Show HN: Electronics Hobbyists – Feedback on Search Startup | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: Electronics Hobbyists – Feedback on Search Startup

buyparts.io

11 pointsbuyparts14 comments

I tried to reply to this on eda board but not enough privileges so I'll do it here.

It's similar to Octopart but with free typing for filtering which is great. Thumbs up for the interface. Thumbs up for content. The interesting bit is that Octopart integrates the availability and pricing buy you dont. It is more like a pure part selection which connects to 3rd part sites for the inventory. Overall I would say for data it looks like the best site out there. Comprehensive. Hands down the winner. Parametric fields and one click files are just perfect. For ordering I would say it's a pain in the behind. No one, and I mean no one can order their parts list by searching separately for each part. You really need to rethink that

Sorry. I found this a little difficult to use. I searched for a few terms and had results that seemed to be in a wide range of categories. Take a look a digikeys search results as an example of results categorization.

Also, I found the pictures on the front page to be without rhyme or reason. One example: Why separate icons for different color leds but not for different types of capacitors? Why aren’t similar items grouped together. Try taking a look at McMaster-Carr’s website for a GREAT example of visual product selection.

Thanks Matt, appreciate note on the homepage images. they are just for search engines to pickup content. Sites not really geared for browsing like McMaster but more focused on searching and faceting using the input boxes in the table headers. So it's really for users who have specific paramaters they're looking for.

It is early so all this feedback is good. Seems to have the marmite effect at the moment. Some users loving it. Some users not.

A few people have said that a key feature of faceting by inputting paramaters is not clear enough and needs some guidance for the user. May revise that a bit.

Good luck. Great idea to solicit feedback early

At first glance it seems like a more visually friendly version of a digikey/jameco style parts interface. In order to be comparable however you need to have more categories of information per part to help sort them. That might go against the design feel, but from a normal workflow on digikey/jameco, I'm personally very used to finding the general category and iteratively adding more constraints until a few parts are left.

Good. The narrowing with inputs is neat. Needs bom upload.

PROS: Spam free Very Fast Lots of data Works on mobile Effective with params

CONS: Only 150 results each search Sites whois private bom

Check out Octopart for an example of this concept done right. To differentiate, need to work on discoverability/browseability. When I click on connectors, viewing a list of the first 150 of 490K items is not useful in any way.

thank you eatenbyagrue. We have faceting as an input on every column for those 490k items. As with every category (like an autocomplete). As well as complete parametric search capabilities.

I looked through the logs to see your actions. You were on the site for less than 80 seconds. Did not use search or attempt to facet from the columns. Only accessed 2 category pages and then exited.

So my thoughts... do you have javascript disabled or was the faceting not visible/clear?

I think it’s just personal preference. For me it has several wins over octopart and I got the input filtering which is really cool. Really neat man. Shame it’s all single search at a time.

thanks boardguy. multisearch is something we may look at in the near future.

Excellent. Direct comprehensive information with no hassle. So curious whos backing the platform?

Early demo but any thoughts on this? good or bad. All suggestions appreciated.

It runs super fast on mobile. The UI feels a bit lacking and unfinished.

Keep up the good work

I sent this link to some of our colleagues at Altadox. They have been using it all day so its good.

150 results is too small. better than element14, digikey

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