_______ __ _______
| | |.---.-..----.| |--..-----..----. | | |.-----..--.--.--..-----.
| || _ || __|| < | -__|| _| | || -__|| | | ||__ --|
|___|___||___._||____||__|__||_____||__| |__|____||_____||________||_____|
on Gopher (inofficial)
URI Visit Hacker News on the Web
COMMENT PAGE FOR:
URI Show HN: Prism.Tools â Free and privacy-focused developer utilities
2TheMoon73 wrote 6 hours 38 min ago:
Iâve been seeing this topic pop up across different discussions
lately. Itâs interesting how early signals tend to cluster before
becoming mainstream.
esperent wrote 16 hours 47 min ago:
What would make this really useful to me it's having it in Vscode as an
extension.
I'm sure lots of the tools are already available but a visual panel
would help to remember them.
Computer0 wrote 16 hours 59 min ago:
The text to ascii text is broken for a few of the options.
BLGardner wrote 15 hours 54 min ago:
Already noted, will check into and make corrections... Check back,
but it may be the weekend before time permits.
hahn-kev wrote 18 hours 12 min ago:
A lot of people mentioned not being able to find this when you want it
later. I wonder if a list of tags in a Firefox bookmark would make it
show up when typing in search to use instead of just googling for it
BLGardner wrote 14 hours 42 min ago:
You need remember one thing: Prism.Tools, search it on the Goog ;)
syngrog66 wrote 18 hours 23 min ago:
CLI programs have existed for decades. no browser or connectivity
needed. more private, more composable
going to a random stranger's website (with a 2 day old account, and new
no-history GitHub account) to generate one's privacy-critical passwords
or hashes is particularly insecure and insane. glaring antipattern.
trusting that "it always only runs in your browser" is foolish. This is
how malware gets injected when the rug gets pulled out
there are safer, less brittle and more modular and scalable ways of
doing all the above. avoid it, kids
shame on everyone involved
photon_lines wrote 17 hours 51 min ago:
You do understand that you can run these tools locally right? The
code is fully available and open source:
URI [1]: https://github.com/blgardner/prism.tools
sirjaz wrote 19 hours 41 min ago:
This would be a great tool if it was a local tool that could run in a
tui or as a desktop app ala devtoys on Windows
fevangelou wrote 20 hours 2 min ago:
@BLGardner
Thank you for building and sharing this.
stronglikedan wrote 20 hours 42 min ago:
Thanks for this. I know we're technically supposed to use the upvote
button to express gratitude, but that just doesn't feel sufficient in
this case.
quentinadam wrote 22 hours 33 min ago:
This is super useful !
A few more tools that I use regularly, if you are looking to expand:
- Base58 encoding to Hex conversion
- Hex to decimal and vice versa
- Strlen
- Compute SHA-256 of text or hex string
- Compute Keccak-256 of text or hex string
BLGardner wrote 21 hours 40 min ago:
Great input! Iâll be checking into these!
ddltodata wrote 22 hours 40 min ago:
I havenât come across anything else like this. Itâs genuinely
impressive.
BLGardner wrote 21 hours 29 min ago:
Thank you, enjoy!
likium wrote 23 hours 17 min ago:
I do like the standalone HTML file approach. With coding agents it's
quite easy to build a suite of tools for personal use. Additionally if
you review the code, you can trust if it's really private/secure.
The ones on mine are more visual focused since cli tools are better at
conversion, formatting and such.
belter wrote 23 hours 18 min ago:
How is an account created two days ago able to post a link? Can the
mods comment?
tomhow wrote 19 hours 39 min ago:
New accounts can post links. What makes you think they can't?
We have spam filters that are tuned more strictly on new accounts,
but people can always email us and ask us to review their posts and
allow them to be submitted, which happened in this case.
ahmetomer wrote 23 hours 51 min ago:
I like initiatives like this but the issue I have mostly is that
whenever I have a specific need, say, I need to format a piece of JSON,
I would directly google "json formatter" instead of remembering that
there is a website with a suite of tools that I can go on and find that
specific tool I wanted. And I would probably do the same for all of the
tools listed there. It's more convenient, I think, to do a quick search
and click on one of the first that came up. I've just never come to
leave this habit.
BLGardner wrote 21 hours 36 min ago:
Iâm with you on that! Iâve done the same thing myself for years.
Now I just have one bookmark for all my needs!
observationist wrote 21 hours 43 min ago:
I've been using AI heavily for things like this, but having well
written tools at hand seems like an easy win to use with AI.
