Development Practices

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Answering “How Long Will This Take?” and Other Impossible Questions

Even if you have many unknown variables, plugging in a made-up number can help avoid analysis paralysis. Find the rough bounds of your problem and start making progress.

Development Practices

How to Ensure a Successful Mobile App Release

A smooth mobile app release should include several kinds of testing, Alpha and Beta distribution, and phased rollouts.

Development Practices

A Guide to Evaluating Closed- and Open-Source Libraries

Do your due diligence before picking out libraries, and you will save yourself a lot of headaches. Avoid things that are poorly maintained unless you want to end up maintaining the

Development Practices

Containers & Containerization – Pros and Cons

Development Practices

Document Your Project’s package.json File

It's a bummer that you can't comment JSON, but that shouldn't stop you from documenting the decisions in your package.json file.

Development Practices

A “Grand Unified Theory” of Agile

Agile isn’t about “doing practice X.” It’s about finding the set of practices that best meet the needs of a given team at a given time. That's not easy.

Development Practices

Strategies for Data Synchronization on Rewrite Projects: Part 3 – No Integration

Early release of working software is critical to a successful rewrite. In some circumstances, not sharing data between systems is a good option.

Development Practices

Strategies for Data Synchronization on Rewrite Projects, Part 2 – Two-Way Integration

Early release of working software is critical to a successful rewrite. Two-way data exchange can keep both systems working in parallel and reduce risk.

Development Practices

Strategies for Data Synchronization on Rewrite Projects: Part 1 – One-Way Integration

Early release of working software is critical to a successful rewrite. One-way data synchronization can be a useful strategy when its constraints fit.

Development Practices

The Non-Technical Challenges of Rewrites

If all of the weird quirks of an old system are reimplemented in a rewrite, all you're really doing is porting the old system to a new tech stack.

Development Practices

Open-Source vs. Build-Your-Own – A Formula for Deciding

You need to deliver a feature. Should you write the code yourself? Should you use one of the dozen open-source solutions available? How do you decide?

Development Practices

Organize One-Off Task Files with Dated Work Directories

Everyday developer tasks generate a lot of files. Here's an easy way to keep yours organized, and a shell function to help.

Development Practices

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