Lumy is transitioning from a closed-source application written and maintained by one person to a community-led effort. The remainder of this page is aimed at detailing the “why” behind this decision and what it means for the Lumy community.
The decision to open-source Lumy is one that has been on my (Brandon’s) mind for a long time. Back when I started Lumy, it was a creative outlet for me. Its primary purpose was being a fun way to play around with the YNAB API. Three years later, Lumy has turned into a full-fledged application with hundreds of subscribers. While that is such a dream come true for me, it is not without its challenges.
When I started working on Lumy seriously, I was waking up before anybody in my house, sneaking an hour or two of development in, and then returning to full-time husband and father duties. It was a lot of work, but was also a lot of fun.
Fast forward a couple years and we’ve increased our child count by 33%, and I struggle to find the energy to continue to work in that same manner. Beyond that, the responsiveness I believe I owe subscribers makes it difficult to balance remaining present with my family while also upholding my “end of the deal”. My belief is that by acknowledging my limitations and opening up Lumy to the community, I can continue to provide a great experience for users while also being present for my family.
Since starting Lumy, YNAB has also changed quite a bit. The addition of the Reflect tab, while not as fully featured as Lumy, has given me just enough information on mobile to (mostly) satisfy my needs. There are still gaps, however. I use Lumy’s advanced spend trackers quite a bit to keep tabs on spending that doesn’t quite fit nicely into a single category. I use its target health report to assess how accurate my targets are and I adjust them on an annual basis. For those reasons and more, I definitely still believe Lumy has a place in the YNAB ecosystem. I just find that I open Lumy less than I used to, and that change has made me personally less driven to continue to add features. I’ve always believed that the best way to write software is to add the things you want to use most, as it aligns your passions/needs with the software. By opening Lumy up for external contributions, my hope is that the broader comumnity will apply this same philosophy and continue to make Lumy a great experience for all users.
Lumy will continue to be free by default. Users who never subscribed will now be able to use Lumy without any limitations. Subscribers will no longer be charged, and will continue to have all of Lumy’s features available. Because the bar for the software’s quality will remain high, regardless of who contributes, my hope is that Lumy will continue to remain stable and usable for all.
With users no longer being charged, I will be responsible for covering the costs of running Lumy. If you’re a subscriber and would like to continue supporting Lumy, you can always make a donation here.
If you’re interested in contributing to Lumy, you can find the source code on GitHub. Please read the CONTRIBUTING.md before opening a pull request.
I want to thank all of Lumy’s users for their support over the years. I hope that this change will allow Lumy to continue to be a great experience for all users, and I look forward to seeing what the community can do with it.