Pivotal‘s free tier might be just what you need to get started or re-energize your side project.
Combining Pivotal’s project management software with pomofocus.io — those two tabs in my browser have really boosted my output and kept me organized. So far, the free tier of Pivotal Tracker has been enough to get my little project off the ground, so I thought it might be helpful to share.
You create an account and then name your project. Then you can add user stories or features which you eventually plan on adding to your app or site (your product roadmap).
Adding these features is pretty simple, and you can put as much detail as you like.
Working solo, some of the features like “Accept”/”Reject” buttons aren’t really useful (think: pull request meme of awarding oneself a medal). Also, I’m not quite clear on the project velocity calculation, which seems like a powerful feature that I’m not taking full advantage of at the moment (here’s a 2-year-old video explaining the velocity calc feature, or you can actually — shudder — read the docs). Other than that it’s pretty amazing for my needs. And it’s nice to know that I can still have up to 5 users should I need to bring on help.
This sort of freemium app is really enabling a lot of startup and small business innovation, since a lot of side projects don’t generate income at first. I hope to pass it along with a freemium app of my own!