TrackLens

If you’ve ever struggled with unreliable epic dates, clunky roadmaps, or doing what-if planning in spreadsheets, this might help.

It’s called TrackLens — a faster, safer way to see and reason about Jira epics without breaking Jira.

Check it out here: https://tracklens-saas-224108059326.asia-south2.run.app/

Would genuinely love feedback from anyone who works with Jira

I just went through my first public launch with TrackLens, and it gave me a very different perspective on what “launch success” actually means.

Before launching, I read a lot about playbooks, pre-launch checklists, and growth tactics. I tried to apply what made sense, but the biggest realization afterward was that outcomes are far less deterministic than we like to believe.

I’ve seen founders with large audiences follow a near-perfect process and still get lukewarm traction. On the flip side, I launched TrackLens with a small network and focused mainly on clearly articulating the problem and talking to people who actually felt the pain.

What stood out wasn’t the numbers. It was the feedback.

People were much more interested in why the product existed, the tradeoffs I made, and the mistakes I’d already encountered than in how polished everything looked.

It made me rethink a few things:

• How much launches are about timing and context

• How much traction comes from genuine conversations vs tactics

• And how easy it is to over-optimize for visibility instead of learning

For folks here who’ve launched products before, I’d genuinely love to learn:

• What surprised you most after your first launch?
• What did you overestimate or underestimate?
• If you were launching again today, what would you focus on more and less?

Trying to get better at building and learning in public, not just chasing launch metrics.

TrackLens is currently completely free to use, so feel free to try it out and explore the features. No pressure, no commitment.

https://tracklens-saas-224108059326.asia-south2.run.app/

If you run into any issues, bugs, or things that feel confusing, please let me know. I’m actively improving it and would genuinely appreciate the feedback.

Happy to help if you get stuck 🙂

We all know the pain. You’re a Product Manager or Technical Lead managing complex roadmaps. JIRA is your source of truth, but visualizing that truth is a nightmare. The native roadmaps are clunky, slow to load, and often require expensive plugins just to see a simple timeline. You end up exporting data to Excel or PowerPoint just to show stakeholders "where we are," essentially killing the real-time nature of your data.

Enter TrackLens. TrackLens isn't a JIRA replacement—it's a JIRA accelerator. It’s a dedicated, local-first application that sits on top of your existing JIRA instance to give you instant, interactive Gantt charts without the bloat.

https://tracklens-saas-224108059326.asia-south2.run.app/

What makes TrackLens different?

1. Zero-Latency, Local-First Architecture Most JIRA plugins run on Atlassian's servers, which means every click waits for a server round-trip. TrackLens is different. It pulls your legitimate JIRA data into your browser’s local storage. This means interacting with the Gantt chart—zooming, filtering, expanding epics—is instant (60fps). You can manipulate your roadmap at the speed of thought, not the speed of your internet connection. But unlike a static CSV export, TrackLens maintains a live link to JIRA to push changes back when you decide.

2. Smart Date Autogeneration One of the biggest hurdles in Gantt charting is missing data. If an Epic doesn’t have a start or end date in JIRA, most tools just hide it. TrackLens uses a smart inference engine. If dates are missing, it looks at the child issues (Stories, Tasks) to calculate reasonable fallback dates based on their sprint assignments or due dates. This ensures your roadmap never has "invisible" work.

3. Privacy & Security by Design TrackLens is "Bring Your Own Key." We don't have a database. We don't store your proprietary roadmap data on our servers. The application acts as a secure proxy between your browser and the JIRA API. Your data lives in your browser and your JIRA instance—nowhere else. This makes it incredibly easy to get approval from IT security teams who are wary of third-party SaaS tools ingesting sensitivity project data.

4. "RAG" Health at a Glance Stop guessing which projects are in trouble. TrackLens automatically calculates a Red-Amber-Green (RAG) status for every Epic based on its progress versus its due date/ETA. You can instantly spot that an Epic is 40% complete but the deadline is tomorrow (Red), or that you're ahead of schedule (Green), without digging into individual tickets.

Key Features Summary:

• 🚀 BFF Pattern: Backend-for-Frontend proxy ensures CORS-free, secure connections.

• 🌗 Theming: Beautiful Dark and Light modes (because roadmapping happens late at night too).

• 🔍 Smart Filters: Filter by "At Risk" projects instantly.

• 🔒 No Vendor Lock-in: It's open-source. Fork it, customize it, own it.

Stop fighting JIRA's UI. Keep the database, upgrade the view.