I've always been obsessed with tracking things in my life - books, movies, habits, finances, workouts. But for every new thing that I wanted to track, or every new tool that I needed, I had to download another app or service. Some of them I even had to pay for.

My data was scattered across apps, scripts, spreadsheets and notes. None of it was connected in any way. And most of it wasn't even owned by me, I couldn't export my habits data and query it myself.

Atlas - What I Built

I started small, just a simple habit tracker to see whether I did my flashcards and guitar practice.

Then one day I went for a run, got annoyed at Strava (again), and thought: why not just add runs to my own dashboard?

And that's how it went. Runs turned into workouts, books, movies, games, subscriptions. Everything lives in one system - one database, one API, multiple ways to interact with it.

What It Can Do

Right now, my system lets me:

• Track finances, subscriptions, and portfolio value
• Manage books, movies, and games with ratings and history
• Analyze runs and workouts
• Aggregate YouTube videos and articles
• Learn with flashcards
• Run small custom tools like timers

Everything is queryable and connected.

Alfred - My True Assistant

Once everything lives in one place, a different interface becomes possible.

I built a simple agent that can query my database and call API endpoints.

Instead of navigating UIs, I just ask:

• "What books did I read this year?"
• "What are my highest-rated movies?"
• "Add a flashcard for Informatieverwerkingssystemenbeheer (I love Dutch)"

This only works because the data is mine, structured, and accessible. It turns an LLM into a real assistant, just like Alfred from Batman.

Why Bother, It Seems Like a Lot of Work

You may be thinking: this must have taken a huge amount of time to build.

It didn't. Most of the functionality came together over a single weekend. AI makes this kind of thing actually feasible. If I had to carefully design and implement every part of this system by hand, I probably wouldn't even start.

But today I can spin up OpenCode, and in a matter of minutes end up with tools I'll use for years.

One day I decided I didn't want to use Anki anymore. Within an hour, I had all my data migrated into a system I fully control. It cost me about $1 in inference (thanks, QWEN) and now I can extend it however I want.

Under the hood, the stack is very simple:

• SQLite database
• Bun + Hono backend
• React frontend, CLI, Raycast
• Vercel's AI SDK for AI integration
• Hosted on a Raspberry Pi through Tailscale

That's another advantage. Because it's personal, you can keep it simple - you don't need insane kubernetes architecture or analytics.

Join Me

I strongly believe that personal software should be personal. A one-size-fits-all SaaS will never fit you as well as something you control. And the barrier to building it is lower than it's ever been.

Since this project is meant to be adjusted perfectly to you, I'm not sharing a codebase. Instead, I created a starting prompt that captures the idea and architecture.

Feel free to paste it into any coding agent you like — Lovable, v0, Claude Code, or any other. The output should give you a solid starting point for iterating.

Personal Backend Prompt - GitHub Gist

Build something that actually fits your life. And if you want to share it, I'd love to see it.