The practitioner's blog for solo founders shipping real AI SaaS. Reviews of AI coding tools, deep-dives on LLM infrastructure, and case studies from someone actually shipping.https://rikuq.com/en-ushttps://rikuq.com/blog/geo/citare-12-day-rebuild-story/https://rikuq.com/blog/geo/citare-12-day-rebuild-story/I underestimated Citare badly. V1 shipped in a weekend, satisfied no one, got scrapped. V2 took 12 days, 76k LOC, and is still iterating.Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/geo/four-index-reality/https://rikuq.com/blog/geo/four-index-reality/ChatGPT uses Bing. Gemini uses Google. Claude uses Brave. Perplexity uses its own. Tracking AI visibility means tracking four indexes, not one.Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/geo/geo-vs-seo-2026/https://rikuq.com/blog/geo/geo-vs-seo-2026/Google said AEO and GEO are 'still SEO.' Half-true. Heres the honest read on what changed on Google, what didnt on the other engines, and what to do.Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/infra/portkey-vs-helicone-vs-litellm-vs-openrouter/https://rikuq.com/blog/infra/portkey-vs-helicone-vs-litellm-vs-openrouter/Honest comparison of the 4 leading LLM gateways in 2026, plus where Prism enters as a new credible alternative. Updated for Fusion + edge replication.Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/infra/anthropic-prompt-caching-real-numbers/https://rikuq.com/blog/infra/anthropic-prompt-caching-real-numbers/Real first-party data: Anthropic prompt caching cut Citare's AI bill 25-35% on parsing-heavy workloads. What works, what doesn't, what burned me $20.Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/tools/github-copilot-review/https://rikuq.com/blog/tools/github-copilot-review/Brief-trial GitHub Copilot review from a solo founder who uses Claude Code daily. Honest verdict: enterprise tool. Not for solos. Here's who fits.Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/stack/production-stack-2026/https://rikuq.com/blog/stack/production-stack-2026/My complete 2026 stack — Cloudflare, Supabase, Paddle, Razorpay, Claude — and why hosting costs nothing while AI does. Honest picks from shipping.Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/finops/what-is-llm-finops/https://rikuq.com/blog/finops/what-is-llm-finops/LLM FinOps is the discipline of managing AI/LLM spend like serious infrastructure cost. Three frames — solo builder, engineering org, CFO — explained.Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/tools/windsurf-review/https://rikuq.com/blog/tools/windsurf-review/Honest Windsurf review from a solo founder who tried it briefly: multi-model IDE that's better suited to small teams than to solo agentic-AI builders.Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/essays/hello-from-rikuq/https://rikuq.com/blog/essays/hello-from-rikuq/I'm a non-coder who shipped 3 production AI SaaS solo. rikuq is the practitioner blog of everything I've learned. Here's the intro.Fri, 22 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/tools/antigravity-review/https://rikuq.com/blog/tools/antigravity-review/I used Antigravity heavily for months, then dropped it after the May 2026 redesign. Honest review of what worked, what broke, and who should still try it.Thu, 21 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/tools/best-ai-coding-tools-2026/https://rikuq.com/blog/tools/best-ai-coding-tools-2026/Claude Code, Cursor, Antigravity, Windsurf, Copilot — honest picks from a solo founder shipping 3 production AI SaaS. What I actually use, what I dropped.Thu, 21 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/tools/claude-code-review/https://rikuq.com/blog/tools/claude-code-review/Honest Claude Code review from a non-coder who shipped 3 production SaaS with it. My $200/mo Max setup, the killer moment, the failures.Thu, 21 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/tools/cursor-review/https://rikuq.com/blog/tools/cursor-review/Why I didn't stick with Cursor — and why that's a recommendation, not a complaint. Honest review from a founder who ships 3 SaaS in VSCode + Claude.Thu, 21 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://rikuq.com/blog/tools/cursor-vs-claude-code/https://rikuq.com/blog/tools/cursor-vs-claude-code/Cursor vs Claude Code, honest comparison from someone who shipped 3 SaaS solo on Claude. The framing most reviews miss — and the answer that matters.Thu, 21 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT