I come from a non-technical background but recently started experimenting with a lot of “vibe coding” to try building something useful.
Originally I wanted to build a full email app using Gmail APIs. But the deeper I went, the more complicated it became. The security requirements, backend work, and API limitations made it hard to keep things simple.
So I stepped back and tried a different approach.
Instead of building a new email app, I built a Chrome extension that changes how Gmail is viewed.
After many attempts (and a lot of trial and error), I ended up making Gmail Feed.
The extension lets you:
See your emails in a feed-style view
Open a preview of the email quickly
Click “View Thread” to jump to the original email inside Gmail
It runs entirely on the client side:
No backend
No external APIs
No data collection
So it’s basically free forever and privacy friendly.
This is my first extension and I’m still learning a lot, so I’d really appreciate feedback from the HN community.
Hey HN,
I come from a non-technical background but recently started experimenting with a lot of “vibe coding” to try building something useful.
Originally I wanted to build a full email app using Gmail APIs. But the deeper I went, the more complicated it became. The security requirements, backend work, and API limitations made it hard to keep things simple.
So I stepped back and tried a different approach.
Instead of building a new email app, I built a Chrome extension that changes how Gmail is viewed.
After many attempts (and a lot of trial and error), I ended up making Gmail Feed.
The extension lets you:
See your emails in a feed-style view
Open a preview of the email quickly
Click “View Thread” to jump to the original email inside Gmail
It runs entirely on the client side:
No backend
No external APIs
No data collection
So it’s basically free forever and privacy friendly.
This is my first extension and I’m still learning a lot, so I’d really appreciate feedback from the HN community.
Curious about:
whether the idea is useful
UX improvements
things I should improve technically
Thanks!