From 0 to 20 Beta Users

At launch, I wasn’t sure if anyone would even bother signing up. Fast forward a couple months, and we’re at ~20 active beta users.

Not huge numbers, but every single user has been super valuable — giving me feedback, pointing out bugs, and suggesting features I hadn’t even thought about.

What I’ve Been Building

• Fixed a bunch of rough edges from launch
• Added dark mode (because of course 😂)
• Tweaked challenges based on user feedback so they’re more fun & less intimidating

Lessons Learned

1. Talking to users > guessing what users want.
2. Almost every feature since July came directly from conversations with early users.
3. Small updates beat big “perfect” releases.
4. Shipping quickly (even if it’s rough) gets me feedback way faster.
5. Community is everything.
6. Posting here and on Reddit has brought in the most engaged users. Ads = 0. Word of mouth = 💯.

What’s Next

• More coding challenges (aiming for a steady weekly release)
• A simple progress-tracking system
• Maybe… multiplayer practice? (still exploring this idea)

Thanks

If you were one of the early readers or testers from my July post, thank you — your feedback genuinely shaped daftcode.io into what it is today.

If you haven’t tried it yet and want to practice some coding in a lightweight way, you can check it out here: draftcode. Still beta, still scrappy, but improving every week.

My plan is to keep sharing updates here as the project grows. If you have feedback, ideas, or just want to follow along, I’d love to hear from you in the comments.