Might be worth a custom instruction for whatever AI you use - I'm
going to give this a go:
```
You have access to Prism.Tools, a free, privacy-focused collection of
40+ standalone client-side developer utilities at [1] . Available
tools by category:
Formatters & Parsers
Code
JSON
SQL
YAML â JSON
CURL to Fetch
SVG to JSX
JSON to TypeScript
Security & Dev
JWT Decoder
Password Gen
Hash Gen
UUID Gen
Subnet Calculator
HTTP Status Codes
Git Command Helper
SVG Editor
CSS Gradients
CSS Shadows
Clip-path Maker
Glassmorphisms
Favicon Generator
Color Converter
CSS Timing Visualizer
CSS Grids
Generators & Content
Lorem Ipsums
Random Data
QR Code
ASCII Art Converter
Slug Generator
Meta Tags Generator
Robots.txt Generator
Bash Script Generator
Encoders & Transformers
Base64 Encoder/Decoder
URL Encoder/Decoder
HTML Entity Encoder/Decoder
Case Converter
String Escaper
Minifier
Timestamp Converter
List Sorter
URL Parser
Additional Utilities
Regex Tester
Diff Checker
Markdown Previewer
Image Tools
Cron Builder
Unit Converter
When a user requests help with a matching task (e.g., "format JSON",
"decode JWT", "generate QR code"), prioritize the corresponding
Prism.Tools utility:
Identify the most relevant tool.
If possible, provide direct link.
Otherwise, prefer directing to Prism.Tools for accuracy, privacy, and
interface.
```
I'll add this to Grok and ChatGPT and test drive for a few days.
URI [1]: https://blgardner.github.io/prism.tools/
BLGardner wrote 21 hours 33 min ago:
Nice! Keep me updated!
observationist wrote 21 hours 26 min ago:
Thank you for this collection! I also like the old school web
ring vibe with the clean layout. :chefkiss:
culi wrote 23 hours 17 min ago:
I agree, but I've definitely used better tools than others and been
stuck with crap that shows up at the top of google results. And
there's great tools like this[0] that I've found through HN but never
show up on google
I think an aggregator for pre-vetted tools like these can go a long
way. Just a repository of various tools with tags and the ability to
search through them
[0]
URI [1]: https://cobalt.tools/
culi wrote 23 hours 10 min ago:
Some possibly relevant bookmarks if anyone is working on something
similar
- [1] - [2] - [3] - [4] - [5] - [6] - [7] -
URI [1]: https://clipdrop.co/
URI [2]: https://cobalt.tools/
URI [3]: https://gchq.github.io/CyberChef/
URI [4]: https://ditherit.com/
URI [5]: https://it-tools.tech/
URI [6]: https://blgardner.github.io/prism.tools/
URI [7]: https://www.no-background.coffee/
URI [8]: https://omnitools.app/
keriati1 wrote 23 hours 59 min ago:
Iâm not sure why, but the first thing I did was check if HTTP status
code 418 was listed.
BLGardner wrote 21 hours 17 min ago:
Guess I missed that one! (Maybe more?)
Sat_P wrote 1 day ago:
This website is an absolutely brilliant resource. I've got bookmarks
for a few tools that are similar to the ones in your website. But man,
this is amazing! Thanks so much for sharing it.
BLGardner wrote 21 hours 26 min ago:
Thank you! I created this with people like you in mind.
photon_lines wrote 1 day ago:
I love what you have here. Thank you for open sourcing your work -- but
why the custom license? Why not just do a standard MIT license?
BLGardner wrote 21 hours 19 min ago:
I believe the MIT license leaves it open for others to host the files
for public access. Iâd like them to be hosted in one place but
others are free to host for their own or business use and/or use them
locally. Itâs just a way for me to protect my rights as the
owner/creator
photon_lines wrote 17 hours 55 min ago:
Ahhh OK - that makes sense - thank you.
RobotToaster wrote 20 hours 56 min ago:
You could use the AGPL, anyone who hosted it would then need to
share the source code of any modifications they've made.
BLGardner wrote 14 hours 32 min ago:
All are invited to modify the code to suit their needs, but not
provide it to the public. If they want to serve it on a local
network that is fine. These tools were made to be freely
available to all and to modify for their own personal/business
needs. If the need arises the latest version will be on Github.
psv2522 wrote 1 day ago:
[1] Wanted to share this since we are talking about tools, I really
like the mesh gradients
URI [1]: https://shaders.paper.design/
hersko wrote 1 day ago:
This looks great and will definitely check out! I've been using DevToys
on my local machine for years but a recent update made it almost
unusable.
