

Show HN: Introducing Comb - personal finance app - heldtogether
http://getcomb.com

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sc0rb
You look like a kid and I don't trust you with my data. Why are all these
types of 'startups' done by people with absolutely no experience that probably
only learnt rails (or some other such low barrier to entry tech) this year?

Before the down votes roll in. This is a legit concern that ordinary customers
could easily have.

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heldtogether
Fair comment, but I've been programming for 10 years (although I know that's
not what your point is getting at). Your fears are fairly moot though, the app
isn't networked (yet) and is fully self contained meaning that no one has
access to your data except for you.

If I get to a stage where there are enough people demanding networking then I
imagine my age won't be much of a concern any more.

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darkxanthos
I think this is a good lesson. Whatever you show in your video you are using
to market your product including you. Just do a video with your voice and
screen capture and you'll probably be better off. I felt the video seemed
semi-unprofessional.

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heldtogether
Could I ask in what made you think it was semi-unprofessional? I'll admit it
was a very candid video, but I can't see how you'd get to unprofessional.

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sc0rb
I watched it until the point where you just rolled in and started chatting.
It's hard to do these types of video.

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heldtogether
As I said I was aiming for candid. But you're entitled to your opinion and I
appreciate the feedback.

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Tycho
This is cool, but it might take too much effort for me. What could maybe sway
me is a companion iPhone app where I could log as I go. Ideally it would all
be voice activated and I'd just say stuff like 'lunch £6'... But even if you
had a simple landing page where I could make single-tap entries to my ledger.
They wouldn't need to be exact either, a button for 'pint' that guessed £3.50,
for 'chocolate bar' that guessed 70p, a few ones for 'meal'
(cantine/pub/restaurant), customisable ones for frequent train fares... You
get the idea.

For me personally the main use case would be tracking what I spend money on,
rather than knowing how much I have left.

On a side note, I wish my bank would get their act together and let me easily
search my balance history on their online banking page. Instead I have to
export it and the history gets wiped after 2 years or something.

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heldtogether
An iPhone companion is in the pipeline. Nice to hear your thoughts on how to
make it more likely for people to actually use the app, which I think is
probably one of the biggest barriers to success with this sort of thing.

There is a huge amount that banks could do to make things easier for their
customers but progress seems very slow. I have a friend who works for high
street banks and it sounds absolutely horrendous! Better to be safe than sorry
for them though I guess.

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krmmalik
How about automated importing of transactions? Lovemoney used to do that but
then stopped

I have to say, i've used ZetaBee cashflow a few times over the last couple of
years and found it to be fantastic in helping project the real amount of money
i have available to spend.

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heldtogether
It's just a weekend project to start with, the first version of the app took a
weekend, another weekend tweaking bits, and then a weekend to shoot and edit
the video.

Would you want automatic importing from your bank account or from a table of
data?

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krmmalik
From the bank account. I know Barclays support this. Don't know about the
rest.

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heldtogether
I've thought about it. The question is, should it bulk import everything from
your bank account every time you open the app, and you just add labels etc to
it/match it up with existing transactions, or should it be separate somehow?
Curious to hear what people actually want, rather than what's available now.

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krmmalik
i'd like to be able to tag transactions. Then when they next appear next
month, theyre automatically recognised and sorted.

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heldtogether
I'll consider it for when the time comes :)

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archenemy
What about throwing some text in there? A couple sentences might have pushed
me to watch the video.

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heldtogether
I've been lurking on HN for quite a while, but first post. Can I add a URL and
text?

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danielgrieve
I think archenemy meant on the site itself rather than on HN.

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heldtogether
Ah I see! Good idea, I'll make a quick change :)

