The Zen of Inbox Zero

Inbox Zero for Error Tracking

A practical guide to Inbox Zero for error tracking: why it works, when it doesn’t, and how it helps you stay focused, avoid buildup, and catch problems early.

June 13, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Developer Setting up Slack Messaging in Bugsink

Bugsink 1.6: Slack Alerts

Bugsink 1.6 is out, and the headline feature is Slack alerts. You can now receive real-time notifications in your Slack channels when new errors occur, making it easier to stay on top of issues as they arise.

June 11, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Temple of Observability, Errors to the Side

Track Errors First

Observability starts with errors, not dashboards. A case for tracking exceptions first — and not losing them in logs and metrics.

June 4, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Side by side comparison of Bugsink and Glitchtip

Bugsink vs. GlitchTip

If you’re self-hosting error tracking, you’ll likely run into two options that are actually maintained and built for self-hosting: GlitchTip and Bugsink...

May 7, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Software Developer, looking at sourcemaps

Introducing Sourcemaps

Bugsink 1.5 is out, and the headline feature is one people have been asking for the most: sourcemaps support. Sourcemaps are files that...

April 14, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Software Developer, looking at the Dokku installation screen

Bugsink on Dokku

Dokku is an open-source platform-as-a-service (PaaS) that helps you build and manage the lifecycle of applications from building to...

April 7, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Software Developer, looking at the Coolify installation screen

Bugsink on Coolify

Coolify is a platform that helps you manage your software stack. Bugsink is now available on Coolify, making it easier than ever to install and manage.

April 2, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Screenshot of the video

Demo Video

Don't want to read? Watch a 3-minute video on what Bugsink, how it can help you debug your applications, and how to install it...

April 1, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Software developer, holding his head in apparent frustration, looking at a Sentry invoice.

Saving Costs on Sentry

Sentry can get expensive quickly. Here's how some teams are saving thousands on their Sentry bill...

March 30, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
A conveyor belt with lady-bugs

Single-writer Database Architecture

Bugsink handles millions of events with a simple, predictable transaction model — built around SQLite and a single writer...

March 24, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Side by side comparison of Sentry and Bugsink

Sentry vs Bugsink

Tools like Sentry and Bugsink help capture exceptions, group related errors, and surface enough context to debug quickly. But beyond that...

March 21, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Magician switching two birds

Simple Import, Strange Error

Some Python behaviors are unexpected if you've never seen them. Others still seem unexpected once you’ve spent an hour debugging them…

March 18, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Man blowing things up on purpose (to gain understanding)

Raise Understanding

Here's a typical debugging scenario: you tweak the code, restart everything, but still – no difference. After 3 changes and some head-scratching…

March 17, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
A magnifying glass hovering over a number of 'tags'

Introducing Search

Bugsink 1.4 brings major improvements to search, making it easier to find relevant errors quickly.

March 13, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Launch rocket

Bugsink 1.4 released

Bugsink 1.4 is here! The biggest addition? Tag-based search — a structured way to find both issues and individual events.

March 13, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Launch rocket

Bugsink 1.3 released

Bugsink 1.3 is here! The biggest change? An optional way to store event data outside the database, making large-scale setups more efficient.

February 20, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Stack of Disks

Storing Event Data as Files

Bugsink stores events verbatim, preserving all details for later debugging and analysis. Until now, these events were always…

February 19, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
Launch rocket

Bugsink 1.2 released

Bugsink 1.2 is here, bringing better reliability and performance at scale. This release focuses on making Bugsink more efficient, especially when dealing…

February 11, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
The 'midwit' from the 'bell curve' meme

The Four Year Bug

Apparently, two hours is too short for a “hard bug.” I recently shared a story about an AI-induced crash in my code, which…

January 20, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
A scroll displaying the word 'license'

New License & Pricing

We're switching to the Polyform Shield License, making Bugsink free for non-competing uses, and we're introducing a hosted option.

January 15, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
A programmer and his copilot, about to crash

Copilot Induced Crash

AI-assisted code introduces new types of bugs. Here's how LLM-assisted coding gave me 2024's hardest-to-find bug.

January 14, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
A bug being held in a pair of hands

Handled Errors: why?

