Dario Tordoni

Stiva 1.0.5 is live

Dario Tordoni — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 08:12:00 +0200

Stiva 1.0.5 is live, and it's the first version of the app anyone outside a closed test group can install.
Everything before it, 1.0.0 through 1.0.4, stayed inside a private testing track with a small group of testers. This is the one I'm actually calling public.

I wanted to mark the occasion properly, explain a few things about how the app and this blog will work going forward, and be upfront about a couple of rough edges you might run into.

What "1.0.5" actually means

I already wrote about why Stiva doesn't use a subscription, and versioning is the other half of that story.

The first number is the major version, a bump there is when new Premium features actually arrive. You'll still get that update regardless, there's only one Stiva app on your device, but unlocking the new Premium features tied to that major version is a separate choice.

If you unlock Premium on Stiva 1, those features are yours for good, and if you later unlock Premium on Stiva 2, that unlock naturally carries everything from Stiva 1 along with it.

The second number is the minor version, it covers new free features and meaningful additions that don't require a fresh Premium unlock.

The third number is the patch version: fixes, refinements, and the small stuff that keeps the app healthy day to day. The jump straight to 1.0.5 reflects the five internal builds that came out of the closed test, not five public updates, this is where the counting starts for everyone else.

The web won't always cooperate

The web is a massive, ever-evolving ecosystem of layouts and frameworks. While my tests so far have yielded good results, there will inevitably be times when a page doesn't extract perfectly, whether it's a paywall not being recognized, or a cookie wall cluttering the extracted text with unwanted elements.

I am committed to chasing down and fixing these edge cases as they appear. To do that, your direct feedback is the single greatest help I could ask for. If an article doesn't look right, please let me know. Your feedback goes straight to me and helps make Stiva better for everyone.

How this blog will work

I'm not going to force a publishing schedule onto this. Posts here will show up whenever there's something worth saying: a new version landing, a feature I'm about to ship, occasionally a preview of something further out.

Some months that might be one post, other months none. I'd rather write when I have something real to say than pad the blog for the sake of a cadence.

Staying in the loop

If you don't want to check back here, I post the same updates on Bluesky. You can also subscribe to the blog via RSS using the icon on this page.

Extensions and the cloud bridge

The Chrome extension is live, letting you send links to Stiva straight from your browser. A Firefox version is in progress and should follow shortly.

On the sync side, the cloud bridge works with both Google Drive and Dropbox. Stiva has no backend of its own, your cloud storage account is simply the private relay it uses to move articles between your devices.

One thing to flag on Dropbox specifically: while I go through Dropbox's approval process for the app, you may see a notice during login mentioning that the app isn't yet fully verified by Dropbox. This is expected and doesn't affect how the sync works once you're connected, it's part of how Dropbox rolls out access to new integrations as they pick up real usage. I'll update this once the app clears their review.

What's next

The first real feedback from a wider audience is what I've been missing until now. It's the only thing that turns my assumptions about Stiva into something objective, and I'll keep reading and replying to all of it. In the meantime, I'm not waiting around: small UI and functionality improvements are already in the pipeline, and I'll write about them here as they ship.

If you haven't tried Stiva yet, now's a good time.

What you can expect from Stiva: features, limits, and the premium deal

Dario Tordoni — Sat, 11 Jul 2026 15:46:00 +0200

I've already shared why I'm building Stiva as an antidote to information overload, and why I chose a one-time purchase model instead of yet another subscription. But beyond the core philosophy, I want to be transparent about what you actually get when you install the app. Here is exactly how Stiva works, what stays free, and what the Premium version unlocks.

What is free

My goal with Stiva is to build a calm, offline-first reading space. That means the core acts of saving, reading, and organizing your articles will always be free. You don't need to create an account to start. You paste a link, and Stiva scrapes the text and stores it directly on your device. Every article in your library is physically yours, stored in a local database, and ready to be read offline.

The free version includes:

Unlimited library: save as many articles and bookmarks as your device can hold.
Save from browser & Cloud Sync: send links from your desktop or mobile browser. To avoid subscriptions, Stiva doesn't run a backend; it uses your Google Drive or Dropbox as a secure bridge to sync articles.
Cloud & Local Backup: export backups of your library to your device or your personal cloud storage.
Individual Text-to-Speech: listen to any single article with background playback and lock-screen controls.
Unlimited tagging: group and organize your readings with custom tags.
Basic search: quickly find articles in your library by searching titles and domains.
Custom Import: easily import your existing library and links from browser bookmarks or other read-later apps.

