Hi, I'm Dipto - I built an open source YouTube blocker used by 5,000+ people

Hey everyone! 👋

I'm Dipto, a developer from Bangladesh. I've been lurking here for a while, learning from all of you, and finally decided to introduce myself and share something I've been working on.

A bit about me:

- 🇧🇩 Based in Dhaka, Bangladesh

- 💻 Self-taught developer (started with HTML/CSS 8 years ago, somehow ended up building Chrome extensions)

- ☕ Fueled by cha (that's Bengali tea) and way too much curiosity

- 🌙 Night coder - my best ideas come at 2 AM

What I built:

Clify - an open source YouTube Shorts blocker that also lets you block videos with keywords in 35+ languages.

Why I built it:

I kept falling into YouTube Shorts rabbit holes. One tutorial would somehow become 2 hours of mindless scrolling. Sound familiar? 😅

I built the first version for myself at 2 AM (classic). Shared it with friends. They wanted more features. Kept building. Now 5,000+ people use it daily and we've blocked over 500,000 distracting videos!

The cool part: It works in 35+ languages including Bengali, Hindi, Arabic, Spanish, Chinese, and more. Most blockers are English-only, but I wanted something that works for everyone.

Tech stack:

- Vanilla JavaScript (no frameworks, keep it simple)

- Chrome Extensions Manifest V3

- GitHub for hosting

- Telegram for community

What I learned:

- Building for yourself first is the best way to start

- Open source means free QA and amazing contributors

- Multi-language support is HARD (unicode normalization is a beast)

- Your "stupid 2 AM project" might actually help thousands of people

I'm here to:

- Learn from this amazing community

- Share what I've learned about Chrome extensions

- Get feedback on Clify

- Maybe find contributors who want to help with the Firefox port

The project: https://diptodesign.github.io/clifydl/

My GitHub: https://github.com/diptodesign/clify

Nice to meet you all! Ask me anything about building extensions, coding at 2 AM, or Bangladeshi tea! ☕🇧🇩

P.S. - If you speak a language that's not supported yet, let me know! We're always adding more. 🌍