[HN Gopher] Show HN: Whenish - Plan Group Events in iMessages
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Show HN: Whenish - Plan Group Events in iMessages
hey everyone! i built Whenish because it was always so difficult to
figure out what date worked best with a bunch of friends in a group
chat. Whenish is an iMessage app that allows individuals to select
multiple dates that work for them for an event attempting to be
planned for. i have more ideas for new features but wanted to get
something out there that was usable. so far ive had good reception
in my friend group chats of Whenish. download it, give it a go,
let me know what you think! this is my first app i felt ~good~
about releasing.
Author : devgoth
Score : 31 points
Date : 2025-05-22 15:15 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (apps.apple.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (apps.apple.com)
| frizlab wrote:
| Hey this looks interesting! Too bad I can't download it. Why
| prevent France from downloading?
| devgoth wrote:
| let me take a look! iirc there was some compliance related
| documents Apple may have needed that freaked me out a bit? ill
| dig into it. apologies for this!
| devgoth wrote:
| should be available in 24 hours...
|
| if anyone knows about this (i remember i saw a warning by
| Apple) please let me know!
| dylan604 wrote:
| from a non-app developer, that's something I'd never even
| contemplated. I've only ever released websites, and I don't
| give a damn about compliance anything. I've spent time making
| something on my own, and now making it available for anyone
| else that comes across it to view. If the viewer lives in a
| country that has rules I'm never going to read, that's the
| viewer's problem. Luckily for the viewer, anything I make
| does not include any of the shit that has been attempted to
| be regulated. But if I did something offends those
| regulations, don't care.
|
| These related documents you speak really makes me not want to
| app. I'm glad there are braver people than me. The only thing
| I can offer is "fly low and avoid the radar"
| dcrazy wrote:
| You might have missed the hubbub about websites shutting
| down or banning UK visitors due to concerns about complying
| with the Online Safety Act.
| dylan604 wrote:
| If the UK wants to force nationwide firewall rules to
| block my little ol' website, then bob's their uncle. I
| don't care if some Limey bastard can or cannot view my
| website. I mean censorship sucks and all, but I'm not
| going out of my way to ensure that I learn every single
| country's specific rules and find a way to ensure I
| comply with all of them. I am not doing business by
| accepting money in exchange for something. If my website
| states something that offends someone else because I said
| that chips is a dumb name for a fry when a chip is
| clearly a different thing entirely, then they need to get
| over themselves. Also, you put stuff in the trunk of the
| car, and you wear a boot on your foot.
| <insert_thumbs_in_ears_and_give_sloppy_raspberry> If
| someone feels unsafe about that, then good luck doing
| anything to me in another country about it.
|
| Again, the main point is that I don't do shady shit that
| needs regulating. I don't use 3rd party libraries that
| hoover up data to be resold to anyone offering to buy. I
| roll my own JS to make something function. I write my own
| CSS to make it look "pretty". I know that nothing
| nefarious is happening because I didn't code anything
| nefarious to happen. My sites are about as lame as the
| people that think that regulations are going to solve
| anything
| ekglimmer wrote:
| I like this execution! I created something similar,
| www.pigeon.ooo, with the intent of eventually adding some
| scheduling functionality but alas, my own schedule has filled up
| so have not had a chance yet.
| cAtte_ wrote:
| beautiful domain name
| teejmya wrote:
| "Probably not used by anyone at these companies" got me, lol
| AnonC wrote:
| What is the planned business model here? I see that this is
| published by an LLC and also that it doesn't collect any data
| (the latter is great to know).
|
| On the app itself, I don't understand why it allows selecting
| past dates in the current month (e.g., Why al I allowed to select
| May 1st?) I can understand allowing a day or so to account for
| time zone differences, but usually people across large time zones
| differences wouldn't be the audience for this app since it
| doesn't allow for availability by time of the day.
| devgoth wrote:
| im toying with the idea of maybe releasing more features in a
| premium upsell (one time $0.99 purchase or something like
| that). still ironing that out.
|
| i release ios apps under an LLC in hopes that one day an app
| will make money and i would rather that be associated with an
| LLC.
|
| good question on past dates! i will fix that :)
| dimitry12 wrote:
| > Whenish is an iMessage app
|
| Where can I read more about using iMessage as a medium for
| generic multi-player collaboration? Or if you can just share the
| right keywords, I will appreciate that!
