Wasp•2y ago

Tried to run open-saas on my Mac Mini M1, here are my thoughts:

So, a few weeks ago I discovered wasp via Mage and loved the idea behind it, and have been trying to make it work properly since then. Recently got invited to test again via a dev.to post and here I am, adding some comments:

0.12 is a huge improvement, even after installing nvm I still had problems running wasp. Now at least the first steps are running
I tried open saas using /wasp new/, install was a bliss, but the steps to run it should be more clear. On medium and dev.to it seems that it's just a matter of executing /wasp start db/ and after executing it I got an error talking about docker not installed. I had to go all the way to the documentation and see how to "fix" it (I'm using quotes as it's not a bug per se, more a nuisance, more later);
OK, docker running locally, postgress installed, IT'S ALIVE! But... the sign up asks for "user" and "password" and later, when I try to buy something, nothing happens. Just after checking the logs I saw the error saying that I need to have an email o_O
But when I clicked to change my user settings, I couldn't find an "Edit" button - I know that it's a starter and some parts need to be added / changed by the dev, but it's kinda confusing to add necessary fields / functions;

Here's what I think it would be nice:

a "lite" version that doesn't need postgressql running so the dev can test the front-end. A simple database should be enough;
a chance to point to a remote database (or that isn't running via docker) before executing /wasp start db/;
a clearer documentation (I can help with this)

Overall, love the idea behind wasp and I hope it doesn't be seem as simple criticism - there's potential on this tool and if I didn't have php/python as my languages I would be more helpful

martinsos•3/11/24, 5:03 PM

Hey @Paulo H. thanks a lot for this, all feedback is welcome, especially constructive like yours!

Right, so we don't mention Docker, because it is optional in a way -> you can indeed provide your own PostgreSQL db connection URL and just connect to it (and we mention that in the docs). But in the instructions right after open-saas install we don't mention that though, to keep things simple, we just say "do wasp start dbwasp start db and yeah, then Docker is needed.
What is tricky here is, we could make instructions more detailed, but then they become cumbersome / quite longer and you have to make decisions like "Should I install docker? Or should I use connect to my Postgres DB? Is it a problem if I don't have my Postgres DB? ..." -> it kind of opens up space for complications.

So we decided, let's go with the simplest route, if they do get stuck on Docker part, they will see the message to install it, and hopefully install it and go on.
Maybe we could improve that message, make it nicer? We had an attempt at it, but it wasn't so easy to do properly, so we decided to just let Docker spit out its default message, which is what you got.

Let me know what are your ideas how to improve this flow. My main concern here is not making the instructions too complicated though!

App starts with username&pass auth, but when you try to buy something, you get an error saying that you need to have an email -> interesting, would you mind opening a GH issue here https://github.com/wasp-lang/open-saas for this?
Editing user settings -> it would be perfect if you could also create a GH issue for this here https://github.com/wasp-lang/open-saas/issues !

GitHub

GitHub - wasp-lang/open-saas: A free, open-source SaaS app starter ...

A free, open-source SaaS app starter for React & Node.js with superpowers. Production-ready. Community-driven. - wasp-lang/open-saas

GitHub

Issues · wasp-lang/open-saas

A free, open-source SaaS app starter for React & Node.js with superpowers. Production-ready. Community-driven. - Issues · wasp-lang/open-saas

Paulo H.OP•3/13/24, 12:55 PM

Hi @martinsos i would gladly open a ticket but one month ago github suspended my 10+ year old account without any major reason and support haven't responded since then. I'll do it if someday github support stops ghosting me

Regarding the install process, the main concern to me is the "block" process that the need for a docker install (or access, if I'm testing from a vm) means.

One alternative that would mean a lot of work could be to have a minimal database installation so the user could first navigate the SAAS. Maybe json files, SQLIte, I don't know, but I'm talking about minimal with a huge warning on the front-end "for full experience, you need postgresql, install or point to a server"

Another idea is to give a chance to point to a server before throwing the docker error. For example "no local postgresql or docker install found, do you want to point to an external database? Y/n"

At least it's clearer to the user and the process is more fluid - > ok, X is missing, I need to install X for full experience

martinsos•3/14/24, 3:19 PM

Thanks @Paulo H. those are valid ideas! We actually have an option with SQLite but some features in Wasp immediatelly require Postgres, like Jobs, since they are expecting it, and OpenSaas uses Jobs I believe so it also requires Postgres then ... We could look into this in the future, maybe work around it, but it is a bit tricky.

Would be nice if we had better error message though!

Thanks for this, and let us know if we can help wit hsometihng else!

martinsos•3/14/24, 3:22 PM

Here is issue for the docker error message I just found it, we have it for some time already: https://github.com/wasp-lang/wasp/issues/1135

GitHub

Have `wasp start db` produce nice warning message if docker daemon ...

This is what it currently looks like:

Starting a PostgreSQL dev database (based on your Wasp config)

Additional info:

Connection URL, in case you might want to connect with external tools: po...

Tried to run open-saas on my Mac Mini M1, here are my thoughts:

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