Spendly Blog

What would you like to see in Spendly?

Have an idea or a request for something you’d like to see in Spendly? Let us know at: http://blog.spendly.com/ask

Man Vs. Debt

I just found this site this morning, and I think I’m in love. Lots of great advice, including a mention about not automating your transactions.

Been working on some design updates for Spendly. Among other things, the keypad is getting a redesign. Here are some early design comps. They’re far from complete, but I’m getting closer. Also thinking about changing up the layout to accommodate some new buttons.

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Design exploration for Spendly Touch. This was done a while ago, but just put it together for the portfolio.

Rethinking

The Spendly alpha has produced some great insight. I’ve put development on hold for a few weeks while I focus on overhauling the purpose of the app. Stay tuned.

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Multi-faceted: An Interview with Garrett Murray

A great interview with Garrett Murray, the creator of Ego and the ManiacalRage podcast. He’s an inspiration that helped me move towards the goal of launching Spendly Touch and Spendly Online.

A Very Early Preview on Dec 15

I’ve been hard at work, just not on Spendly Online. The last few days have consisted of a lot of client work. For now, client work trumps Spendly, mainly because my clients pay all those pesky bills I’ve managed to accumulate (You know, mortgage, car loan, etc…).

That being said, I’m still planing on opening the gates on Dec 15 for a few people to start playing with Spendly. I wanted to outline what those people can expect:

First off, don’t expect the world. This very early alpha preview is all about getting initial impression on the _idea_ of Spendly, not necessarily every working feature.
There’s a lot missing. Right now, I’ve tried to focus on the process of viewing, creating, and editing entries. Thats about all you can do. The process is actually similar to the experience using Spendly Touch.
Reports are kind of working, but they’re really strange sometimes. Creating a useful and robust reporting system takes time. Time that I’m planning to invest soon.
The current design is already outdated. What you’ll see on Dec 15 is the very rough design. How rough? Well, its only been tested in Safari. Maybe a peak in Firefox, but I wouldn’t expect it to work at all in IE. Yet. The latest iteration of the design will solve a lot of flow and usability issues. A preview of that design is shown above.

So while this very early preview of Spendly Online is missing a lot. If you’re one of the few early testers, I’m looking for you to take some time and peruse Spendly Online. Really get a feel for the app as-is, and dream. Dream about how you want it all to work. Your dreams will be the foundation upon which Spendly will be built.

Want to help create the best income and expense tracker? Enter you email at http://spendly.com to be added to the preview list and maybe you’ll get an email on Dec 15 with your login information!

jQuery Sparklines

I’ve been looking for a way to quickly add some simple — yet incredibly useful — graphs and charts to Spendly. I’m pretty sure I found it.

On Self Promotion

From the man himself:

Create for the joy of creating. Share for the joy of the sharing, and because the information you’re sharing genuinely excites you. Do that, and the rest will follow.

A rule to live by.

How I Hire Programmers

Great thoughts on hiring from Aaron Swartz, aimed specifically at programmers, but this stuff is universal:

First, do they know stuff? Ask them what they’ve been thinking about and probe them about it. Do they seem to understand it in detail? Can they explain it clearly? (Clear explanations are a sign of genuine understanding.) Do they know stuff about the subject that you don’t?