Handled errors explained: What they are, why they matter, and how to use them to debug and improve your app.

January 13, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
A plain-text stacktrace being 'colored in' with a brush to have more context

dsnrun: on-demand sentry-sdk

dsnrun is a small utility that lets you run any Python script with sentry_sdk enabled, without needing to modify the script itself.

January 6, 2025 by Klaas van Schelven
An eraser removing some complexity from a stacktrace

raise ... from None

In Python, exceptions can be chained to provide context about what went wrong and why. This is achieved through the "raise ... from" construct…

December 27, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Error Tracking in Django with Bugsink

Django Error Tracking

Django provides built-in error tracking that sends email reports for unhandled exceptions. While this is a good starting point, it lacks the features needed to effectively manage and debug errors in a live application. For a more robust solution…

December 19, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Magnifying glass over a log file showing a stack trace

Logs with full Stacktrace Context

There are times when you want to log "something interesting" that isn't quite an error, but still something that's interesting enough to get the same rich debugging context. This article shows how.

December 10, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Launch rocket with '1.0'

Bugsink 1.0 released

I'm thrilled to announce the release of Bugsink 1.0! This version reflects everything we’ve learned during the beta phases and earlier releases.

December 3, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
An overweight man with a hamburger in his hands on a scale, looking at measurements

You don't need Application Performance Monitoring

In this article, I’ll argue that APM tools are a trap. They encourage a reactive approach to performance, mask deeper design issues, and come with real costs that often outweigh the benefits. Instead of empowering…

November 5, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
A 'local development' environment with a hammer, a laptop, and a coffee cup

Error Tracking in Local Development

Bugsink is built to help you track and fix errors in your applications as they are deployed in production. But why not just use it in local development too? I do, and it's awesome. Here's why…

October 31, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Developer with servers being thrown away

Disposable Web Servers

Learn how to quickly build disposable Python web servers to solve specific problems, without the overhead of complex configurations. Perfect for debugging and quick testing.

October 18, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
A software developer with a puzzled look

The Stacktrace Puzzle

Explore how Python stacktraces with chained exceptions can become confusing puzzles and solve a few puzzles of your own.

October 17, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
'Authors' in a big factory -- AKA content-farm

The rise of on-site content farms

I stumbled upon a practice that I call “on-site content farming”, where otherwise non-spammy companies are creating spammy “howto” articles on their actual website.

October 14, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Scale as a sinking ship

Does it scale (down)?

A rant about the obsession with scalability, and how it can lead to over-engineering and complexity.

October 6, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Breadcrumbs

Local Variables as Accidental Breadcrumbs

Directly seeing the values for local variables in your stacktrace is invaluable for debugging — in fact it's one of the main reasons Bugsink is so useful. However: what actually gets captured depends on…

October 5, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Beta

Bugsink is in Public Beta

I'm excited to announce that Bugsink is now in public beta! We've been in private beta for most of September, and the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive.

October 4, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Self-hosting Sentry

I gave up on self-hosted Sentry

In the early 2010s, I was a big fan of Sentry. It was a great tool for tracking errors in web applications. At the time, I was making software for law firms, so sending error reports to a third-party service was out of the question, I needed…

September 6, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Snappea

Snappea: A Simple Task Queue for Python

Since Bugsink is only available self-hosted (we don't host it for you), we are obsessed with making installation as easy as possible. In an earlier article, we talked about how we do this by removing as many moving parts as possible. In this…

September 3, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Architecture in the process of being simplified (by removing parts)

Django Deployment, Simplified

Bugsink, our error tracking tool, is offered exclusively as a self-hosted piece of software. In a world dominated by SaaS solutions, this raises a critical two-part question: can we still persuade people to install their own software at…

August 30, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
Container filled with Snappea and Gunicorns

Multi-process Docker Images

In the world of modern software deployment, Docker has become a de facto standard. Its ability to create isolated, consistent environments has made it indispensable for developers and operations teams alike. However, running multiple…

August 29, 2024 by Klaas van Schelven
A man surrounded by stacks of paper; a big snail on a monitor

Software Bloat Makes me Sad

Most software is bloated, meaning: it's taking both a lot more space to store (both in memory and on disk) and more time to run than required…

July 3, 2015 by Klaas van Schelven