Hi, I'm Richard
I'm an indie developer, and most of what I build starts the same way: I get annoyed at something, and fixing it myself sounds more fun than living with it. The latest was ~80 open browser tabs -- which turned into a Chrome/Brave extension for persistent, themeable browser workspaces.
A few things I keep coming back to:
- Browser extensions. A split-screen/workspaces tool, a local-only password vault, markdown and favicon utilities -- free and open source, collected at https://kit.whitneys.co. Manifest V3 is a maze, and I have opinions.
- Boring, durable stacks. Node and vanilla JS, ES modules, no build step, minimal dependencies. I'd rather understand my whole app than chase a toolchain.
- Local-first, privacy by default. No third-party trackers, no account walls, data that stays on your device. I'll price a spammer's CPU with proof-of-work before I hand my visitors to a CAPTCHA vendor.
I also spend a lot of time with AI coding agents and thinking about how software should decide things -- probably a future post or ten.
What you'll find here: browser-extension internals, local-first patterns, notes from shipping small products solo, and the occasional "here's the one-character bug that ate my evening."
If you build things for yourself and give them away, we'll get along.
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