How I Taught Myself to Code in 6 Months and Built Fuel My Work — An India-First Creator Platform

#webdev #programming #beginners #learning

Hi everyone 👋, I’m Rahul.

I wanted to share my journey as a self-taught developer, and how that led me to build Fuel My Work — a platform for Indian creators to get direct audience support, without losing income to global platforms or app store cuts.

My Journey Into Development

I started coding in January 2025 with Python.

Why Python? Because almost everyone — ChatGPT, Google, dev forums — suggested it as the easiest language to start with.

I learned the basics, wrote small scripts, but quickly realized I couldn’t build much that I actually wanted to use.

By March 2025, I switched gears to JavaScript, HTML, CSS, React, and Next.js. I spent March through April building projects, learning the fundamentals of web development, and experimenting.

One of those projects was a Buy Me a Coffee-style clone I called Fuel My Work.

That project changed everything.

From Early Project to Fuel My Work

While building the first version, I kept asking myself:

Why isn’t there a platform like this made for Indian creators?
Why should Indian streamers, musicians, and educators lose money to global platforms with USD-based fees?
Why can’t we just use UPI — the thing we already use daily for food, cabs, and bills?

That’s when the idea clicked. Instead of stopping at a clone, I decided to build something bigger — an India-first platform for creators.

And that’s how Fuel My Work was born.

How It Works

Fuel My Work is a SaaS platform that gives creators tools to engage with their audience.

Features available today:

Public Creator Pages → A page to showcase your work and receive support.
UPI-first Payments via Razorpay → Fans support you instantly with a familiar flow.
Stream Alerts & Overlays → Real-time shoutouts using our in-house overlay system.
Goals & Supporter Walls → Build trust and social proof with public recognition.
Analytics → Track growth, supporter interactions, and payment status.
Posts → Share updates, links, and news with your audience.

Coming soon:

Memberships (recurring supporter contributions).
Storefronts (sell digital goods, templates, resources).

Unlike global platforms, Fuel My Work is designed for India’s UPI-first payment culture and doesn’t eat away your income with commissions.

The Tech Side

When I started, I leaned heavily on managed services like Supabase. But as the project grew, I realized I needed to avoid vendor lock-in and build something more scalable and reliable.

Current stack:

Frontend → Next.js
Backend → Express.js, self-hosted on a VPS with Docker
Database → PostgreSQL (self-hosted) with Prisma ORM
Connection pooling → PgBouncer for stability and scaling
Realtime alerts → SSE (Server-Sent Events) + Redis publish/subscribe
Auth → NextAuth.js

Migration lessons:

We started with Supabase for auth, DB, and realtime overlays.
Later, we migrated to self-hosted Postgres for more control and stability.
Replaced Supabase Realtime with SSE + Redis for overlays and in-stream alerts.
Migrated to NextAuth.js for authentication to keep everything in-house and reduce vendor dependency.

This way, we ensured there’s no single vendor lock-in — giving us more flexibility and long-term stability.

Learning While Building

Here’s the honest part: I didn’t know 99% of these things when I started.

Almost everything — from Docker to NextAuth, Prisma, Redis, and SSE — I learned while actually building Fuel My Work.

Every time I hit a roadblock, I googled, used ChatGPT, read docs, broke things, fixed them, and kept going.

I’m still learning every day, because this platform keeps pushing me into new problems I’ve never solved before.

That’s the beauty of building something real: you don’t just “learn first, build later.” You learn because you’re building.

Why This Matters

Indian creators are often forced to either:

Drop a UPI ID in their bio, which lacks appreciation, alerts, and persistence.
Or use global platforms that don’t fit the Indian payments ecosystem.

With Fuel My Work:

Creators keep more of their earnings.
Supporters feel appreciated and connected.

It’s not just about payments — it’s about building stronger creator–supporter communities.

Final Thoughts

When I started with Python in January, I didn’t know I’d be here in September writing this post.

From small scripts → a prototype → now a real SaaS platform, this journey taught me that you don’t need to be an expert to solve a real problem. You just need to care enough about the problem, and be willing to learn along the way.

If you’re a creator in India (or know one), check out Fuel My Work.

If you’re a developer curious about the stack, feel free to ask me anything in the comments — I’d love to share more.

Key takeaway for devs:

Sometimes the best projects don’t come from “what can I build?” but from “what problem do I see every day?”

For me, that problem was creators dropping UPI IDs without connection — and building Fuel My Work was my answer.