Web scraping is messy

Websites change, layouts shift, and HTML is often chaotic. I won't pretend Stiva will parse every single web page perfectly on day one—no read-later app does. But because I use Stiva as my primary reading home every single day, I am committed to refining the parser and chasing down layout issues as the web changes.

The parser is also smart enough to recognize paywalls. Stiva doesn't attempt to bypass or crack paid gates; it respects publishers' models. If a link is behind a paywall, you can open it in a secure in-app browser overlay, log into your account, and save the unlocked text. It simply lets you access what you already pay for, without the clutter.

If a page ever looks broken, your feedback goes straight to the person behind the app. Just me trying to make the tool better. And I will really appreciate your feedback.

What Stiva Premium unlocks

If the free tier is a complete reading library, Premium is for readers who want to retain what they read, collect key insights, or build a personalized audio feed. Because I don't charge a subscription, I had to decide which advanced features belong behind a one-time paywall. I didn't want the free tier to feel like a crippled demo, but I wanted to make the Premium unlock worth it.

Here is what Stiva Premium (Version 1) unlocks:

Full-text search & filters: search through the actual body text of all saved articles and use advanced sorting.
Articles playlist: queue multiple articles to play sequentially, turning your list into a custom, ad-free podcast.
Immersive reading: use a customizable Focus Mode overlay that dims everything except the paragraph you are reading.
Unlimited Study Tools: highlight text, save key quotes, write notes, and share citations. Free users can test these on up to 10 articles; Premium removes the limit and lets you search your notes.
Unlimited Document Export: export individual articles as PDF or Markdown files (free users get 3 exports total).

A long-term tool

Whether you need a clean, local, offline-first inbox for your web articles, or simply a place to save important links, the free version of Stiva is all you will ever need. It has no ads, it doesn't sell your data, and it won't lock you out of your saved content.

But if you use Stiva to collect your thoughts, read deeply, or listen to playlists on long drives, the Premium unlock is a way to get advanced utility. It is a one-time purchase, and the features you unlock stay yours forever.

Stiva is built to be a long-term companion. The app is ready and functional today, but I have a quiet, steady roadmap ahead. I am constantly thinking about new improvements and refinements to make the reading experience better over time.

The app is currently in closed beta as I polish the final details. If you want to help me test it or want to know when it launches publicly, join the waitlist at stiva.app.

Why Stiva has no subscription

Dario Tordoni — Fri, 12 Jun 2026 23:43:00 +0200

Subscription fatigue is a real thing. And it makes sense, up to a point, because plenty of software genuinely benefits from the model: cloud services, collaborative tools, anything that involves ongoing infrastructure and real recurring costs.

But somewhere along the way, even small utility apps started charging monthly fees. Apps with no backend. Apps with no recurring operational costs. Apps that just run on your phone and do a thing.
When I started working on Stiva, I decided I wanted to think carefully about this.

The subscription trap

I get why subscriptions are tempting for developers. Predictable revenue is genuinely valuable, especially for solo projects. It smooths out the financial ups and downs, makes planning easier, and keeps the lights on.

But from a user's perspective, a subscription for a read-later app asks for a strange kind of trust. You're committing to a recurring charge for something you might use heavily for three months and then barely touch for six.
And the app doesn't get dramatically better month after month.
The ongoing cost doesn't feel matched to ongoing value delivered.

More than that, I kept thinking about ownership. When I save an article to Stiva, I want it to feel like mine. My library, my annotations, my reading history.
A subscription model quietly converts that feeling into a rental.
Stop paying, and the relationship ends.

A different bet: pay per major version

So I landed on something simpler. Saving, reading, and organizing your library in Stiva is free. Premium capabilities are a one-time unlock per major version.

You unlock Premium for Stiva 1. Those features are yours forever, including every update, bug fix, and improvement released during its lifecycle.

When Stiva 2 ships with genuinely new premium capabilities, unlocking them is a new choice. You're not forced to upgrade.
Because there is only one Stiva app on your phone, you will still download the update, but the new V2 features will remain locked:

If your unlocked version 1 features do everything you need, they keep working exactly as they did.
If version 2 offers something worth paying for, you can decide that's a fair trade.