BLGardner wrote 14 hours 7 min ago:
I'd love feedback!
toastal wrote 1 day ago:
> Free
> Privacy-focused
> GitHub (Microsoft)
> Cloudflare
Which is it? These US megacorporations are respecting neither usersâ
privacy nor their freedom. Then on top is a proprietary license
stating: âNo Re-hosting: You may not host these Tools on other
websites or public repositoriesâ even if you wanted to host it
locally or your own server. [1] [2] Also not to be confused with PRISM
Break < [3] >, an aggregated list of privacy-focused tools.
URI [1]: https://mako.cc/writing/hill-free_tools.html
URI [2]: https://httptoolkit.com/blog/public-cdn-risks/
URI [3]: https://prism-break.org/
BLGardner wrote 14 hours 12 min ago:
The key word here is 'public'...
"No Re-hosting: You may not host these Tools on other websites or
public repositoriesâ
You can host on a local network, modify to suit your needs, point to
local libs if CDNs are a concern. Just don't make them Public. The
latest versions will be available on Github if they are ever needed.
DANmode wrote 23 hours 26 min ago:
Doesnât âhostâ imply âhost for othersâ?
giancarlostoro wrote 1 day ago:
...or PRISM the privacy violating government program...
URI [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM
toastal wrote 1 day ago:
Which is why PRISM Break was created.
giancarlostoro wrote 1 day ago:
Ah, I missed that, coffee has not kicked in yet.
koakuma-chan wrote 1 day ago:
I hate these "browser" tools that actually upload your data to their
server for processing, and even if you ignore privacy implications,
they also obviously have file size limits, even though the actual work
can be done entirely on the client.
fainpul wrote 20 hours 14 min ago:
Yeah, weirdly enough it seems some tools actually make server
requests (3rd party even). For example the QR code generator. Seems
unnecessary, since certainly there are libraries to create QR codes
client-side?
dinoqqq wrote 1 day ago:
Great work! I really appreciate these tools with the privacy angle!
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
Thank you! I am a big privacy advocate!
lrpe wrote 1 day ago:
Can I turn off dark mode?
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
No, not at this time, maybe in the future. I went dark since it seems
to be the pref now.
lrpe wrote 12 hours 12 min ago:
That's a shame. The "pref" is whatever the user has set on their
device, and I wish more sites would respect that, rather than
defaulting to their own "pref".
alsetmusic wrote 1 day ago:
There are lots of these, but this is the first that I've seen that
focused on frontend dev a bit more. I've saved it to my list of tools
for reference.
Here's another with a more local / backend / IT flavor: [1] I have a
couple more local apps with similar functions. Here's one that's cross
platform[0]. This one appears to be Mac only[1].
Someone else mentioned not being able to remember these sites when
needed. I recently started manually keeping track of web tools in html
files inspired by a random repo[2] that fit well into a mode of
category-abstraction that suited me. I don't recall how I landed there,
but I liked the minimalism and adapted it to be a jumping-off point to
a personal kbase that I made with another tool[3] some years ago. I
have no design skills, so this (start-page) was just the right combo of
minimalism and tasteful CSS for what I wanted. Works with markdown,
which I also recently started using a lot more.
I ended up writing a lot more than I originally intended because I kept
thinking of more links. They may be out of order because of non-linear
editing and my having to rearrange them, so heads up. Also, it's early
and I might just have made dumb mistakes.
0. [2] 1. [3] 2. [4] 3. [5] Edit: Oh, looks like the it-tools link came
from cruising the repo of start-page or vice-versa. Ha!
URI [1]: https://it-tools.tech
URI [2]: https://devtoys.app
URI [3]: https://devutils.com
URI [4]: https://github.com/oinam/start
URI [5]: https://github.com/alanagoyal/docbase
elashri wrote 20 hours 1 min ago:
There is also network-tooling of the same idea and works locally [1]
URI [1]: https://github.com/Lissy93/networking-toolbox
BLGardner wrote 20 hours 24 min ago:
Thanks for saving and sharing! If you use one tool Iâve reached my
goal!
Lord_Zero wrote 21 hours 55 min ago:
ASCII Art Text Generator seems broken
BLGardner wrote 21 hours 41 min ago:
I will check into that, thanks! Can you elaborate a bit on what
specifically it is or is not doing? Thanks
sphars wrote 17 hours 21 min ago:
Not OP but the ascii art generator on your site is broken when
selecting to generate from text. All the font style options
except Standard, produce unexpected output. Using Block font for
example, with ASCII as the input:
URI [1]: https://i.imgur.com/5qhCR3h.png
Lord_Zero wrote 20 hours 42 min ago:
Sorry I meant on [1] "Current settings resulted in error."