| pvg wrote:
| https://developer.apple.com/imessage/
| GuinansEyebrows wrote:
| oh, this is cool. crossing my fingers apple buys you out for a
| fat payday (if that's something you want) cause this seems like a
| natural feature for imessage/ical!
| devgoth wrote:
| <3
| dylan604 wrote:
| Hopefully, you don't get Sherlocked
| andrewfromx wrote:
| how does it look on someone's phone who doesn't have the app
| installed yet?
| devgoth wrote:
| heyo! so it will show the Whenish thumbnail in the chat when it
| is sent. when the user without Whenish clicks on it they will
| be routed to the app store to download Whenish.
| andrewfromx wrote:
| oic. maybe add an ascii poll display until it's installed?
| awill wrote:
| I get it, but that's a hurdle for a lot of people. If someone
| is using this just once, they don't want to download an app.
| This feels like it will take convincing.
| aagha wrote:
| What happens to your friends on Android?
| devgoth wrote:
| alas this is focused on iOS and i do not have plans to port to
| Android for the moment :(
| kaladin-jasnah wrote:
| You should be aware of the social impact this makes. iMessage
| is already partitioning Android and iPhone users socially.
| These products just make it worse and will exclude people
| from social groupa even more. There's also that lower income
| individuals who can't afford an iPhone and use Android
| devices for cost related reasons would lose out on event
| planning.
| dylan604 wrote:
| friends don't let friends android??
| dmitrygr wrote:
| Given the amount of SMS spam and the lack of such on iMessage,
| I am, at this point, ready for iMessage-only life. The few
| friends I had who were not iPhone users, I gifted them iPhones.
| So far none switched back, and I get to ignore all non-iMessage
| incoming messages (and thus 100% of SMS spam)
| tmpz22 wrote:
| Looks compelling from the app store page! Because I might use it
| I have to ask - how do permission work around messages? I'd
| assume something like this:
|
| * Install App
|
| * App cannot passively READ messages
|
| * When I need to _use_ the app, like in a group chat where we are
| spontaneously planning an event, I can invite it into the chat so
| that the group can input their preferences
|
| * Other group members (who may also need to install the app) can
| interact with the widget to submit their planning prefferences
|
| * Widget then WRITES results back to the chat
|
| Does it ever read my messages? Does it ever write messages to the
| chat? Does my entire group chat need to install it?
|
| Great work. Seems well targeted and that it could help a lot of
| folks.
| devgoth wrote:
| this app _never_ reads any messages. the iMessage framework is
| very strict around privacy...so much so that you are unable to
| get user information of. This is why you will see Participate
| 1, 2, 3 instead of the person 's name. There is no way to get
| this information of who the sender is! Kudos to apple for this.
|
| The only message that is written to the chat is when you hit
| submit. There is no external service as all information is
| stored as metadata on the message itself. I did not want to
| have an external server (which has its own challenges, see in
| another message around collisions).
|
| Your entire group can see the message but in order to interact
| with the poll they will need to download the app. They will be
| redirected to the app store if they do not have the app after
| clicking.
| mikehotel wrote:
| Congrats on publishing!
|
| It seems like a very polished and better integrated version of
| https://www.when2meet.com/.
|
| You say you do not collect info. Are you saving the meeting
| details and availability in a database?
| devgoth wrote:
| there is no external server! all meeting information is stored
| as metadata on the message.
|
| this leads to some issues with potential collisions like if two
| people click the Whenish message at the same time and submit
| their message, there is no way to merge both that data. while
| this is an issue, i wanted to err on the side of privacy as
| much as possible and not rely on a server at all.
| bruceb wrote:
| App size: 990.2 KB I don't think I have seen an iOS app under 1mb
| ever. Wow!
| isodev wrote:
| Does it work on Android? We have to be realistic, 2/3 of the
| group is not on iOS or using iMessage :)
| smt88 wrote:
| This isn't true in the US, where the vast majority of people
| (especially middle-class or wealthier) use iMessage as their
| primary messaging app.
|
| And no, of course this iOS/iMessage app doesn't work on
| Android.
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(page generated 2025-05-22 23:01 UTC)