It's a model with roots in how desktop software used to work, before the subscription wave hit everything.

It's more complicated than it sounds

I won't pretend this model is simple to build.
Technically, it means managing multiple entitlement tiers simultaneously: a version 1 purchaser and a version 2 purchaser sitting in the same user base, with the app behaving correctly for both, serving each exactly what they're entitled to, no more, no less.

In practice, this means no messy app migrations: everyone keeps the same app, everyone gets the same performance updates under the hood, but the app simply unlocks only the major features you've paid for.
That's non-trivial plumbing, and it only gets more intricate as major versions accumulate.

There's also a psychological complexity on my end: with subscriptions, revenue is relatively steady. With this model, revenue is event-driven.
It spikes when a new major version ships, then levels off.
That creates real pressure to keep shipping, not fake pressure, not manufactured urgency, but the genuine kind that comes from knowing your business depends on it.

Why that pressure is actually healthy

Here's the thing, though: I think that pressure is good.

A subscription model creates a subtle but real misalignment. Once you've captured recurring revenue, the incentive to dramatically improve the product weakens. Your income doesn't depend on shipping breakthroughs, it depends on not making people angry enough to cancel.

The major version model inverts this. My next meaningful revenue event only happens when I ship something worth paying for. Not worth keeping, worth upgrading to.
That's a meaningfully higher bar. It forces me to ask, genuinely: has this changed enough to earn money again?

I find that question clarifying. It strips away the incremental tweaks that look like progress without delivering it, and focuses attention on the kind of improvements that actually change how you use the app. New major versions should feel like new chapters, not the same story with small edits.

What this means for you

If you decide to pay for Stiva's Premium features, you're paying for something that stays yours.

When I ship major new versions, your app will update just like normal and you'll get to see what's new. If what I've built sounds useful, you can decide to pay to unlock those new capabilities. If it doesn't, no hard feelings, your existing features keep working exactly as they always have, right inside the same app.

It's a model built on the belief that software should earn money by delivering value.
I think that's a fair deal. I hope you do too.

Stiva is currently in closed beta and getting close to a public release. If you want to try it before launch, you can join the testing phase at stiva.app.

From endless lists to action: the philosophy behind Fillin

Dario Tordoni — Wed, 20 May 2026 08:10:00 +0200

At work, I love being organized. I feel completely in my element with Kanban boards, Scrum sprints, and using Jira every single day.
In a professional setting, making everything fit together perfectly is natural, it’s essential.

But when I close my laptop, the rules change. It’s not that personal life isn't organized, running a home takes a lot of planning, too. The real difference is the direction we are going.
At work, even when tasks intertwine and unexpected things happen, everyone is mostly moving together toward a shared goal.
At home, you have to balance different needs, family dynamics, and goals that sometimes clash. A rigid plan doesn’t easily shatter just because life is unpredictable. It shatters because you can't force different human needs into a strict to-do list. Outside of work, being organized isn't about following a strict schedule; it's about being flexible.

As soon as I find some free time, the first thing I ask myself is: "Okay, what needs to be done now?".
I really want to get things done, but then I open my personal to-do app, stare at an endless list (often organized with the same strictness I use at work), and I just get stuck.
I end up procrastinating, unable to decide what to do first, and wasting what little precious time I had.

I realized that for my everyday life, I didn't need another tool just to keep a list of things I’m not doing. I needed a switch. A way to get myself unstuck.

That’s where Fillin came from.

I chose this name because the goal isn't to fill your days with anxiety, but to help you "fill in" those empty pockets of time, turning "I should" into "I’m doing it."

Right now, I'm using it myself in a very straightforward way: whenever an idea pops up, I just write it down quickly. The app doesn't ask me to plan my day down to the minute or rigidly block out tasks on a calendar.

In fact, that’s its true superpower: Fillin is designed for people who can't or don't plan their free time.

If you want to extend hyper-structured scheduling outside of work, this probably isn't the right tool for you. Fillin is for those who want to feel free from self-imposed deadlines, but still need a tool that pushes them to take action as soon as they have a moment. I'll talk more about how I built the "engine" behind this approach in future posts.

