Launching open source visual regression framework

My name is Dimitri, and I've been absent from indie hackers for quite a while after I sold Tweetastic (Fyrereach now). However, I love making things, so not much time has passed since then as we came up with a new product together with my friend Chris!

What? 🖼️

Today we are launching our open source visual regression testing tool called Lost Pixel. Check it out here: https://github.com/lost-pixel/lost-pixel . For those who are not aware yet, visual regression testing is a process to continuously ensure that new changes to the code do not break existing functionalities, in this case, the visual appearance of your landing page, part of the application or component.

Why? 🤩

We thought that the barriers of existing tools in the market(pricing, hard to set up, vendor locking) are making it hard for people to use this incredible and cheap testing strategy. Yeah, it's cheap because as you integrate it once, it does not take much time or effort to add new tests to the suite; after all, your existing frontend is your tests.

How? 🎯

As a status quo, we offer a couple of lines of code integration with GitHub actions. As well as the support for all the major transports - Storybook(component testing), Ladle(blazing fast Storybook alternative) and Pages(simple and easy way of adding visual regression testing to any existing frontend application).

That's why we are open sourcing the core Lost Pixel engine and offer you some building blocks to build your visual regression testing pipeline!

Materials 📚

For some quick introductions, I've prepared some getting started materials for your that will get you acquainted with the concepts in a matter of minutes:

• Adding Lost Pixel visual regression tests to your existing Next.js app (Blogpost)
• Adding Lost Pixel visual regression tests to your Next.js & Storybook (Video tutorial)

What's in for Indie Hackers 👨🏼‍💻

As savvy indie hackers, we are based on a couple of pillars for our launch:

• We launch early, and ship changes fast(Lost Pixel open source is available in open beta from today. You can integrate it into your CI/CD absolutely for free)
• We have already built the MVP of SaaS that makes the whole process even easier, including collaboration, UI dedicated to working with visual regressions & huge performance boosts to your Lost Pixel build times (WIP). If you are interested in joining closed beta - get the invite by filling out this simple form.
• We are actively looking for our early adopters, so if you feel like you want to ship with more confidence and want to promptly make your testing suite more solid.

We are open for the chat 🗯️

If you have any questions or need more guidance feel free to reach the cofounders of Lost Pixel - Chris & Dimitri