Question Can I Ask for Feedback on a Color Matching Tool I’m Working On?

[o0Wiggyo]

Hi everyone,

I’ve been working on a small web-based tool to help with color matching in sign making, especially when dealing with Pantone references, material changes, and reprints where consistency matters. It's packed with helpful features.

I’ve hit enough bumps in my own workflow over the years that I decided to build something to solve the common issues — mainly tracking what worked before, matching colors across different printers or substrates, and creating reusable reference charts.

I’d love to share a bit more about it and invite a few of you to try it out while it’s in beta. But before I do, I just want to check with the mods/admin to make sure that's okay?

I’m not selling anything — I just want honest feedback from people who live and breathe this stuff and help me develop it further.

Is it alright to post more about it here?

Thanks for your time,

 

[netsol]

yours is a software solution?
what hardware component does it use?
xrite I1?

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Are you just using the browser for the GUI or actually using the browser for both GUI and logic? Hopefully, the former and using a local server to handle communication with local hardware, otherwise be limited to whatever hardware the browser supports in it's CORs related sandbox and that may not be as accurate as one would want.

I'll use browsers/webviews for prototyping tools or short lived tools as that is quicker to throw a GUI on, especially compared to an immediate mode gui, but the sandbox nature of the browser is what will get one when it comes to local apps and it will need that local server.

 

[o0Wiggyo]

That's a very sharp and insightful question. We use a modern, hybrid architecture to get the best of both worlds:

*GUI (Runs in the browser):** The user interface is built with Next.js and React, running in your browser for a fast, interactive experience.

*Critical Logic (Runs on the server):** For all the important tasks that require precision and power—like generating a **true CMYK PDF** or running AI features—we use **Next.js Server Actions**. When you click a button for one of these features, the request is securely handled by our server backend. This bypasses the browser's sandbox limitations and color management issues, ensuring professional-grade, accurate results.

*Data Persistence (Runs in the browser... for now):** For this alpha version, all your data (jobs, color history, etc.) is stored in your browser's `localStorage`. This makes it fast, completely private, and available offline. The trade-off is that your data is tied to a single browser. For the full production release, we plan to migrate this to a cloud database to enable user accounts and cross-device syncing.

This approach gives the app a responsive interface while ensuring the critical color and generation logic is handled with the accuracy and power it needs.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

*Critical Logic (Runs on the server):** For all the important tasks that require precision and power—like generating a **true CMYK PDF** or running AI features—we use **Next.js Server Actions**. When you click a button for one of these features, the request is securely handled by our server backend. This bypasses the browser's sandbox limitations and color management issues, ensuring professional-grade, accurate results.

Ok, so the app is not local. When I use browser for gui, it's with a C backend for the local host and everything is local and it's not tied to the .config folder of the browser (which is important given the next bit) and can directly interface with hardware due to that backend.

*Data Persistence (Runs in the browser... for now):** For this alpha version, all your data (jobs, color history, etc.) is stored in your browser's `localStorage`. This makes it fast, completely private, and available offline. The trade-off is that your data is tied to a single browser.

Be careful here. Local storage may be deleted if the user is running cleaning programs (some have it as a default option as well, may happen even with indexedDB as well). May want to have some type of backup format: json (although depends on size of what this could be as well), sqlite (my favorite).

EDIT: Oh I see, you plan to move this to offsite storage, rendering the suggestions moot.