Solving Session Persistence, Finding Product Clarity, and Laying Groundwork for Strategic Integrations

Startup Status – April 25, 2024

Founder: Richard

Another day deep in the weeds—but in a good way. Today was all about session persistence. Still can’t believe how something this foundational keeps breaking at the worst possible times. Current bug: sessions drop on hard refreshes like it’s 2007. Devs in the pilot are understandably frustrated. Onboarding is basically unusable without persistent auth—it’s like asking someone to log into Slack every time they open a new tab.

What I Worked On

• Focused entirely on Supabase session persistence. Refactored the auth layer to store sessions in localStorage instead of relying on their default caching.
• Added a boot-time sync check between localStorage and the session state on Supabase. Still some edge cases around token expiration, but early signs are promising.
• Added a lightweight visual indicator to simulate whether the session “sticks” between page loads. Just a tiny green dot—but useful for debugging in real time.

Also synced with our part-time designer. Short version: timeline on UI/UX polish is slipping. We had a good convo, though. Refocused scope to attack onboarding microcopy first (where most of the pain is), then circle back to visuals. Not perfect, but pragmatic.

Random Thought

The difference between polish and progress is narrower than it looks. Right now, onboarding fails not because of code, but because of friction. That’s the UX trap when building for engineers: we tolerate jank—to a point.

Highlight: Possible Integrations?

Had an inbound chat with a founder working on an SDK analytics platform. It’s early, but we jammed on some shared use cases: usage-based billing rooted in identity sessions, session-aware tracking, smart retries. No promises yet, but great signal. Even the possibility of layering over another platform makes the vision feel more real.

Friction Point(s)

• Supabase’s session handling docs are… minimal. Feels like I’m reverse-engineering their SDK half the time.
• Juggling deck updates with deep code work is annoying. There’s no easy way to switch cognitive modes. I keep a notes file open throughout the day and turn it into “investor narrative” at night. Feels hacky but it works.

Biggest Win

All signs point to a partial fix on session persistence by end of tomorrow. That unblocks onboarding. That unlocks more testers. That unlocks real feedback loops. Momentum compounds.

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✍️ Today’s "How-To": Session Persistence with Supabase Auth

If your Supabase sessions are nuked on refresh, here’s a quick workaround to create more reliable persistence:

1. Store the session token manually:

   const session = supabase.auth.getSession();
   localStorage.setItem("sb_session", JSON.stringify(session));
   

2. On app boot, check and restore:

   const raw = localStorage.getItem("sb_session");
   if (raw) {
     const parsed = JSON.parse(raw);
     supabase.auth.setSession(parsed);
   }
   

3. Bonus: Add a visual indicator to show session state.

   useEffect(() => {
     const { data: listener } = supabase.auth.onAuthStateChange((event, session) => {
       setSessionStatus(Boolean(session));
     });
     return () => listener?.unsubscribe();
   }, []);
   

This isn’t battle-tested for prod (yet), but it provides stability while working on a wrapper that abstracts this across providers.

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Tomorrow’s plan: test the patch end-to-end, clean up observability around auth failures, and finalize the investor deck before Friday. Oh, and maybe sleep more than 5 hours.

We’re inching forward—but every inch matters.

— Richard