Join the journey

For now, as any indie developer knows, I'm building this app solo, but to make it genuinely useful, I need real-world feedback.

If you recognize yourself in this "organizational paralysis" and want to kickstart your momentum without the burden of planning, I'm putting together a small group of early testers.

To join the trials: email me directly.
To follow along: the waitlist is open at usefillin.app.

Why I'm building Stiva: my antidote to information overload

Dario Tordoni — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 09:26:00 +0200

We are constantly bombarded. We open social media during a lunch break, scroll through the feed, and stumble upon dozens of interesting links, articles we’d like to dive into, or insights that could be useful.
But time is short, and the "snackable" format of modern content pushes us to consume everything at lightning speed.

The result? We read superficially, falling victim to FOMO, accumulating information without actually absorbing it. We end up being consumed by the content, rather than treasurying it.

It is from this reflection, and a personal need, that I started developing Stiva, my "Read It Later" app.

The immediacy of a personal space

There are already excellent apps in this category on the market, long-standing tools that have paved the way and that I respect deeply. However, I felt the need to explore a different path, founded on immediacy and true ownership of one’s digital library.

I wanted an app that was ready to use from the very first launch, one that didn’t ask me to create yet another account before I could even save my first link. I wanted to build an intimately personal space, designed for strictly individual use, where every saved article resides physically and locally on my device to always be available offline.

The goal wasn’t to lean on an external service, but to forge a tool of my own: a quiet corner, ready to welcome me instantly, where it’s just me and the readings I truly want to focus on.

Why "Stiva"?

When I had to choose a name, I wanted something that held real meaning for me. In Italian, a stiva is the cargo hold of a ship, the space designated to store and protect the cargo during a journey.

This is exactly what the app does: it is a safe place to store your precious cargo (articles, essays, long reads) while you navigate the chaos of the web.

It is a name that, while it may sound abstract or purely phonetic in other languages in the future, carries a strong identity and a meaning that matters a lot to me.

My daily rhythm

The app is currently developed and I am using it daily, albeit in an internal testing phase. My ideal workflow, the one I designed it for, is very simple: in the morning or during lunch, I come across interesting links, but I know I don’t have the mental clarity or the time to give them the right attention. I save them to Stiva.

In the evening, when everything slows down, I open the app.
Free from distractions and without algorithms suggesting what to watch next, I take advantage of the clean interface to read calmly.

I assimilate the content and give those pieces the value they deserve.

Building in public (and an invitation)

Developing an app alone as an indie developer is an exciting experience. You have total control over the vision and the code, but you inevitably miss one fundamental thing: real-world feedback.

So far, I’ve gathered thoughts from friends and family, but I’m now looking to build a small group of early testers for the coming months. If you recognize yourself in this need to slow down and regain control over your reading ,and you’d like to help me shape Stiva when the time is right, please reach out to me directly via email.
I am planning to start the first test sessions later this year, so I’ll be sure to get back to you as soon as the first stable build is ready for external eyes.

If you’d prefer to wait for the official release but want to stay updated, you can join the waitlist here to be notified as soon as the app becomes public:

Join the Stiva waitlist

In the next post, I’ll go into a bit more detail about how Stiva is built on the inside, but for now, I just wanted to tell you why I decided to set sail.

More letter, less envelope

Dario Tordoni — Wed, 18 Mar 2026 00:20:00 +0100

Francesco, a fellow tech nerd, shared an interesting interview with Jason Fried.

The interview sometimes felt a bit too staged, and I don't know if he actually behaves the way he described, but I appreciated some points.
Fried didn't invent these concepts, but he made me think.

Small is beautiful

In a business you must earn more than your spend. You can’t control the context where your Business works, but you can control how much you spend.

Talking about the digital field, I think that using AI we are going to see more small companies with higher margins, thanks to automation reducing operational costs. Creating a small org from the beginning will be even more strategic.

I believe that we are at the beginning of a turning point, and we will need to figure out how to take this, unclear to me, path.
Not to mention the social consequences we may have to face, such as job displacement and widening salary gaps, a complex issue whose full impact is yet to be seen.

Reducing the size of a company, simplifying its structure, flattening it, can reduce friction, empower teams, remove communication layers.
Organizational streamlining should also be reflected in product simplification; ultimately, you ship your organization.

