I built, but now what?

Career (You Can Do This!)
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Hello everyone. This is going to be a long post, but I’d really appreciate it if you could take the time to read it and share your suggestions.

I started learning coding with FreeCodeCamp about two years ago when I felt stuck in my previous job. I completed the HTML course and about half of the CSS course, but then things changed and I had to stop.

Over time, I changed jobs and now I’m happy with what I’m doing. However, one thing I learned from the course, as well as from dozens of podcasts and success stories, is that if you have a solid idea, you can build a project and make it happen.

So, I did exactly that.

Using my professional background, I created a calculation spreadsheet in Excel. Then, with the help of Claude, I converted it into a browser-based reporting tool that is well organized, at least in my opinion.

I believe it’s a solid product and that it could potentially be sold in the maritime market. However, I’m not sure how to protect it.

If I upload it to the App Store or Google Play, or if I sell it online and send the code to someone by email, what’s stopping them from copying it? It feels like once they have the code, they effectively have ownership of it.

How should I proceed from here? How can I protect my project?

Thanks in advance for your suggestions and comments.

Happy coding!

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if you do this you are not giving the code, they install the app

you also don’t send the code via mail, if you host your browser based app, you create a subscription for users to use it. For an app to install locally you give an executable file that installs the app, not the raw app code

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If you host it as a web application on a cloud provider, you do not have to distribute your source code. Users interact with the app in their browser while the calculations run on your server.

A practical way to move forward:

Distribution and feedback:
Host the tool behind user accounts and invite three to five contacts from your maritime network to test it. Watch how they use it or ask them to run a real calculation. Early feedback from actual practitioners will tell you quickly whether the workflow matches industry routines.

Documentation:
Keep documentation short. A one-page guide explaining the required inputs, output definitions, and how edge cases are handled is much more helpful than a long manual.

Iteration:
Focus your early updates on fixing calculation edge cases and usability bottlenecks that users hit during testing. Once the core workflow is reliable and clear to users, you can decide on monetization and additional features.