Zuppa
The recipe webapp that makes allergies easier
This week was a bit of a frustrating week in terms of coding. I came to a lot of brick walls and it was only later in the week that I figured out a way around one of them.
The Database Access Layer still causes me great difficulty. I now understand what it does, but I'm still at a loss as how to actually create one.
However, while I've been trying to figure that out, I started working on the UI of Zuppa and I have to say, HTML/CSS are my favourite of the coding languages I've learned so far. Maybe it's because it's very easy to see when I've made an error? I'm a very visual person and the instant feedback (unlike with C# or SQL) makes learning very easy.
(This actually makes me curious -if you taught yourself to code, what was your favourite language to learn and why?
On the business development and planning end, things have been going a lot better. I've scrapped the business plan for now because I'm not planning on going for funding until after the beta launch (thank you for the advice @bradcerb) and am instead working on a rudimentary strategic plan, both for how I plan to develop the business and how I plan to start getting people ready and excited to try my product when it launches.
Next week is a busy one, but I'm going to keep working away at the UI and try and get in contact with a friend of mine who has some experience with DALs to see if he's willing to give me a hand.
Happy Weekend!
Today I sent a welcome email to our first subscribers! I'm so excited to see such a positive response from the food allergy community and this increases my drive and desire to make this product as good as it can possibly be to meet their needs!
If you missed the link, you can sign up to receive updates from Zuppa here: https://mailchi.mp/4bbb6d2014ba/zuppacomingsoon
Beginning to validate the idea through the landing page and through food allergy communities on Reddit have proved to be a success!
I've gotten a lot of feedback from potential users both saying "I want this!" and giving suggestions for various features they would love the webapp to have. Most of these were already planned for future versions of the product (either free or paid) but it was nice to hear that these features are wanted without me even suggesting them to people.
While I'm still taking feedback from people, I'm definitely ready to move forward into a more concrete design of the features to make sure I don't accidentally code in a way that makes those features harder to implement down the line.
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Tell me more about it
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Hi Arthur! What would you like to know more about? Have you checked the website linked in my profile?
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Yeah, but I find only one frontend page - this is why I curious more about details.
Again, as I'm building a network of people like you-you welcome to write details about your project at HackerNoon forum thread. it's a place where I'm put every knowledge that I have for the last few years, working on food tech. link: https://community.hackernoon.com/t/food-alliance-project-diary/2034
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(If you're in Canada!)
How are you planning on spending your Mondays?
For me, I'm planning on putting some serious effort into working on the Database Access Layer.
Cheers!
-@AKWest
The hours of work I put into learning SQL has paid off because now the MVP has a database.
Next stop: learning C# to connect said database to the front end.
Wish me luck!
In general, I'm a fairly private person and I tend not to talk about what I'm working on until I have something substantial to show people. However this time, I'm putting so much work into learning coding just to create the project that I decided I need to validate this one before committing thousands of hours into creating a real MVP. With a new baby, hours like those are in short supply!
Originally I had planned on creating a Zuppa-like service on Fiverr , but after some complications with my account I decided to just go with a landing page instead.
https://mailchi.mp/4bbb6d2014ba/zuppacomingsoon
I will be sharing this landing page on Reddit, social media, twitter, and pretty much wherever else I can to try and get emails of people who would be interested in hearing when this website has gone live.
Your support is always appreciated!
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I have subscribed! Maybe when you share around, you can highlight like "Want to eat cake, but you're allergic to eggs? Follow us so we help you find & cook your own egg-free cakes but still tasty!" or something like that. *I subscribed because my dad couldnt eat chickens and eggs, so kinda hard to bring something home (as normally a lot of food/ bakeries contain eggs haha)
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Thank you for subscribing! Eggs is such a tough one, and egg proteins are in so much :(
Thankfully, eggs are one of the allergens we've included in the beta version, and because you've signed up, you'll be one of the first to hear about it!
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I just want to say, congratulations on your landing page. You nailed it, while it isn't for me, I know exactly what you are proposing and I get it. And using a service to build your landing page to funnel into a mailing list is the perfect MVP. Very well done. :D
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Thanks for the reply Grendorf :) I appreciate the feedback!
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Don't stop at a landing page. If someone doesn't click on your landing page, you don't know why.
Make a list of 10 people who should use your website (when it exists).
Talk to them. How do they get recipes? How hard is it for them to get recipes.
Why not just start a blog or email newsletter sharing your recipes? WAY easier than building a new site. Or use a white label solution - http://www.kitchenmonki.com/white
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I have looked into options like this, but I'm trying to bootstrap the whole thing, which means that purchasing software to do what I need (the highest level on the link you sent me) is way out of my budget for this project.
In terms of blogging...I'm not looking for a place to share my own recipes. I'm looking for a place to collect allergy-friendly websites around the web and automatically remove results without the user manually having to sift through them :)
Thank you for your suggestions though! I've definitely been approaching people I know who would benefit from this app.
