[HN Gopher] Show HN: Yaak - An open source, Git-friendly desktop...
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Show HN: Yaak - An open source, Git-friendly desktop API client
Hi HN! I'm Greg and I've been working on Yaak for just over a year.
I usually describe it as a Postman alternative since most
developers are familiar with that, but it's targeted more toward
users that just want an API client (no mocking, testing, spec
design, etc). Having also created Insomnia for a similar purpose,
I never thought I'd build another API client again. But, after
selling Insomnia in 2019 and watching it expand into the broader
feature set of Postman, I was left wanting a simpler tool again.
Yaak was my answer to that. It's hard to describe how it's better
than the 100 other API clients, since its main benefit is design,
but there are a few stand-out features: - Optionally sync data to
a local directory as plain-text, for use with Git/etc - Build and
install plugins for authentication, template functions, or generic
actions - Support for REST, GraphQL, WebSocket, server sent events,
and gRPC Yaak requires a license for commercial use but this only
applies when using the prebuilt binaries. If building from source,
a license is not required. It's available for Mac, Windows, and
Linux and the source is at https://github.com/mountain-loop/yaak
I'd love to hear you think!
Author : gschier
Score : 114 points
Date : 2025-02-26 17:24 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (yaak.app)
(TXT) w3m dump (yaak.app)
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| This got much less attention than I would have expected.
|
| Yaak is awesome, please please please keep it local-friendly
| gschier wrote:
| Ya, the gamble of HN I guess. Thanks for saying so! It will be
| local friendly for as long as I'm working on it, and I'm in it
| for the long haul this time.
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| Glad to see this picked up :)
|
| Any chance there's room for assertions in your vision for
| Yaak? Running API tests is important for some teams which
| might force them to stick with Postman / Bruno
|
| IMO the local focus also makes this better--can run tests
| directly in pipeline without calling out to some SaaS
| solution
| dhruvkb wrote:
| Would love to see a comparison with Bruno[1].
|
| [1]: https://usebruno.com
| gschier wrote:
| I've been meaning to put some comparisons together!
|
| Bruno is also a good local-first client but leans more toward
| Postman's market.
|
| The main advantage Bruno has is the ability to run tests, and a
| CLI to do so.
|
| Yaak supports more protocols (eg. gRPC and WebSocket), has
| plugins, and more powerful templating for doing things like
| generating UUIDs (also extendable via plugins).
| kamalhm wrote:
| would you consider adding pre-request and post-request script
| in yaak also?
| gschier wrote:
| It's definitely under consideration. Yaak has Request
| Chaining [1] to solve some of the use-cases that scripting
| is typically for, though, so there isn't a ton of demand
| for it.
|
| [1]
| https://feedback.yaak.app/help/articles/7017237-request-
| chai...
| literallyroy wrote:
| Here's my own take [1] when I was on the hunt for a good HTTP
| client a month or so ago.
|
| [1]: https://royathan.com/blog/the-api-client-hunt/
| gschier wrote:
| Hah, and you chose Yaak!
| codecraze wrote:
| Congratulations ! Will test this out tomorrow :)
| gschier wrote:
| Awesome! Let me know what you think.
| czhu12 wrote:
| I use yaak! Great piece of software for just not having to
| memorize curl syntax, wrestle postman
|
| What's the end goal though? Planning to sell a licensed version?
| I'd be happy to pay for a model where I can own it for life but
| only get updates for a year.
| gschier wrote:
| This is how it works now, though I need to make it more clear.
|
| If you subscribe to the annual plan (or the monthly plan for 12
| months) and cancel, you get a perpetual license, meaning you
| can continue using the current version indefinitely.
|
| The end goal is generate a sustainable income for as long as
| possible, so I can enjoy life with my family.
| sunnybeetroot wrote:
| This is excellent Greg thanks for sharing! One thing I do find
| missing from a lot of these API clients is synced environment
| variable entries between environments.
|
| For example if I create a `dev` environment that contains a
| `base_url` environment variable, it's expected that when I create
| a `prod` environment, it will also have a `base_url` environment
| variable. Then in the future if I add more environment variables
| to my `dev` environment, I need to duplicate the work of adding
| an environment variable entry to `prod.
|
| I can't be the only one that experiences this pain :P The UX of
| this could be handled in any number of ways:
|
| - When you create a new environment, ask if you want to duplicate
| an existing environment's variable names (with empty values)
|
| - If you add a new environment variable, ask if you want to add
| the environment variable name to another environment
|
| - Option to enable syncing between all environments i.e. deleting
| a variable row in one environment deletes it for the rest etc
|
| I was about to post this as a github issue for traction but given
| Issues are turned off thought this may be the next best place.
|
| Regardless, Yaak is excellent!
| gschier wrote:
| The feedback board is linked in the readme! I do agree with
| your points and have been passively thinking of an overhaul to
| how environments work. It's one of the most important features
| and has so much potential (like activating multiple at once)
| sunnybeetroot wrote:
| Ahh I'm a silly sausage then, thank you! I'm very glad you're
| so responsive. Whilst postman is excellent, it's become so
| big and enterprisey that it doesn't feel like requests are
| heard let alone would be considered given the breadth of
| customers they deal with.
| gschier wrote:
| Ya, I feel like their need for growth is forcing them into
| it. I'm glad I only have to earn enough income for 1
| person, not 1000.
| opem wrote:
| Yaak is so underrated!
