respond.
- Only returns success once the MicroVM is 100% online.
Result? Zero 502 errors. The URL only opens when the server is actually ready.
🧠 The $150 Phone Realization
We are trained to believe that building "enterprise-grade" DX requires a $3,000 MacBook, a $100 AWS bill, and a team of senior engineers.
But constraints breed innovation.
Because I have limited resources, I couldn't build a bloated, heavy CI/CD pipeline. I had to build something lean, ephemeral, and instant. I look at my terminal output: hyna-stage watch test.html is live-reloading my code in a Firecracker MicroVM, running entirely from a budget Android phone in Tamil Nadu.
I am 12. I don't have a laptop. But today, I built a developer experience that rivals Vercel.
HYNAWEB isn't a side project anymore. It's a company.
Try the new DX yourself:
npm install -g @hynaweb/stage
hyna-stage watch your-file.html
Top comments (7)
You're learning and executing on things some devs never seem to learn. The DX direction is a fantastic start and I've been a supporter of being able to use a screen and a keyboard to build stuff.
As for your CI/CD pipeline statement, there are services available in the cloud around this. Just so you're aware of it.
I'd love to hear how your business does in it's first 3, 6, & 12 months. 🤓
Thank you so much, David! That means a lot coming from you, especially the support for building with just a screen and a keyboard. 🐯
You are absolutely right about cloud CI/CD services (like GitHub Actions or Vercel). They are fantastic and I use them! My statement was more about the design philosophy of this specific CLI tool: I wanted the developer experience to be completely self-contained and instantaneous. I wanted to eliminate the friction of setting up external cloud runners, YAML files, or waiting for remote queues just to get a quick, ephemeral sandbox URL.
But I completely agree that for production applications, robust cloud CI/CD is the gold standard. It’s all about using the right tool for the right job!
I will absolutely hold you to that 3, 6, and 12-month check-in! 🤓 Consider this a public promise that I will post those business and growth updates right here on Dev.to.
Thanks for being a supporter of the journey. Onward to month 1! 🚀
Oh, gotcha. I misunderstood what you meant - thanks for clarifying! I love your philosophy of a self-contained system.
Haha, all good, David! I always appreciate the honest feedback, especially from a friend and supporter of the journey. 🐯
Since you've got a great eye for this stuff, I'm curious: when you are spinning up quick prototypes or ephemeral environments, what is your go-to stack or workflow? I am always looking to learn from how other experienced devs tackle friction and streamline their DX.
And yes, I will definitely keep you posted on those 3, 6, and 12-month milestones! Gotta keep the accountability high, and having supporters like you in my corner makes a huge difference. 😄
What are you currently building or experimenting with?
I have around a decade in C# .Net, so that's my go-to core stack. Whatever is required from the language/libraries determine which ones I go with on top of that.
That said, I'm currently working on piloting a new job market and vibe-coding the prototype. That's in nodejs & react with supabase as the persistence (database) layer. I'm planning to rewrite the backend (nodejs) code in C# .Net once I get a successful pilot. Until I'm past it, the development and prototyping speed is king for me. I'm pretty anti-AI, but I'll still acknowledge the very real benefits of the tech when I see it.
What are you building with?
That is a incredibly smart approach, David. C# .NET is an absolute powerhouse for production, and your strategy of prototyping in Node.js/React/Supabase to validate the market before rewriting the backend is exactly how seasoned engineers ship efficiently. Prototyping speed is king, and Supabase makes that frictionless.
I also completely respect being "anti-AI hype." Honestly, that skepticism is partly why I built KAVLR. I don’t use AI to blindly write my core business logic. I use it as a sounding board or to speed up boilerplate (especially when typing on a $150 phone), but the architecture, constraints, and security guardrails are 100% human-driven. In fact, KAVLR exists specifically because I believe AI cannot be trusted to execute destructive commands unchecked. We need deterministic guardrails, not just probabilistic guesses.
To answer your question, here is the exact stack powering HYNA-Stage right now:
commander,chalk, andorafor that premium DX).And the wildest part? The entire codebase is written, tested, and deployed from Termux on a budget Android phone.
I would love to hear how the job market pilot goes! Prototyping in public is the best way to learn, and it sounds like you are on the right track. 🚀
@akhourianmolkumar bro what do you think 🔥 is this a real product you carry