Issue #431

Tuesday 18th July’s issue is presented by Swarmia

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In addition to surfacing healthy metrics, it also offers a two-way integration between GitHub and Slack to keep you from jumping between apps and help you stay in the flow.

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Build Times And Developer Productivity

— Abi Noda

tl;dr: The takeaway is that even modest improvements to build times are helpful. Three things: (1) There is no specific threshold for how fast builds need to be for developers to stay on task and be productive. (2) Providing developers with estimated build times can improve productivity. (3) Even modest improvements in build latency can be helpful.

Leadership Management Productivity

Finding A Buddy When You’re A Team Of One

— Lara Hogan

tl;dr: These steps can help mitigate isolation felt when working as a "team of one," fostering a more supportive and collaborative work culture: (1) Regular Check-ins. (2) Peer Groups. (3) Cross-team collaboration. (4) Training sessions and workshops. (5) Online Social Activities. (6) Mentorship Programs. Lara explains how to act on each.

CareerAdvice

The Ultimate Guide To Developer Experience

—  Ari Koponen

tl;dr: Investing in developer experience is a bit of a no-brainer if you want to improve developer retention and productivity. But what are some practical ways to drive great DX in your organization?

Promoted by Swarmia

Leadership Management DevEx

Right-Sizing Your Technology Team

tl;dr: Authors provide insight into the following questions: (1) Do we have enough developers? (2) Are we paying more than we need to for our development efforts? (3) Why isn’t the software our developers are creating delivering the outcome we wanted to see? (4) Can we wind down or repurpose the number of developers maintaining some of our internal and legacy software capabilities? (5) Why is the value of our software falling?

Leadership Management

“Clean code always looks like it was written by someone who cares.”

— Michael Feathers

Measuring Performance For iOS Apps At Uber Scale

tl;dr: This article discusses how Uber measures performance metrics, specifically focusing on app startup performance on iOS. The article mentions that Uber monitors various critical metrics such as UI flow latency, memory usage, bandwidth, and UI jank. App launch times are highlighted as a crucial industry-standard metric that directly impacts the customer experience.

Mobile Scale

Common Design Patterns At Stripe

— Paul Asjes

tl;dr: “You might disagree with how the Stripe API is designed, and the design you end up with is likely going to be different than what we use. That’s just fine, since different companies have different use cases. Instead I present here some design patterns that I believe are generic enough to be useful for just about anyone in the API design process.”

API Design

Snapshot Testing

— Kent Beck

tl;dr: Kent explains what Snapshot Testing is and how it scores on the  test desiderata - a list of 12 desirable properties of tests. This list is a useful framework for evaluating different types of tests.

Testing

How I Run My Servers

— Wesley Aptekar-Cassels

tl;dr: The author uses a robust, low-maintenance server setup with DigitalOcean VMs, Debian 10, and Rust-based server software. Deployment is simplified with binary files, and SQLite databases ensure data safety. Nginx handles HTTPS, and services are isolated using individual Unix user accounts. Key takeaway: By utilizing tried-and-true, long-standing tools and methods, you can achieve a reliable, stable server infrastructure without over-reliance on cloud solutions.

Infrastructure

Recommended Reading

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