The envelope and the letter

Focusing on the letter means focusing on the substance,

“the envelope is just the thinnest little thing that needs to be there to hold the letter”.

I think that it’s not easy to stay focused on a digital product, because software is less bounded by limits, it can easily grow in functionalities and complexity, getting worse if they don’t add real final value for the users.

Building a product, there’s a time when we must ask ourselves if what we built is enough.
A very hard question.

Short-term Planning

You can plan everything, create a specific roadmap, but you don't have a crystal ball.

A long-term plan can help you clarify your thoughts, write down your goals, acting as a strategic tool, to review periodically.

But you must also short-term plan for your tactical needs.
You have to face how the context of your product is changing, to adapt it, to redefine a better road, especially in such a fast-changing field, where new technologies and competitors can shuffle the cards quickly.

Templates, metrics and random thoughts on drinklytics' future

Dario Tordoni — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 22:39:00 +0100

Following the learn-by-doing approach, in September 2024 I started working on my first app, Drinklytics. In these articles I share my journey, ideally once a month

Following the “fresh start effect” of the new year, I spent some time reflecting on Drinklytics and its trajectory. I asked myself: what value does Drinklytics actually bring to people?

To answer that, I refined the value proposition:

Drinklytics helps drink enthusiasts build a private, personal archive to remember, compare, and choose the right drink for every occasion.

Three key pillars emerge from this:

Personal collection
Retention
Search & Selection

Consequently, I decided to pivot my North Star Metric (NSM) from:

Drinks added per active user per month

Monthly users who add at least one drink

Here is why this shift makes sense:

It measures real value: it focuses on consistent engagement rather than raw volume.
It’s inclusive: it doesn't differentiate between someone who logs a fine wine once a month and someone who logs their daily tea.
It rewards growth: the metric only grows if the archive stays alive.

The true value lies in supporting a habit. I don’t want to over-engineer the process, but this new NSM aligns much better with my vision. After redefining it, it suddenly became clear how my backlog prioritization was slightly off.
I have now adjusted the I.C.E. parameters of my tasks to align with this new metric.

✅ What’s New

I’ve officially released Drink Templates. Users can now create templates based on drink types, customizing them with specific fields and tags.

To make the process frictionless, as soon as a user selects a drink type, the app automatically loads the corresponding template. This makes logging a new entry significantly faster.

I’m particularly proud of this release because:

I shipped a feature directly requested by users.
Feedback came through the “Give me feedback” CTA I implemented in the previous release; it’s great to see users engaging.
It can directly impact the NSM by lowering the friction of logging a drink.

How Templates work in Drinklytics:

Flexible Fields: templates can include numeric or text fields. These remain blank when adding a new drink to keep the UI clean.
Smart Tags: if a user adds a tag to a template, the app asks whether to apply it to old entries or just to the new entries.
Clean UI: when viewing old entries, empty template fields are hidden. However, if a user hits Edit, those fields appear, ready to be filled.
Non-restrictive: templates aren't rigid; users can still add custom fields on the fly for specific entries.
Consistency: I’ve implemented title case formatting for labels to keep the archive looking professional, regardless of the input.

To help those who already have an existing archive, I also developed the Smart Deducer. This tool scans old entries by drink type and automatically suggests templates based on the statistical occurrence of fields and tags. If there aren't enough entries for a precise scan, the Deducer alerts the user, who can still choose to force the template creation.

📈 Numbers and goals

Based on the renewed NSM, here the monthly users which at least add one drink (among those who agreed to send usage statistics):

and here the numbers of active installs with MoM growth rate:

Growth is steady and organic, but slow compared to the potential user base.
At this point in history, when AI enhances, speeds up, facilitates, or unlocks development, reaching potential users becomes the area where we need to focus most of our energy, which is increasingly necessary due to the growth of potential competitors.

Clearly, the product and the experience with the product remain central, but reaching users and doing so quickly makes all the difference.

I think this is particularly true for simple applications that can be replicated in a few hours of work, such as mine.
This could also open up the issue of pricing, with a phenomenon of replication in vibecoding and price reduction that is somewhat reshaping the landscape of this product line, but potentially also larger areas.

Not to mention a future in which app creation will be on-demand and personalized. Perhaps by then Drinklytics will even have 300 active installations.

