I don’t often write about my hobby for developing niche web apps, websites and oddities very much. I’ve developed everything from websites that load on 20 year old ibooks to simple forums and communities. Coding has been a pass time time for me since I was young but usually these projects are self contained and only run off one server.
In the modern development space having something run in a self-contained environment is perfectly fine but there comes a lot of flexibility with being able to move data from one service to another. Services like Google and Fabebook have offered 3rd party login integration for years and that has provided developers with an extra layer of security – not wanting to open the opportunity for passwords leaking in the event of a database breach.
This is where relative newcomer Boost.Space comes into play, in terms of my development workflow. Boost.Space combines the flexibility of a database (think alternatives like Airtable, nothing static like an excel spreadsheet or google doc) with the ability to send data out to other services integrated into your Boost.Space “Spaces”.
If you’re already an established engineer Boost.Space’s concept of inputs and outputs from one service to another with a database in between won’t be all that unfamiliar. It is not as simple as something like Zapier or Albado where you simply sign-in to each respective connected service 1:1 the fields and you’re good to go. So you’ll have to keep that in mind when using Boost.Space, the idea of how the incoming data relates to the Boost.Space database and finally how it relates to the outgoing dataset. It’s a like a series of inputs and outputs with a crucial step in the middle.
What is a practical use-case for a service like this? In my case, aside from the web app I am currently prototyping I am actually planning to move all 3,000+ articles I’ve written here on this blog into Boost.Space, because I’d like a back-up of my last ten years of writing without having to download several gigabytes of SQL.
Powered by the MAKE Engine, Boost.Space offers connectivity with over 1,700 existing applications with the promise of more coming in the future. When I decided to select them for the back-end of my next project I manually checked if they had integration with things like WordPress, AiTable, Forento and other platforms and surprisingly the majority of no-code and data science tools I use already had pre-built integration. My favourite integration has to be the ability to connect an SQL database to a Space. Is there anything they haven’t thought of?
This isn’t a paid advertisement for Boost, I am honestly writing about this tool because I feel like their tiers on offer right now are quite generous especially when compared with established players Zapier – who have only increased their prices in the past year. Sure, Boost doesn’t offer a free tier, but while you won’t get 150 integration a month at $0. The prospect of getting 50,000 operations a month for just $70 USD (lifetime) is very enticing – and that is their lowest tier.
I am not going to say that buying into Life Time Deals are always worth it. You never know if the company will be around in a couple years or if the promised features far off in the future will ever pan out. Boost.Space gets my recommendation based not on what they’re promising in the future or what the service could be but rather the value it offers to independent developer right now.
Boost.Space is available on AppSumo for the next 24-hours. After that these LTD deals will be going away and they’ll be launching on Product Hunt. Boost.Space did not purchase this article or have any in at at all. I did buy their “Tier 1” offering to power my next product and I’m writing about it because I can see the potential.
