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Show HN: Dropbase AI – A Prompt-Based Python Web App Builder

141 pointsby jimmyechan10 months ago
Hey HN,<p>Dropbase is an AI-based Python web app builder.<p>To build this, we had to make significant changes from our original launch: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=38534920">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=38534920</a>. Now, any web app can be entirely defined using just two files: `properties.json` for the UI and `main.py` for the backend logic, which makes it significantly easier for GPT to work with.<p>In the latest version, developers can use natural language prompts to build apps. But instead of generating a black-box app or promising an AI software engineer we just generate simple Python code that is easily interpreted by our internal web framework. This allows developers to:<p>(1) See and understand the generated app code. We regenerate the `main.py` file and highlight changes in a diff viewer, allowing developers to understand what exactly was changed.<p>(2) Edit the app code: Developers can correct any errors, occasional hallucinations, or edit code to handle specific use cases. Once they like the code, they can commit changes and immediately preview the app.<p>Incidentally, if you’ve tried Anthropic’s Artifacts to create “apps”, our experience will feel familiar. Dropbase AI is like Claude Artifacts, but for fully functional apps: you can connect to your database, make external API calls, and deploy to servers.<p>Our goal is to create a universal, prompt-based app builder that’s highly customizable. Code should always be accessible and developers should be in control. We believe most apps will be built or prototyped this way, and we&#x27;re taking the first steps towards that goal.<p>A fun fact is that model improvements were critical here: we could not achieve the consistent results we needed with any LLM prior to GPT-4o and Claude 3.5 Sonnet. In the future, we’ll allow users to modify the code to call their local GPT&#x2F;LLM deployment via Ollama, rather than relying on OpenAI or Anthropic calls.<p>If you’re building admin panels, database editors, back-office tools, billing&#x2F;customer dashboards, and internal dev tools that can fetch data and trigger actions across any database, internal&#x2F;external service or API, please give Dropbase a shot!<p>We&#x27;re excited to get your thoughts and questions!<p>Demos:<p>- Here’s a demo video: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;RaxHOjhy3hY" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;RaxHOjhy3hY</a><p>- We also introduced Charts (beta) in this version based on suggestions from cjohnson318 in our previous HN post: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;YWtdD7THTxE" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;YWtdD7THTxE</a><p>Useful links:<p>- Repo here: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;DropbaseHQ&#x2F;dropbase">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;DropbaseHQ&#x2F;dropbase</a>. To setup locally, follow the quickstart guide in our docs<p>- Docs: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;docs.dropbase.io">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;docs.dropbase.io</a><p>- Homepage: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;dropbase.io">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;dropbase.io</a>

3 comments

cryptoz10 months ago
Ooooh, this is interesting. I think I&#x27;m building something quite similar! May I ask, how do you solve the code modification problem? In your demo video it shows the AI prompt is modifying code, not just generating it first-time, but I am curious how you do it. Are you using diffs?<p>I wrote about my approach here using ASTs: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.codeplusequalsai.com&#x2F;static&#x2F;blog&#x2F;prompting_llms_to_modify_existing_code_using_asts.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.codeplusequalsai.com&#x2F;static&#x2F;blog&#x2F;prompting_llms_...</a><p>You wrote in your post that you &#x27;regenerate&#x27; a file - is that how you do it? Is it reliable? How does that work on big files? Does it fail at reproducing the rest of the file that should remain unchanged sometimes?<p>Thanks for answering any of these! Great project!
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canadiantim10 months ago
Can it generate a django app? Or a Litestar app? Or any kind of framework?
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alexliu51810 months ago
This looks fantastic! Excited to try Dropbase for building quick, customizable web apps with ease.