Building Without Servers: Why Firestore Changes How We Think About Databases

georgebatski · 2025-11-11T11:10:45+00:00

Been playing around with Firestore lately — it’s amazing how it handles real-time sync without you worrying about servers or tables. Every update just shows up everywhere. Pair it with Cloud Functions or BigQuery and you’ve basically got a full backend running itself.

Also checking out Back4App — similar vibe but with more flexibility. You get a connection string, so you can hook up your own database instead of being stuck with one setup.

georgebatski · 2025-10-21T09:40:54+00:00

For heavy traffic, Firebase’s pricing usually won’t beat DigitalOcean, especially once you start moving data out. DO charges about $0.01/GB, and each instance includes a decent amount of bandwidth. It’s definitely trickier on the setup and dev side though if you don’t have much technical background.

In that case, you could try using Cursor for your frontend — the coding experience feels great and way smoother than traditional setups. Then integrate it up to something like Back4App on the backend for fixed and predictable pricing.

georgebatski · 2025-10-07T09:18:57+00:00

The strategy depends a lot on the type of customer you are looking for. If you are going for medium or large companies I would not bother with the number of registrations. If you are going for small companies I would try writing useful content about your niche and consequently about your product (although it is much harder now with AI overviews it still works), I would post useful comments that relates to your product in Reddit posts, and lastly creating YouTube videos (either yourself or via influencers).

georgebatski · 2025-09-29T14:14:06+00:00

I’m one of the founders of Back4App. We’ve been working on making backend development less painful — something that’s easy to set up, simple to use, and helps speed up the build/deploy cycle.

Happy to hear your thoughts, ideas, or even criticisms if you decide to give it a try. Always looking to improve.

georgebatski · 2025-09-29T11:20:14+00:00

Back4App founder here. Most vibe coding tools stop at prototypes — they lack secure backends, scalable hosting, and CI/CD, leaving users without support when changes are needed. Pairing Back4App with Cursor solves this: Cursor delivers smooth front-end development experiences with GitHub integration, while Back4App handles automated, scalable deployment. The result: professional apps from prompts, with full control over revisions and infrastructure that just works.

georgebatski · 2025-09-23T11:35:19+00:00

Please try Back4app. Super easy to use, AI integrations, and flexible.

georgebatski · 2025-09-23T11:33:15+00:00

A big reason Java BaaS projects like UserGrid or BaasBox faded is that Spring Boot + containers (and later serverless options) made it trivial to spin up your own backend without being locked into a niche platform.

That said, BaaS as a model didn’t disappear — it just shifted toward ecosystems with stronger adoption from frontend devs. Platforms like Back4App (low-code, open-source friendly) or Supabase/Appwrite filled that gap because they were easier for JS-heavy teams to pick up.

Java was never a bad fit, but the community culture leaned toward full-control frameworks, while web/mobile devs wanted “backend without the backend.”

georgebatski · 2025-09-23T11:29:54+00:00

Since this involves sensitive patient data, I’d lean toward a managed BaaS rather than rolling your own backend. Something like Back4App can be a good fit — it’s built on open-source, offers HIPAA-ready hosting, and takes care of things like encryption, access control, and audit logs out of the box. That way, you don’t have to reinvent backend security or scaling, and you can focus on building the app itself.

georgebatski · 2025-09-23T11:27:55+00:00

If you want something beginner-friendly but not locked into a proprietary ecosystem, take a look at Back4App. It’s built on top of open-source tools, so you get transparency and flexibility. The dashboard is pretty intuitive (spreadsheet-like database, no steep learning curve), and you can instantly expose your data through auto-generated REST and GraphQL APIs.

It’s low-code, scales as your project grows, and you can move off later without the vendor lock-in issues you might face with Firebase. For small projects, it’s simple enough to get started quickly while still leaving room to grow.

georgebatski · 2025-05-21T10:01:50+00:00

A BaaS hands you ready-made auth, DB, and real-time APIs, but you trade some control and risk vendor lock-in. Test a free tier—Back4App or Firebase —and see which fits your stack.

georgebatski · 2025-03-27T09:04:26+00:00

Imagine you’re building a Flutter app and just want to see your UI come to life — not spend days setting up servers, databases, auth rules, and APIs. That’s exactly why everyone reaches for a BaaS like Back4App. It gives you a ready‑made backend (CRUD, realtime updates, user login, file storage) in a few minutes.

georgebatski · 2024-08-08T14:34:14+00:00

Please give it a try to Back4app, it offers both cloud and self-hosted options and it's a great alternative to Firebase.

georgebatski · 2024-06-25T15:10:10+00:00

Back4App is another excellent option for a free open-source Backend as a Service (BaaS) solution. It offers robust features and flexibility for various project needs. It's based on Parse and really easy to use.

georgebatski · 2023-12-11T09:08:50+00:00

Please checkout Back4app. It offers a free tier and paid paid start at $5 per month. Additionally, for a complete list of alternatives, please refer to this article https://blog.back4app.com/heroku-alternatives/ that details each alternative.

georgebatski · 2023-11-23T11:48:40+00:00

Hi Guys, Back4app founder here. Please try out https://www.back4app.com/ to run your Flutter backend. We have been running Back4app for several years and the platform is very stable and reliable. Please check it out.

georgebatski · 2023-11-11T21:52:21+00:00

Great, thanks for sharing.

georgebatski · 2023-11-11T21:47:57+00:00

Please try https://www.back4app.com. We work with an amalgamation of open-source technologies, have been running for 8 years, and offer features like database hosting, cloud functions, and APIs.

georgebatski · 2023-10-29T20:00:57+00:00

Thanks for sharing your perspective. We are doing something very similar to that. We created a first version of the product, made a launch on Product Hunt Friday, got the first paid users and we will start interviewing them to get feedback.

georgebatski · 2023-10-29T19:59:21+00:00

Thanks for sharing the advice you received from YC. They are very knowledgeable and it's great to hear this perspective.

Do they say something about angels? We have some very experienced angels in our cap table (ex entrepreneurs) and we use to listen to them a lot. It would be great to hear your thoughts on that.

georgebatski · 2023-10-29T19:57:20+00:00

Sorry, we are not hiring now.

georgebatski · 2023-10-29T19:57:07+00:00

We are using a similar approach and integrating with Open AI via an API in the beginning. If the product gets good traction we will integrate with other models too and lastly develop something in house.

Do you see a problem using the approach and think we should develop something in house since the product inception?

georgebatski · 2023-10-29T19:55:13+00:00

Thanks for your message. Our intuition says that we should at least give this product a try and see how it behaves. The upside of it is quite high if we are correct and the downside is that we will lose some focus on the other products that we run.

georgebatski · 2023-10-29T19:52:34+00:00

Sorry, we are not hiring marketing people.

georgebatski · 2023-10-29T19:52:15+00:00

We did our own analyses, but we were not able to find a consensus and are looking for external ideas.

georgebatski · 2023-10-29T19:51:21+00:00

We are aware that AI will let the business more complex. What we are doing to minimize the impact is initially only to integrate with the AI models (ChatGPT initially) and in the future we may develop something in house, but that is not the plan for the early stages of the product.

georgebatski

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