Profile hub released, templates in progress and a 37% growth

Dario Tordoni — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 17:49:00 +0100

Following the learn-by-doing approach, in September 2024 I started working on my first app, Drinklytics. In these articles I share my journey, ideally once a month

I failed, and maybe I could have done more, but I see goals, especially for this side project, as inspirational moonshots.
In July 2025, I set a goal for Drinklytics: 1000 active installs in six months.

We could talk about how relative 1000 active installs are as a goal: for some people it’s unachievable, for others it’s just a simple step.
I won’t go deep into this; for me it’s a goal that helps me growth in multiple ways.

So, let’s see how good December has been for Drinklytics.

✅ Done

I released the profile feature, a hub of data that gives an overview of a user’s tasting journey.

As a first version it’s quite simple, a tasting heatmap and some charts; I will improve it in the future releases, but it works, adds nuances and makes the path I expect for the app clearer.
I also decided to make the profile hub the place where users can contribute to the project, in three ways:

support by sharing
support by donation
support by giving feedback

Sharing and donating unlock a “supporter” badge, but for now it’s only a badge of honor: I would like to unlock some features by sharing, but I’d also like to give the whole value to all the users, so I want to think more about it.

The badge is unlocked as soon as a user taps the call to action. I don’t know if and when a user shares the app, and I don’t really want to know that, it’s their device.

Regarding donations, with the current setup, I don’t know who is donating, so the easiest way for now is to just unlock the badge after a tap. I am fine with this, and I make it clear inside the app.

🚧 Progress

After the release of the profile section, I received two feature requests from users, and they asked for the same thing: a drink template system, to customize the fields of new drinks based on the drink type, making it faster to log a new one. That makes sense to me.

I am working on this new feature, which involves many aspects to consider:

should I apply a template to older entries? If so, how?
should I allow users to override a template while logging a new drink?
should I let users find pre-made templates?
should I make some fields mandatory regardless of templates?

I am making good progress and in the next update post I should be able to summarize the choices I made.

📈 Numbers and goals

As usual, some number to show the growth of Drinklytics.
These are active, organic installs, with a 37% increase compared to November.

And here some Mixpanel numbers, from the people who enabled the stats tracking (pure love for them <3).

Total drinks added

And the drinks added ratio

One year has passed, new core features and sharing

Dario Tordoni — Fri, 05 Dec 2025 00:06:00 +0100

Following the learn-by-doing approach, in September 2024 I started working on my first app, Drinklytics. In these articles I share my journey, ideally once a month

Welcome to a new update on my Build in Public journey with the Drinklytics app.

I realize just now that September marked the anniversary of the start of the project; not the publication, but the very first experiments.
I had the opportunity to look back a little, and I think I learned some important things:

Better time and priority management (I.C.E. framework and time-blocking). In a side project they are not a given.
Substantial improvement in my prompts structure (brainstorming and refining in out-of-context chat)
I deepened my understanding of ASO concepts through hands-on experience
I overcame of my shyness and reluctance to write publicly and step outside my comfort zone

✅ Done

The “Custom importer” is live! It’s based on a user’s feedback, who asked me to create a way to import an existing archive, previously created in excel or using another app.

I found the idea very challenging and useful. It required me almost a month and a half of testing and testing to try to release a (beta) feature, as stable as possible.
Now a user can import XLSX, CSV or JSON files.

For any field missing in Drinklytics, a user can create a custom one on the fly, and if the user’s file doesn’t contain a mandatory field, he can choose to fill the field with custom values.

I tested this features with fake files thousands rows long, and it worked. In the previous update I also referred to some technical aspects I had to face.

Another user on Reddit found that the pics taken within the app weren’t available outside of it.
This is the standard behaviour of Drinklytics, but I saw the point of the user, so I added three ways to solve this problem:

a general setting that let the app to save a copy of a pic into the gallery of the device (disabled by default, full size pic)
a download button that appear when a user open a drink image inside the app (optimized size pic)
a share button that appear when a user open a drink image inside the app (optimized size pic)

This is also another way to make people free to use their data outside the app, to avoid lock-in.

Last but not least, I added a “What’s new” screen. No one asked for it, but I think is a way to make users aware of the new value offered by the app.

