I'm irked how "Firebase alternative" has come to mean "hosted database with an API layer". I mean, the key pitch of Firebase has always been that it's a realtime database. With both Supabase and Trailbase this seems a bit of a bonus aspect, kinda sorta half supported for a few things here and there. In Firebase meanwhile, as well as its successor Firestore, everything can be monitored in realtime. This is its key feature and all design choices derive from that. Notably all its weird limitations of the schema possibilities and query options derive from the goal to make a simple database that's 100% realtime-observable.
It's just super weird to me to see something presented as a "Firebase alternative" without a single realtime data sync example on the homepage. Trailbase has one deep, deep down the docs and nothing is explained about the "subscribe" limitations. That's not a Firebase alternative, it's just a hosted database. That's like calling a Chromebook an "iPhone alternative" because it lets you access WhatsApp and Twitter just like an iPhone would.
ps. I haven't followed Supabase a lot so maybe they got on top of this since, but it was pretty disappointing to me back when they launched to much fanfare. Like the only realtime thing they had was a counter or something like that.
We likely agree that firebase is superb. But your criticism of using ‘alternative’ is unjust both in terms of the breadth of firebase, and why a competitor might target someone about to choose Firebase.
I think it's fair criticism and certainly an area where TrailBase can improve (it's still young). FWIW, I used to avoid the "Firebase" comparison and be more descriptive with a long list of features. That confused a lot of folks. Firebase-like seemed to get the rough product-ballpark across more effectively. If I had to guess, I'd say Supabase probably arrived at a similar conclusion.
Either way, they are all rather broad products and many users only use subsets.
Thanks for speaking up, appreciated.
The Supabase comparison is pretty poor and needs improvement. In many ways TrailBase and PocketBase are architecturally a lot similar. The key-difference of both compared to Supabase is that they're a single executable, easy to self-host, less resource hungry and in many cases faster (for better or worse due to their simpler architecture). In case you're interested: https://trailbase.io/reference/benchmarks/
Sorry to hear. The beauty of giving folks admin access and that's why we can't have nice things :). Excuses aside, in case you're still interested maybe try a bit later. The demo resets regularly. If you still run into issue, please don't hesitate to send a quick, low-key bug report: https://github.com/trailbaseio/trailbase/issues . Strong wording welcome
This is pretty cool. Just needs clients for iOS and Android and it would be a rock solid replacement for a lot of large enterprises, or privacy minded companies.
Privacy, data ownership and reduced reliance on public clouds were definitely motivations.
A Java/Kotlin client is certainly on the short-list. We recently added one for Swift. There are also clients for Dart, TypeScript, and C# in case you're more into cross-platform app development (Flutter, React Native, and Maui/Avalonia respectively)
I'm irked how "Firebase alternative" has come to mean "hosted database with an API layer". I mean, the key pitch of Firebase has always been that it's a realtime database. With both Supabase and Trailbase this seems a bit of a bonus aspect, kinda sorta half supported for a few things here and there. In Firebase meanwhile, as well as its successor Firestore, everything can be monitored in realtime. This is its key feature and all design choices derive from that. Notably all its weird limitations of the schema possibilities and query options derive from the goal to make a simple database that's 100% realtime-observable.
It's just super weird to me to see something presented as a "Firebase alternative" without a single realtime data sync example on the homepage. Trailbase has one deep, deep down the docs and nothing is explained about the "subscribe" limitations. That's not a Firebase alternative, it's just a hosted database. That's like calling a Chromebook an "iPhone alternative" because it lets you access WhatsApp and Twitter just like an iPhone would.
ps. I haven't followed Supabase a lot so maybe they got on top of this since, but it was pretty disappointing to me back when they launched to much fanfare. Like the only realtime thing they had was a counter or something like that.
There is little mention of realtime on the Firebase landing page https://firebase.google.com
We likely agree that firebase is superb. But your criticism of using ‘alternative’ is unjust both in terms of the breadth of firebase, and why a competitor might target someone about to choose Firebase.
I think it's fair criticism and certainly an area where TrailBase can improve (it's still young). FWIW, I used to avoid the "Firebase" comparison and be more descriptive with a long list of features. That confused a lot of folks. Firebase-like seemed to get the rough product-ballpark across more effectively. If I had to guess, I'd say Supabase probably arrived at a similar conclusion.
Either way, they are all rather broad products and many users only use subsets. Thanks for speaking up, appreciated.
Nice. I assume this was inspired by Pocketbase (Golang): https://pocketbase.io/
Absolutely, PocketBase and Supabase. They're both awesome: https://trailbase.io/comparison/pocketbase/
What is the difference between this project and Supabase?
Does this project have a different focus than Supabase regarding the features to be implemented?
Supabase: https://supabase.com/
Looks like they compare it: https://trailbase.io/comparison/supabase/
Honestly they spent more time comparing supabase to pocketbase
The Supabase comparison is pretty poor and needs improvement. In many ways TrailBase and PocketBase are architecturally a lot similar. The key-difference of both compared to Supabase is that they're a single executable, easy to self-host, less resource hungry and in many cases faster (for better or worse due to their simpler architecture). In case you're interested: https://trailbase.io/reference/benchmarks/
Trying the online demo but it seems that it doesn't work properly, getting a lot of errors
Sorry to hear. The beauty of giving folks admin access and that's why we can't have nice things :). Excuses aside, in case you're still interested maybe try a bit later. The demo resets regularly. If you still run into issue, please don't hesitate to send a quick, low-key bug report: https://github.com/trailbaseio/trailbase/issues . Strong wording welcome
This is pretty cool. Just needs clients for iOS and Android and it would be a rock solid replacement for a lot of large enterprises, or privacy minded companies.
Privacy, data ownership and reduced reliance on public clouds were definitely motivations.
A Java/Kotlin client is certainly on the short-list. We recently added one for Swift. There are also clients for Dart, TypeScript, and C# in case you're more into cross-platform app development (Flutter, React Native, and Maui/Avalonia respectively)
How did you evaluate it so thoroughly?
good! i will try it in my next project.
Appreciated. If you run into any issues, please don't hesitate to file a quick report. Strong wording welcome :)