Hi all — quick intro and one weird story to break the ice. I’m Lucas, 29, freelance front-end dev from Bordeaux. I mostly do small Shopify themes and the odd WordPress blog for friends. I’m not here to preach — just sharing a slice of what happened last month because it still feels unreal.
A client wanted a flashy product filter and a landing look that would match a live event we had in two days. Budget was tiny, timeline tighter. One of the devs on a Discord server tossed me the name of a plugin said to “do it all” — no license, just drop it in. I hesitated, but everyone I asked shrugged (“everyone uses them,” “it’s fine if you’re careful”), so I installed it on a staging copy to test. The demo looked great, the client loved it, and we went live.
Two days later the checkout showed a weird banner no one added and an ad redirect flashed for some users. My client noticed; customers messaged us. I spent a long, panic-filled night rolling back, restoring backups, and then rebuilding the exact functionality using a combination of smaller legit plugins and a bit of custom code. The site worked again, the client paid, the event happened. People on the team still joke that I survived by espresso and blind panic.
What surprised me most wasn’t the technical mess — it was how casual the whole thing felt around me. Colleagues, friends, even a couple of clients admitted they’d “used one before” and never had issues. No drama, no guilt — just “it worked, then we fixed it.” I guess when you’re short on time and money, the risk feels abstract until it lands on your doorstep.
So why post this? Mostly to say hi and to give a real, human snapshot: shortcuts happen, teams shrug, and projects still ship. If you’ve got similar small-shop tales or just want to commiserate about last-minute launches, I’m all ears.
A client wanted a flashy product filter and a landing look that would match a live event we had in two days. Budget was tiny, timeline tighter. One of the devs on a Discord server tossed me the name of a plugin said to “do it all” — no license, just drop it in. I hesitated, but everyone I asked shrugged (“everyone uses them,” “it’s fine if you’re careful”), so I installed it on a staging copy to test. The demo looked great, the client loved it, and we went live.
Two days later the checkout showed a weird banner no one added and an ad redirect flashed for some users. My client noticed; customers messaged us. I spent a long, panic-filled night rolling back, restoring backups, and then rebuilding the exact functionality using a combination of smaller legit plugins and a bit of custom code. The site worked again, the client paid, the event happened. People on the team still joke that I survived by espresso and blind panic.
What surprised me most wasn’t the technical mess — it was how casual the whole thing felt around me. Colleagues, friends, even a couple of clients admitted they’d “used one before” and never had issues. No drama, no guilt — just “it worked, then we fixed it.” I guess when you’re short on time and money, the risk feels abstract until it lands on your doorstep.
So why post this? Mostly to say hi and to give a real, human snapshot: shortcuts happen, teams shrug, and projects still ship. If you’ve got similar small-shop tales or just want to commiserate about last-minute launches, I’m all ears.