2
1 Comment

SnailChat - Chat at a healthy pace, with meaning and mindfulness, without distraction.

Hello all. I've released a web app for chatting with friends. The twist is that you also set a delivery time. The messages everyone sends in a room will not be sent immediately but only at the next delivery time. It is available at : https://snailchat.app

The idea is that chat apps are annoying. People expecting you to reply straight away is annoying. Notifications and buzzing is annoying. This app eliminates that problem as the sending of messages being delayed is coded into it. If you send a reply straight away or in a few hours it doesn't matter, the delivery time is the same.

I would really appreciate some feedback on the homepage. Is it clear what the app does? Is it interesting? And if you could sign up and test the app out yourself and give me feedback that would be great. If you have no one to talk to my username is "snailchat". This is the first place I've shared this app publicly because I want some feedback first.

Cheers

posted to Icon for group Beta Testing
Beta Testing
on June 21, 2020
  1. 1

    So far, what I'm seeing is pretty solid. Sign-up is quick and painless, and the interface is clean and simple.

    Positives:

    • Quick and painless sign-up
    • Login is fast, works with email and username
    • 'Email and password are wrong' error shows for correct email + wrong password. Good security against brute force password hacking.
    • Chat rooms show in order of soonest message delivery
    • Load times are quick, and loading animation/indicators are clear to end user.
    • Sidebar icons are clear, with helpful tooltips on hover.
    • Well-proportioned for mobile screens (sidebar becomes topbar, good font size).

    Room for improvement:

    • Message threads so that the context of a reply isn't lost after x days. Slack has this feature, very handy when many conversations are happening at once.
    • Tooltips occupy too much space on the page, especially on mobile. A '?' icon with a hover tooltip would save space. See 'create chat room' and 'contacts' pages.
    • The blue & white theme is intense; reminds me of the stressful worlds of FB/Twitter. A dark theme with pastel colors suits the app's intention better.
    • User IDs (these look like UUIDs) should be private keys in your database, and not be shared between users for chatroom invites. Username and email address uniqueness is enough to distinguish users.
    • Add IDs to interactable elements, such as text inputs, buttons, and status indicators. This will make automated testing much easier.
Trending on Indie Hackers
The most underrated distribution channel in SaaS is hiding in your browser toolbar User Avatar 192 comments How are you handling memory and context across AI tools? User Avatar 107 comments I gave 7 AI agents $100 each to build a startup. Here's what happened on Day 1. User Avatar 101 comments Do you actually own what you build? User Avatar 62 comments Code is Cheap, but Scaling AI MVPs is Hard. Let’s Fix Yours. User Avatar 34 comments How to see your entire business on one page User Avatar 29 comments