I built a tool USELESS to most

Brian Quan — Wed, 15 Apr 2026 14:12:42 +0000

Hello everyone.

Let me start directly. I am a software engineer, mostly working from home and sitting way too long in front of my MacBook. In my last job, I led a team. I felt I should take responsibility for everything and worked extremely hard to make everyone happy. The teammates were happy, the bosses were happy with my job.

But I forgot about myself.

I was often working overtime, still at my desk at 1 am trying to make things perfect. I felt I had to do it because I was the leader. Eventually, I was extremely stressed and knew I had to change my life to make myself better. I quit that job to start a new journey: creating software that could help someone just like me.

So I created a desktop pet for Mac called NotiSprite. I feel it gives me the emotional support I need during my time in front of the screen. It is a cute selection of sprites that run on your desktop across multiple monitors. It gives me healthy reminders that it is time for a break or a meeting, and it gives me a daily quote to cheer me up. Anyway, it works for me at least.

I felt it was a great idea to push it to the public. I launched on Product Hunt, posted on Reddit, and tried to market NotiSprite on different platforms. I even presented it to my friends so they could use it freely.

The results are quite different from what I felt.

I love my project, but reactions from people are different. Mostly they think it is just a toy, not a productivity tool. It is really hard to change people's mindset about desktop companions. They always think it will be distracting! But I implemented so many configurations, like moving modes, staying in a certain corner, or changing the size, specifically because I don't want to be distracted either. I am using it every single day.

Anyway, I think I am falling down to the fact that all creators love their own projects, but not everyone else will like them. I might have created something useless to most but useful to me.

I still want to share this with you though. You are developers same as me, working so hard and sitting so long. Maybe you also need that emotional support from a cute pet. That is why I am posting here. I am looking for my kind of people.

If you want to try it, there is a free sprite called Noti Peach. My wife created it and I really like it. It is absolutely free to use.

Please let me know if you think it is useless or useful to you. This might completely change my thoughts and what to do next.

Take care! Stay safe!

App Store Link: https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/notisprite-smart-desktop-pet/id6752292657
Website Link: https://notisprite.com

Forem: Brian Quan

I built a tool USELESS to most