URI [1]: https://it-tools.tech/ascii-text-drawer
hk1337 wrote 23 hours 1 min ago:
it-tools is one I use often and have setup locally.
I like that prism.tools seems to be 100% static, so it doesn't
require node to run like it-tools but I would imagine there's
probably some tasks it couldn't do.
BLGardner wrote 20 hours 48 min ago:
Yes, there are definitely things that canât be done in the
fashion of Prism.Tools but there are soooo many that can!
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
Thanks for the great feedback and I am very happy you decided to save
it to your tool list!
netdevphoenix wrote 1 day ago:
Is the name choice intentional? I wonder if it was inspired by the
notorious privacy busting program.
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
The name just popped into my head as I was sitting there looking at
the main page, I saw how one idea can need multiple tools, like the
rays of a prism relying on a single beam of light.
browningstreet wrote 1 day ago:
Did you search online for overlap before running with it?
BLGardner wrote 20 hours 54 min ago:
I did, quickly, thatâs where the .Tools addition to just Prism
was decided on. I really liked the name, so Prism.Tools!
MarleTangible wrote 1 day ago:
Would there be a way to resize the input/output fields?
Current layout only accepts 3 lines which is not sufficient when
formatting SQL or JSON.
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
Good catch! I will check into that. Iâm sure there are other tools
with some quirks too. I will be going over them all to make sure
issues like this are taken care of, Thanks!
jaden wrote 1 day ago:
I love these kinds of collections but often don't recall the site in
the moment I have a task they could fulfill.
To combat that I've been self-hosting [1] which has a lot of overlap
with these tools and might provide some ideas. [2] is a rust CLI with a
similar purpose.
URI [1]: https://github.com/CorentinTh/it-tools
URI [2]: https://github.com/ksdme/ut
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
That's exactly why I put this together, not being able to find what I
need, when i need it. Now I have one bookmarked page with all the
tools! Thanks for the link to your tools, will be checking them
out...
cadamsdotcom wrote 1 day ago:
Thanks for making these and for making them available.
A testament to the power of the web, and the power of a motivated
individual giving a damn and making something cool for everyone.
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
You are welcome! I hope you find at least one of the tool useful, if
you do then I have succeeded in my quest!
vivzkestrel wrote 1 day ago:
- my gripe with most of these tools is that whenever i actually need
one, i can never seem to remember their name.
- That kills like half the traffic for you guys.
- For example look at this dude [1] This is easily one of the most
comprehensive tools I have ever seen anyone build
- I literally bookmarked that site under a tools tag and that is how I
am able to find them. I can't ever seem to remember their name when I
need these quickly
- Perhaps get a good DOT COM domain name and host your site there. It
would make a huge difference in usage.
- Discoverability is the problem. Since these tools I believe are not
there to sell subscriptions, that means they don't make much in
revenue. Organic marketing is the best way for such tools and an easy
to remember name makes a huge difference.
URI [1]: https://gchq.github.io/CyberChef/
callumprentice wrote 21 hours 55 min ago:
Phenomenal collection but like the parent of this message, I have
many similar sites bookmarked but without a good bookmark manager
(Chrome), it's hard to add meta data like "I really like this page's
JSON formatter" etc.
I might have a go at a making meta-utility site when you enter names,
descriptions, tags etc. of a utility and it lists relevant sites.
To the parent's point about a good DOT COM, I have one that might be
perfect since I seem incapable of finishing the project I purchased
it for decades ago.
giancarlostoro wrote 1 day ago:
I was going to post this exact tool to see what the differences were.
As others have noted, GCHQ is basically the NSA for Britain.
lozf wrote 1 day ago:
You know that "this dude" is basically the UK Governments version of
the NSA, right? [1]
URI [1]: https://github.com/gchq
URI [2]: https://www.gchq.gov.uk/
giancarlostoro wrote 1 day ago:
Ah you beat me to it ;) I was chuckling when I read that
testycool wrote 1 day ago:
I was not expecting that. It's really interesting that they are
behind this.
catapart wrote 1 day ago:
my big gripe with them is that they aren't part of a "developer"
package my operating system offers. I wouldn't, personally, consider
any of these utilities "bloatware", if they were just on my machine.
They do something useful, even if I rarely need to do those things.
But even if we say that those apps would be "bloat" for an OS, I
should still be able to open the package manager and get a
vendor-supplied package that includes a bunch of utilities like this.