| martin_a wrote:
| How can we be sure that Yaak won't be sold and enshittified two
| years from now?
|
| Maybe I'm nitpicky, but I love sticking to software for years,
| had to ditch Insomnia after an auto-update killed my collections
| and wanted me to sign up for a cloud service. Could happen with
| this (yes, any software for that matter), too, because you'll
| sell it in a year from now.
| gschier wrote:
| I agree, there's no way to know for sure. But I feel like I'm
| the least likely person to do this with Yaak since I learned
| from experience already.
| drpossum wrote:
| You can't. Ever. So you just need to live with uncertainty.
| Artoooooor wrote:
| For Insomnia I had to disable auto-update...and also cancelled
| my paid subscription the day after the enshittification.
| unchar1 wrote:
| > Yaak is still open source under the MIT license. You can view,
| modify, and run the source code for both personal and commercial
| use. Licensing applies only to the prebuilt binaries.
|
| That's a pretty interesting pricing strategy. I think REHL is the
| only other project I saw with this type of pricing.
| gschier wrote:
| I remember seeing another one while coming up with this, but
| now I can't remember what it was. It's definitely rare.
| DandyDev wrote:
| "Is still open source"
|
| Does this mean that you anticipate Yaak not to be open source
| anymore at some point?
| gschier wrote:
| Yaak used to not require a commercial use license (original
| plan was to do cloud sync), so "still" refers to the fact
| that the commercial use license now exists, but the open
| source nature hasn't changed. I'll update the wording
| there, thanks!
| mzajc wrote:
| Since the binary and source release come under different
| terms, are there any technical differences between them? For
| example, some projects (like Visual Studio Code) will
| telemetry in the binary release, but do not enable it by
| default in the source.
| gschier wrote:
| No difference. You can see the build pipeline in the GitHub
| repository which builds directly from HEAD
| mzajc wrote:
| I see, thanks! Very interesting project by the way, am
| looking forward to switching from Insomnia due to its
| enshittification.
| dban wrote:
| > But, after selling Insomnia in 2019 and watching it expand into
| the broader feature set of Postman, I was left wanting a simpler
| tool again. Yaak was my answer to that
|
| I'd love to read about your experience building two distinct but
| similar products in the same space years apart
| gschier wrote:
| I'd say the only real differences are that (1) I know what I'm
| building from the start and (2) I can avoid the fundamental
| technical mistakes.
|
| It's actually been way harder to gain traction this time, I
| think because APIs are no longer sexy and there are so many
| good tools out there.
| denvermullets wrote:
| fantastic. i was about to make my own after being frustated with
| bruno's change in billing and just lack of quality.
|
| having gone from postman -> insomnia -> back to postman -> bruno
| - id like to just have something simple that _just works_ without
| making it a pain.
|
| looking forward to giving this a spin.
| gschier wrote:
| Thanks! Let me know if there's anything missing :)
| yoyohello13 wrote:
| https://hurl.dev/index.html
|
| Probably the only tool that won't get SASSified into oblivion.
| CLI only is like plot armor for enshitification.
| yoyohello13 wrote:
| The Software tool lifecycle:
|
| 1. Dev makes a cool lightweight productive tool
|
| 2. Tool becomes popular
|
| 3. Company buys tool
|
| 4. Company adds a bunch of shit nobody needs making the product
| bloated and annoying to use.
|
| 5. Dev makes a cool lightweight productive tool
| tv10 wrote:
| I love your landing page & overall design of the home page. So
| clean. Love the color scheme as well.
| gschier wrote:
| Thanks, I just did a big overhaul on it and came up with
| something I'm very pleased with :)
| tv10 wrote:
| If you were to develop an MVP and release your first Saas in
| the next month, what would you like to know beforehand?
| JadoJodo wrote:
| > The interface is clean and much nicer to use than bloated
| alternatives like Insomnia and Postman.
|
| As I recall, both _used_ to be the same way.
| gschier wrote:
| Yes indeed. This is why I stared over with Yaak
| Gys wrote:
| Downloaded it, looks great. I am building a desktop app as well
| (very different functionality) and I wonder how do you do license
| management?
| gschier wrote:
| Just a basic server. Licenses are attached to paying users. The
| app checks the license against the server periodically to
| unsure it's still valid. It's not that complicated since I
| don't care about piracy.
| yoeven wrote:
| Looks great!! I would love to move to this as my go-to API client
| but my fear is it stops getting maintained overtime like
| httpie.io but at least this is open source so a great win!
| saikatsg wrote:
| Cool stuff, how does it compare with httpYac? >
| https://httpyac.github.io/
| gschier wrote:
| Not sure, I haven't used it!
| desertkun wrote:
| Ah! I was so happy I can put postman to rest. What I didn't like
| is the landing page did not clearly communicate I am installing a
| non-free product with a trial, so I uninstalled it. I am only
| letting you know that this trick might affect retention.
| desertkun wrote:
| Did you consider JetBrains licensing model? I don't like renting
| software, I'd rather buy it upfront, but JetBrains with their
| fallback licenses really got me - you get your perpetual fallback
| license for a particular version of product. And guess what, I
| keep paying them anyway, because of confidence I can fallback,
| but they keep innovating with new updates.
| gschier wrote:
| I basically copied this. Yaak also has a perpetual fallback
| license.
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(page generated 2025-02-27 23:01 UTC)