On my device, updates are automatic and they run in background so, every now and then, I discover by chance new features inside the apps I use.
If an app doesn’t show me the changelog, I can’t know what’s new.
This is the reason why behind this new feature. Is enabled by default, but users can easily disable it.

🚧 Progress

I am working on a core feature, a personal stats screen, a kind of a hub to get an overview of the user’s tasting journey. This new screen should become a pillar of the Drinklytics experience.

It’s not always possible or desirable to contribute financially to a project, and Drinklytics was created free of charge and will remain so.
For this reason, I am also trying to allow users to contribute to the project in other ways, specifically by encouraging them to share it with people who might be interested, thereby increasing the audience of potential users and, indirectly, the number of donations.
That’s why I am working on some sharing features to experiment some growth techniques.

📈 Numbers and goals

As usual, some number to show the growth of Drinklytics.

Here the active installs, they are increasing slooower, but still 100% organic.

And here some Mixpanel numbers, from the people who enabled the stats tracking (pure love for them ❤️).

Total drinks added

And the drinks added ratio

October update

Dario Tordoni — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 00:21:00 +0100

Following the learn-by-doing approach, in September 2024 I started working on my first app, Drinklytics. In these articles I share my journey, ideally once a month

This is the October update, made in November. I am such a rebel. But I like the idea of a monthly post to tell what happened the last month.

Given that time is short for everything, I set up a new priority system, or better, I optimized my previous one.

I still use I.C.E. (Impact, Confidence, Ease), but now every field has a maximum level of 5 (before was 3) and the values are multiplied (previously they were added together). This way, tasks in the backlog are ranked based on a much clearer and more defined I.C.E. score.

I did a little experiments using story points and logging time for tasks, but it doesn’t fit my needs now. I don’t have a fixed amount of time to devote to Drinklytics, so giving more structure to the flow just makes everything slower.

✅ Done

Pictures were saved at full size. With lots of items the app and its backups became too heavy.

Since the last update I improved the images management, reducing images sizes during the item saving step, also creating smaller variations for the ones used on the listing screen.

This let the app load faster and improved the backup system.

🚧 Progress

I am working on a big single feature, the custom importer.

Chatting with some Drinkylytics users or potential users they told me about their personal archive, like excel or csv files where they store their tasting notes.

If you start logging drinks into an app, you would also like to import the archive you already have, to make you journey complete. This makes perfect sense to me, and I am close to the release.

The hardest part:

manage different date formats
converting different rating systems to the one of Drinklytics (0 to 5 with half points)
let users to add custom fields in bulk while importing
make some fields mandatory and give users the possibility to add a standard values if these fields are not in their archives
manage multiple file format (now csv, json, xlsx)

I am going to release the custom importer soon, but I will label it “beta” during the initial period.
There are too many variables thinking about all the possible personal archive structures out there.
II tried to manage the common use cases, but I am sure that I will need to improve this feature from time to time. I just hope to receive feedback to do it, rather than bad review for not having done so.

📅 Next

After the custom import I am going to address a major feature, a personal profile with statistics and charts. Because I like them.

I know, it’s not the best product management workflow, but my business stakeholder self, he sometimes just wants things done with no supporting data.

I will also manage minor issues that a couple of users have raised with me.

📈 Numbers and goals

Active installs are growing, not as fast as I expect, but they grow, and all organically. My goal is 1.000 active installs in 6 months (from mid-June 25 to the end of 2025).

I am almost at 9% at about 70% of the time.

I also defined more KPIs to follow. I created a Mixpanel dashboard with some data that I will start to share.

On October I received a donation from a Drinklytics user, the third since my June launch.

I have a goal set up on ko-fi, and I am at 34% of it.

Completing the goal should allow me to manage the app expenses for a couple of years, and also to publish it on Apple Store (which would be the largest annual expense)

📝 Final thoughts

The custom importer is a powerful feature, and a very time consuming one to develop. But it’s an interesting feature to release, it requires lots of thinking and tests.

When fully working and available for multiple file types, it will be a precious ally for all the new Drinklytics users.

My posts are more about development than anything else, but I am also working a little on marketing, or better on setting things up for close future marketing.
I am not a developer, I am a product/marketing/data guy, so I want to give more focus soon on these topics too.

I would love to receive feedback, whether it's about my app or these build-in-public posts. If you feel like it, send me an email. I'll be happy to hear from you!