Copper

Promptfree, for everyone, and the only version there is

Copy the prompt for Claude CodeCopy the prompt for CodexCopy the prompt for Cursor

Copy

Build me a CRM that lives in my inbox, replacing Copper — and know why this is ALMOST.

The records are easy. The reason people adopt it is **that it is inside Gmail**, so the CRM is where the work already happens. Reproducing that means a browser extension or a Workspace add-on, maintained against an interface that changes without warning. That maintenance is the recurring cost and the reason for the verdict.

STACK
- Node 20+ with Fastify, server-rendered HTML with a little vanilla JS
- SQLite through better-sqlite3, WAL mode, with FTS5
- A browser extension, Manifest V3, injecting a sidebar — or a Workspace add-on, which is more stable and more restricted
- Caddy in front

THE DATA MODEL
- people: id, name, email, phone, title, company_id, owner_id, last_contacted_at, notes_md, created_at
- companies: id, name, domain, industry, size, owner_id
- opportunities: id, company_id, person_id, name, stage, amount_cents, currency, expected_close_on, closed_at, outcome, lost_reason, owner_id
- stage_history: id, opportunity_id, from_stage, to_stage, at, actor_id — append-only, and where every honest metric comes from. It cannot be reconstructed later
- activities: id, kind, subject, snippet, occurred_at, person_id, company_id, opportunity_id, source, external_id — mail, meeting, call, note
- tasks: id, title, due_at, completed_at, assignee_id, related_kind, related_id
- Every identity keyed on email address and domain, because that is what a mailbox gives you

THE SIDEBAR, WHICH IS THE PRODUCT
- Open a message and see who this is: their record, their company, the open opportunity, the last few activities, and the tasks due
- Log the message with one click, or automatically for known contacts
- Create a person, a company or an opportunity without leaving the message
- Add a note and a follow-up task from the same panel
- The extension talks only to your own server, with a token, and requests permission for one host rather than every site
- The interface it attaches to will change. Write the injection as one small adapter with a saved page fixture and a test, so a break is a failing test rather than a mystery. Say in the README that this is the ongoing cost

SYNC, SO NOBODY TYPES ANYTHING
- Read-only mailbox sync over the provider's API or IMAP: one activity per message with a known counterpart — the address, direction, subject, timestamp and a short snippet. Never the body
- Calendar sync: one activity per meeting with its attendees
- Contacts synced two-way if you want it, one-way if you want it simpler
- Incremental with a cursor, idempotent by external identifier
- The last-contacted date is derived and never typed. A CRM whose dates are maintained by hand is six weeks out of date within six weeks
- Say plainly in the README exactly what a mailbox sync stores. That restraint is what makes it usable

THE PIPELINE
- Stages defined by you, a board view, and drag to move — which writes a history row
- Conversion between stages and time in each stage, computed from that history
- Deals not moved in longer than the median stage duration, ranked. That list is worth more than any forecast
- A required lost reason on a lost deal, which is the only way anybody learns from losing

THE REST
- Views as saved filters over any object, with columns you choose
- Deduplication by exact email then by name similarity within a domain, reviewed by hand, merges reversible. Never automatic
- FTS5 across people, companies, notes and activity subjects
- Export everything as CSV and JSON in one command, including stage history

OPERATIONS
- .env: DATABASE_PATH, BASE_URL, SESSION_SECRET, ENCRYPTION_KEY, HASH_SALT, provider credentials
- Migrations on boot, each once; credentials encrypted at rest
- Nightly backup off the machine, restore script
- Health endpoint reporting the age of the last mail and calendar sync

WHAT MATTERS MOST
The sidebar adapter and stage history. The first is why anybody uses it and the reason it needs maintaining; the second is the only thing that will ever tell you something you did not already know.