Not a third-party "if you know, you know" situation. Windows
Development Utilities. Ubuntu devutils. DevToolKit on MacOS. Etc.
Included as a toggle on the OS install screen, even.
But like... this is the kind of stuff I want an Operating System to
provide. Not just paging and networking and file storage, and so on,
but also utilities for me to operate the system specifically the way
I want to at any given time. Basic text entry, word processing, and -
yes - text manipulation utilities. Color space utilities. Randomizing
utilities. Password and cryptographic utilities. All of those with
familiar UIs that can be iterated on by the OSes and relied upon by
the devs.
fainpul wrote 20 hours 20 min ago:
Many of those things can be done with commandline utilities which
come pre-installed with your OS of choice. But you have to learn
about them, it's not a clicky GUI.
lcrz wrote 1 day ago:
That âdudeâ is the UKâs GCHQ. Of Bletchley Park fame.
FergusArgyll wrote 22 hours 40 min ago:
TIL!
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
CyberChef is a great tool, thanks for sharing that! One of my main
focuses was to create something a user could keep on their own system
if they wish. Only coming back to the actual site when/if they want
to get latest versions.
PhilippGille wrote 1 day ago:
CyberChef runs locally as well. It even has a download link for
that on the top left of the main page.
getpokedagain wrote 1 day ago:
I was going to ask. Is a goal here for users to self/locally host
if they like?
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
Yes, you can self host if youâd like as long as you donât
make it public. Be sure to get the latest version from GitHub
periodically, or not. If itâs working no need to update.
rvz wrote 1 day ago:
Nice, however:
> Vanilla JavaScript (ES6+) CSS3 with CSS Grid Minimal external
libraries: marked.js, exifr, highlight.js, sql-formatter (all from CDN)
No frameworks, no bundlers, no npm Hosted on Github Pages
One problem. - "Hosted on Github Pages"
I don't think either using GitHub or hosting it on Github Pages
respects the user's "privacy".
A better way is to self-host on your own server + domain instead.
frizlab wrote 1 day ago:
I fail to see how âhosted on Github Pagesâ has anything to do
with the userâs privacy⦠This is not a snark, I really would like
to understand.
toastal wrote 23 hours 58 min ago:
It allows Microsoft to collect the traffic data. Generally it also
implies the code is also hosted on Microsoft GitHubâwhich
requires an account, accepting ToS, training the Copilot models by
interacting with the platform.
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
Users do have the option to 'Git' or simply download the pages and
use them locally, can't get more private than that.
DJBunnies wrote 1 day ago:
Likewise the CDN's, probably.
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
CDNs are necessary for some tools, they wouldn't work without. The
do CDNs help eliminate bloat.
catapart wrote 1 day ago:
I mostly do front-end work, so I get why you would default to
CDNs - it's more likely that users ALREADY have that CDN link
downloaded and cached on their machine than not. It's absolutely
an upgrade for 99.9% of most use cases.
Here, on the other hand, you are trying for peak privacy, though,
so the situation reverses. Every single third-party request is a
potential attack vector. Contrary to general best practices, you
would want to force yourself to include every CDN package unless
there was some MASSIVE benefit to excluding them (and disabling
the utility that relies on it), like hundreds of MBs of data for
a rarely-used utility, or something that you wouldn't want to
force on the majority of users.
That aside, I really appreciate this collection! Local first will
always be preferred to server apps as far as I'm concerned, so
this is fantastic!
toastal wrote 1 day ago:
> it's more likely that users ALREADY have that CDN link
downloaded and cached on their machine than not
This isnât how itâs worked for years. Browser isolate
isolate assets like this to mitigate fingerprinting which
renders the whole concept of use-CDN-since-itâll-be-cached
moot.
DJBunnies wrote 1 day ago:
> CDNs are necessary
What exactly can't be repackaged / hosted alongside?
The bloat is still there, regardless of where its downloaded
from.
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
It could all be done alongside but this seems redundant to me,
the resources are already hosted elsewhere specifically for
this purpose.
DJBunnies wrote 1 day ago:
Right, including extra user tracking.
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
Yes, everything online seems to want to track you. I will
seriously consider making all resources local. Then the
tools could be used offline as well.
lukaslukas wrote 1 day ago:
Nice! I made something very similar, but with a focus on frequent daily
use, means no clicking required, you can only use keys
Look at stringify.cc
BLGardner wrote 1 day ago:
Nice set of tools! It's nice to see there are others that appreciate
ad free, no bloat tools!
DIR <- back to front page