I make apps
and websites.
One at a time.
Penedo Labs is me, Efrén. I’m a physicist. I’ve spent eight years building electronics and software for CERN, where you don’t get a second go at the hardware once the machine is running.
A penedo is the block of granite that crowns a Galician hillside. It stays put for centuries because what holds it up runs far deeper than the part you can see. That’s what I go for in what I build.
What I’m making
Things I’ve built and still keep running. Have a click around.
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MapToArt
Pick a city and you get a poster of it. It pulls the street network out of OpenStreetMap, gives you 25 colour themes to try, and hands back a 300 DPI file. You print it wherever you like, so nothing has to be shipped to you.
maptoart.com (opens in a new tab) -
Inquly
Free rental management for Spanish landlords. It chases the rent, writes contracts that follow the LAU, and fills in your 303, 347 and 390. Tenants get their own portal, which is mostly so they stop sending you photos of receipts.
inquly.com (opens in a new tab) -
Vestava
Photograph your clothes and get them in order. Build outfits, see what you actually reach for, and find out what each thing has really cost you per wear. It all stays on your phone. There is no account and nothing gets uploaded. The iOS build is with Apple.
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Vecindad Ames
A neighbourhood platform for Ames, the council I live in. People put projects forward and get to see what becomes of them. It also walks you through the paperwork everyone runs into sooner or later: registering, local taxes, grants. Galician, Spanish and English, installable, and it still works with no signal.
ames.penedolabs.com (opens in a new tab) -
Kuadri
For people whose week isn’t nine to five. You draw your shift cycle once and it fills in the months ahead. It works out your pay with nights and holidays counted, and keeps track of swaps with colleagues. Works offline, and never asks who you are.
How I work
You talk to me, I take on few things at once, and what I build is meant to still be working in five years.
- You deal with me
- There’s no account manager, and nobody hands you off once the work starts. The person who answers your email is the one writing the code, and you’ll hear back in a day or two.
- Few jobs at a time
- I only take on what I can actually finish, so you’re not sitting behind six other clients. It makes for a longer calendar, with a lot less dead time in it.
- Boring on the inside
- I use dependencies I expect to still be around in five years, and I skip whatever framework came out last month. It’s dull, but it’s what lets you change something in two years without paying to have it rebuilt.
- It tells you when it breaks
- Everything breaks sooner or later. What costs you money is when it breaks quietly, so the things I build make a noise about their own errors. Hardly anyone asks for this. It’s the bit I care about most.
- Written down
- I leave notes saying why things are the way they are, and I test on the old phone, not the new one. Both are for whoever picks this up next, which might not be me.
Say hello
I’m free for website work. Tell me what you need, what it has to do and roughly when, and here’s what happens next.
- I get back to you in a day or two. Always, even when the answer is no.
- We talk for half an hour. Nothing rides on it.
- You get a fixed price in writing, with what’s included and the dates. Nothing costs you a euro until you say yes.
Or write to hello@penedolabs.com, whichever you prefer.