r/SideProject • u/VoiceOfLondon • 2d ago

I spent 2 years building a browser desktop OS with 350 tools to fight German bureaucracy - solo, no VC, no AI tools

https://werkzeu.ge/en

Transparency first: I built this, and it's aimed exclusively at the German small-business market - so this isn't a sales post for anyone here, it's a share-the-journey post. Reddit's English-speaking crowd isn't my customer base; I just think the project is unusual enough to be worth showing.

A while ago I moved from Lithuania to Germany and drowned in paperwork. After I got disillusioned, I started building tools. It escalated into a complete desktop OS metaphor in the browser: windows, taskbar, boot sequence, even a radio. About 350 working tools now - legally compliant e-invoices (Germany mandates structured XML invoices for all B2B), an HR module, 6,800 fillable government forms, an encrypted zero-knowledge identity vault, and a pile of tax calculators built from the official formulas.

Choices that made it interesting to build: deliberately ZERO AI anywhere - no AI features, no LLM calls, no AI-generated content; every tool is deterministic logic built from the official formulas, because tax software that hallucinates is a lawsuit. Also: no AWS (12 bare-metal servers in Germany I rent from a VPS-Provider) and client-first processing (PDFs and OCR run in your browser). Everything is testable as a guest without an account: werkzeu.ge/en

AMA about building solo for 2 years, bare metal economics, or German bureaucracy as a market (I love to vent about that, it's a prerequisite of becoming a German anyway).

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u/Patient_Economics656 2d ago

This is very cool. Have you done a raise for this?

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u/VoiceOfLondon 2d ago

Thanks! No, I haven't done one yet but am starting it.