I don't code. I just shipped a native macOS app in 2 days.
I'm what you might call a gringo vibe coder.
No dev degree. No traditional background. Just me, Cursor, Claude, and AI... figuring things out together.
Rick Rubin said it best: "In the past, for music, you had to go to the conservatory and study for years... then when punk rock came along... if you had something to say, you could say it." He calls vibe coding the punk rock of coding.
That's exactly how this feels. Messy. Raw. Full of energy and possibility.
This week, I shipped Respira Pulse — a native macOS menu bar app that monitors Vercel deployments.
75 commits. 31 releases. Two days from first commit to live product with a website, homebrew + DMG release, payments, and licensing.
I don't write code. I describe what I want. I point out problems. I say "this feels wrong", and somehow working software comes out the other side.
What the app does:
Glance at your menu bar. Green means ready. Yellow means building. Red means failed. Click to copy build logs, paste into Claude for debugging help.
Quiet when everything's fine. Present when you need it.
That's it. Ambient awareness without the mental tax of checking tabs.
Why I'm sharing this:
I'm not chasing unicorn founder dreams. I'm here to learn, stay curious, and explore what's actually possible in 2025. Turns out the best way to understand where technology is heading is to get your hands dirty building something.
To real developers and engineers watching this amateur hour unfold: thank you.
You built the tools that let us newcomers learn. Tauri, Rust, the entire stack I'm standing on — that's decades of craft. I'm not trying to take anyone's job. I'm just trying to understand yours a little better.
The app: respirapulse.dev
7-day free trial. One-time purchase after that. No subscriptions. Fair exchange.
Happy to answer questions about the process, the mess, and the magic.
Replies
yes, we live in unbelievable tech paradigm / revolution.
said, to myself in the last 2 decades in the internet that we live the biggest revolution in the history of literature.
now, given the AI, I'm left without order of magnitude regarding comparation.
no, I don't think you are a gringo vibe coder.
I remember the early days of internet and how uninitiated where called...
Nice app!
@samuel_caraliu long time no see 🙏
I relate to this so much. I often feel like an outsider in the dev world, so seeing you lean into creativity instead of credentials is refreshing. Respira Pulse looks awesome and your mindset is even better. Keep building in that raw, punk-rock way.
@safina_seth amen sister! would love to see your work
This is one of the more polished non-developer built apps I've seen. Very well done @webmyc
@tomp_mke thank you! I really like to polish my stuff
@respira I'm curious if you're using any Claude skills in your process. I've been using the "frontend-design" skill to improve the look of my UIs and it's been working really well.
@tomp_mkeI am using a multitude of meta prompts and keeping all together in projects so it knows the tech stack and my preferences. With skills, I experimented with adding a SEO/AEO playbook and applying it to various projects, and getting new page suggestions and other optimization recommendations. Are you using a generic frontend-design skill or something more specific?
anybody has any recommendations about pricing?
what about product hunt launch strategy?
Thanks!