Hacker News: preetigagarwal

New comment by preetigagarwal in "Why don't AI coding tools like REST?"

preetigagarwal — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 21:59:59 +0000

REST APIs are deceptively simple on the surface but notoriously inconsistent in practice — different teams implement auth, pagination, and error handling completely differently. AI tools struggle because there's no single 'correct' REST — every API is its own dialect. GraphQL and gRPC have stricter contracts which makes them easier for AI to reason about. The irony is that this inconsistency is also why REST APIs have so many security vulnerabilities — no standard means no standard security either.

New comment by preetigagarwal in "Ask HN: How do solo devs protect their work in the age of vibe coding?"

preetigagarwal — Fri, 24 Apr 2026 16:45:43 +0000

API security is the most common blind spot. Vibe coding tools generate endpoints fast but almost never think about broken authentication, excessive data exposure, or injection flaws. A solo dev can ship a beautiful frontend with completely exposed APIs behind it. At minimum — test your own endpoints like an attacker would before going live.

New comment by preetigagarwal in "Tell HN: My open-source project hit 5k registered users"

preetigagarwal — Thu, 23 Apr 2026 18:25:13 +0000

Congratulations! 5k users is a real milestone — especially for open source where you rarely hear from most of your users. The ones who take time to register are your most valuable early adopters. Would be curious what your biggest growth channel was — was it a single post that took off or slow organic growth over time?

New comment by preetigagarwal in "Ask HN: What skills are future proof in an AI driven job market?"

preetigagarwal — Thu, 23 Apr 2026 18:23:24 +0000

Security skills are becoming more valuable not less. As AI writes more code, the attack surface grows faster than ever. Someone still needs to find and fix the vulnerabilities that AI introduces. Knowing how to think like an attacker — not just a builder — will always have value.

New comment by preetigagarwal in "Tell HN: I'm sick of AI everything"

preetigagarwal — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 20:15:00 +0000

The AI fatigue is real. The problem is most AI products are just wrappers that add a chat interface to existing tools and call it AI. The ones that actually stick are the ones where AI is doing something that was genuinely impossible or impractical before — not just faster or cheaper. That bar is higher than most builders think.

New comment by preetigagarwal in "Ask HN: How to solve the cold start problem for a two-sided marketplace?"

preetigagarwal — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 20:13:06 +0000

Cold start is the hardest problem in any marketplace. What worked for us was focusing on one side first — get the supply side locked in before worrying about demand. Also doing things manually at the start that don't scale. Personal outreach to every single early user, not mass emails. The product can be rough but people forgive that if you give them personal attention early on.

New comment by preetigagarwal in "Ask HN: How did you land your first projects as a solo engineer/consultant?"

preetigagarwal — Tue, 21 Apr 2026 16:55:01 +0000

Referrals from the first 2-3 clients were everything. But to get those first clients — LinkedIn outreach with a very specific message about their problem worked better than anything else. Generic 'I am available for work' messages got ignored completely.

New comment by preetigagarwal in "German police name alleged leaders of GandCrab and REvil ransomware groups"

preetigagarwal — Mon, 06 Apr 2026 21:32:14 +0000

These groups typically exploit unpatched vulnerabilities and exposed credentials. Most companies don't discover they're vulnerable until after a breach. Regular security audits are the only real defense.