Rolo - Personal Contact Manager

A simple, fast PWA for remembering people I meet while traveling and working remotely.

🔗 Live at rolo.ninja

The Problem

I travel 2-3 months/year for work and meet tons of people - at conferences, coworking spaces, coffee shops. My phone's contacts app is too slow and cluttered for quick capture. I needed something lightweight that works offline and focuses on context: where I met someone and what we talked about.

The Solution

Built a dead-simple Progressive Web App that prioritizes speed and offline-first functionality. Add a contact in seconds, search instantly, works without internet.

Features

• Quick Capture: Name, location, notes - that's it. No friction.
• Offline-First: PWA means it works without service (crucial when traveling)
• Fast Search: Find people by name, where you met, or conversation topics
• Clean UI: No clutter, just the essentials
• Syncs Across Devices: MongoDB backend keeps everything in sync

Tech Stack

Frontend:

• React + TypeScript
• PWA (service workers, offline support)
• GraphQL client (Apollo)

Backend:

• Node.js + Express
• GraphQL API (type-safe)
• MongoDB

DX:

• Full type safety via GraphQL Code Generator
• Monorepo structure
• Hot reload in development

Architecture

The app uses GraphQL to maintain type safety end-to-end. When the schema changes, types are automatically generated for both client and server, preventing runtime errors and enabling great autocomplete.

Client queries are defined in .graphql files, which generate React hooks for data fetching. It's a nice DX for a simple app.

Local Development

# Install dependencies
cd client && npm install
cd ../server && npm install

# Start MongoDB locally (port 27017)

# Copy .env.sample files and configure
# See repo for details

# Run
cd client && npm start      # localhost:3000
cd server && npm run start-dev  # localhost:4000

Why I Built This

Started as a weekend project to solve my own problem. Kept iterating on it because I actually use it daily. It's taught me that the best tools are often the simplest ones - just solve the core problem well.

Also wanted to experiment with PWA capabilities and GraphQL type generation in a real app I'd actually use long-term.

Status

✅ Live and actively used
Built over a few weekends in 2024, ongoing minor improvements as I find rough edges while traveling.

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Built by @arist0tl3