About Boring Utils
Small, reliable tools for the dull jobs.
A small studio that does the boring chores of running domains and websites. We pick jobs that are easy to forget and expensive to get wrong, and do them carefully.
How we work
- One job each
- Each utility does one thing, says plainly what it found, and gets out of the way.
- Failures look like failures
- If a check can’t finish, you see a failed check. It is never shown as expired, and never as fine.
- Alerts, not promises
- We tell you what we found and when something is due. We never claim a site is secure, compliant or safe.
- Email you asked for
- We only email confirmed addresses, and every message has a one-click unsubscribe.
- As little data as the job needs
- An email address, the domains you watch, and their check results for 90 days. No tracking cookies, no ads, no selling data. The privacy policy lists everything.
- Files you keep
- Charts export as plain SVG and PNG files that work anywhere, without us.
What we make
Expiry Watch does the chores. We check the certificates, domain registrations, DNS and email settings and scheduled jobs behind your sites, and email you only when one needs you: a certificate close to expiring, a registration about to run out, a mail setting that quietly stops your email getting through or a backup or other scheduled job that didn’t run. It watches up to 10 domains for free. Registration expiry alerts need an expiry date we can get from the registry. If we can’t show one, check the renewal date with your registrar.
Chart Link is a bonus: it turns CSV or JSON into a chart you can put anywhere, an email, a Slack message, a README or a PDF. It draws the chart in your browser, so nothing you paste is uploaded, and exports SVG or PNG files.
We also write guides on the problems these tools exist for.
How we write guides
- Where a guide shows a command’s output, we ran the command before publishing and show what it printed.
- Every date, standard and limit links to its primary source, and each guide lists its sources with the date we checked them.
- When we couldn’t verify something, we leave it out or say so.
Found a mistake? Write to hello@boringutils.com. We fix errors and update the date.
How we make money
From paid plans. The one-off checks and the chart builder are free for everyone, and the free plan watches 10 domains. Paid plans watch up to 1,000 domains and add certificates checked every hour, alerts for SPF that mail servers reject and DMARC reports that won’t be delivered, more people to alert and client groups with a monthly report for each. Prices: Plus $15, Agency $49 and MSP $99 a month, or 10 months’ price for a year. Paddle, our merchant of record, takes the payments. The pricing page has the details. We don’t run ads, and we don’t sell your data.
About the name
The best utilities are the ones you stop thinking about: they do the same job the same way every time, and you only remember them on the day they save you. That’s the kind of boring we’re aiming for.
Contact
Questions, bug reports and ideas: hello@boringutils.com. A person reads every message.