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"In terms of blogging...I'm not looking for a place to share my own recipes. I'm looking for a place to collect allergy-friendly websites around the web and automatically remove results without the user manually having to sift through them :)"
You can do that with a blog. With a spreadsheet. With a FB group.
Do the cheapest, easiest thing possible and validate the idea. Don't spend 10 months coding it only to find that no one wants / uses / will pay for it.
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Hi Allison... I'm really intrigued, and I signed up for your notification list. I've got a wife who has trouble with dairy, a son-in-law who is deathly allergic to eggs, and a brother-in-law with a multi-nut allergy so bad he carries an epi-pen.
In short, we would find this handy even if only for family gatherings.
How would you expect to monetize this, if you don't mind me asking?
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Hi Ross,
I'm so sorry to hear about all the allergies in your family :(. I agree...gatherings can be tough! I have celiac disease and my husband and son are allergic to dairy and soy. My brother is vegetarian and my mother is on a paleo diet so trying to eat together around holidays is a gong show! Which is why I started creating this in the first place ;)
During the beta version, I will be monetizing primarily with ad revenue while we get the bugs sorted out. Then, when the MVP features are finalized (ability to create the allergy profile and ability to automatically refine recipe searches based on that profile) I will be creating a premium version that is :
-ad free
-can create multiple allergy profiles and select which ones you want to search by (for example if only your brother in law was coming over for dinner, you could set up a profile for him and your wife, and be able to include all the recipes with eggs)
-(eventually) add a meal planning and grocery list function.Of course, there are other features planned for both the free version and the paid version, but these are the big ones.
I'm also toying with the idea of creating partnerships with brands to essentially advertise allergy-friendly products. Say for example you want to make bbq ribs but your allergy profile says no soy or wheat. So the app would look through a database of products and find one to recommend to you that has no soy or wheat. But that I've never seen done before so it would a lot of planning and extra coding so that is definitely a more down-the-road option.
Does that answer your question? If you think that other people in your life would be interested in this app, feel free to share it with them :) I would be very grateful!
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Yes it does, in spades. Thanks!
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10 Comments
Happy Weekend, Alison!
Thanks for sharing such an honest update—I think every developer knows that feeling of hitting brick walls, so you're definitely not alone there. The fact that you pushed through and found a way around one of them is a win worth celebrating! 💪
I completely get what you're saying about HTML/CSS. There's something almost therapeutic about the instant visual feedback—you change something and immediately see the result. With backend languages like C# or SQL, the feedback loop is longer and more abstract, so it makes total sense that a visual person would click with frontend work. Visit the website for more details wafflemenus. us Plus, seeing your UI come together piece by piece is genuinely exciting!
To answer your question: when I was learning, I actually really enjoyed JavaScript for similar reasons. Being able to tweak things in the browser and see the page respond in real-time made concepts stick way faster than just reading about them.
Smart move on the strategic plan approach, too. Building anticipation before launch can make a huge difference—getting people excited early creates that momentum that's so hard to manufacture later.
Hope your friend is able to help with the DAL! Visit the website for more details wafflehouse. us Sometimes just talking it through with someone is all it takes for things to click. Good luck with the busy week ahead. Keep enjoying that UI work!
Cheers,
Emma Smith
Hi, instant feedback is also essential for me during day to day programming, otherwise you lose the focus to quickly. Therefore watch out for development tools which provides you with a short feedback loop. Some tools I'm using:
This video explains it pretty well how interactively you can develop in the browser nowadays:
https://youtu.be/8o01g6C7jWg (minute 10:50)
Best regards,
Max
Regarding the database access layer have a look at:
https://github.com/gothinkster/realworld/
It is a collection of demo apps which all implement a clone of medium.com It was implemented with many different programming languages, frameworks and databases. I guess there is also one example for your database and programming language.
Regrettably, most databases are still mutable and this causes a lot of issues:
https://medium.com/@val.vvalval/what-datomic-brings-to-businesses-e2238a568e1c
These are some great resources, thank you so much!
I can do Everything I want to with JavaScript!
From UI to Backend to App to IOT :-)
Python inspired and still inspires JavaScript and it's my second most loved language.
A part from that I love using GraphQL instead of a Restful architecture.
this is the only one comment that is not hard and clear. I'm for JS too. And i can talk not only from developers perspective. as PM, HR as well
I'm most proficient in JavaScript so if I need to build something serious, I use JS. For everything.
Other than that, I'm learning Elixir and ReasonML.
For Data Science-related stuff, Python is still king, but Julia is pretty great too!
I have bad news for you: html/css are not programming languages. Besides that, yep SQL is really hard.
Dis you try to make your website with Python? Take a look at flask. Its really simple and from there you can jump to sql. (At least that was what I did)
I didn't know they weren't programming languages...what are they considered then?
That is a good suggestion, thank you very much!
I googled a better answer and found this:
"No, HTML is not a programming language. The "M" stands for "Markup". Generally, a programming language allows you to describe some sort of process of doing something, whereas HTML is a way of adding context and structure to text."
I see some people suggested you learn javascript, but I find it hard to setup.