Vernon de Goede

Is it finally time to say goodbye to ugly Objective-C wrappers for Kotlin shared code in our Kotlin Multiplatform apps? 🚀 Even though we started working with KMP less than a year ago, I still believe we are in the group of early adopters of this technology. Until now, we have used KMP to build two different apps which have roughly 80 downloads per day 📈 With that being said, during this year, one of the main issues of our iOS team had with debugging the compiled shared code was that KMP is currently generating Objective-C headers from Kotlin code 🤔 We are aware that Google will release Swift interoperability during this year, but I always thought to myself, there has to be a better way to do it. And, totally by accident, I found it today 💡 So apparently, there is a framework: https://skie.touchlab.co/, which can be used in KMP projects to generate Swift code based on generated Objective-C headers 🤯 I still didn’t try it out, but I plan on doing it in the upcoming week. Community developed frameworks rock 🤘🏻

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Bolt - 1 Year In I joined Bolt a little over a year ago to continue my passion for building products that make a difference in people’s lives. Looking back, here are my top 5 highlights at Bolt: Freedom in My Work: At Bolt, everyone owns their work. No one tells you what to do; you’re given the context, and the decisions are in your hands. This freedom has allowed me to find gaps and improve things beyond my “job description.” It feels great to truly own my work. Always Building Something New: We improve users' lives every day. We’ve launched new features and products continuously over this last year. For example, we developed Bolt Dine-in within a few months, a completely new product allowing customers to place orders via the Bolt Food App while sitting at a restaurant table. You can already find the Bolt QRs on tables in restaurants like LeBab. A Collaborative and Skilled Team: The people at Bolt are super nice, friendly, and collaborative. I’m never alone. I can always bounce ideas off others or brainstorm new concepts with anyone. Embracing Frugality: We strive to operate at minimal costs. Initially, this level of frugality was new to me, but now it makes perfect sense. This culture helps Bolt offer the lowest prices and remain accessible. We save every penny so customers can pay less. It has to come from within. Authentic Relationships (a.k.a. We’re not a family): At Bolt, we aren’t a family. We’re a group of passionate individuals working towards goals we believe in. We care for each other while challenging each other to grow, following the proverbial “challenge directly, care personally.” Honesty and respect define our interactions—no family involved. Is it all sugar, spice, and everything nice? Of course not. Things can and do go wrong. Nothing is perfect. But what I appreciate most about Bolt is the no-blame culture. When issues arise, we work together to find solutions. Good year 🌞

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Android Studio Meerkat | 2024.3.1 Canary 1 is now available. But this sparked significant backlash from developers. Why? They want to put back Clean Project and Rebuild Project buttons! Many argue that these features are essential for effective development, especially when dealing with complex projects or resolving build issues. Here’s why developers are frustrated: 1. Android Studio should avoid creating situations where these buttons are needed. 2. Full-time developers use Clean/Rebuild multiple times a day. 3. Making it harder to use your computer's CPU for clean/rebuild tasks is frustrating. 4. Issues with views or Dagger/Hilt often require a clean/rebuild to resolve. 5. Google’s changes seem to make simple tasks more complex. 6. Removing these options ignores the real needs of developers. 7. Developers feel disconnected from those making these decisions. 8. Burying useful functions makes life harder for new developers. What are your thoughts on this change? Have you experienced similar frustrations with recent Android Studio updates? #android #mobile

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Most developers are in trouble! StackBlitz's latest AI product Bolt is the closest we have seen to making 80%+ of developers obsolete. With one prompt it's able to build out a simple solution including all the files needed for deployment. Still error-prone on the first attempt but was able to fix the bugs automatically and after a few attempts, it worked. What does this mean? 1. As an engineer what matters is not the coding but the more complex and higher-level topics like architecture, security, tooling and user experience. 2. You no longer need a large technical team. 3. Distribution/Growth > Software. #ai #software #growth #marketing #developer #engineers https://lnkd.in/dpXKqVVQ

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Let's talk about Trust. Recently I just finished my skipper courses, and you know what - it's so much a software development. You're - a cross-functional team of 2-8 people - with a delivery idea of moving the vessel from point A to point B. But yet, that's an extreme sport - and as with every extreme team activity - Trust is key to success. A team member has the Trust if - believe other members are doing their best in their work - believe other member's estimations/promises are true - believe other members will raise a flag once trouble appears > We can fail, but fail quickly and learn. But how do you build that in the team? The first thing you do - you become such a person. You always do your best. You try to keep your word and promises. You fail and talk about that openly. You are - the Trust deliveryman. > As a leader, you need to trust your team first to be trusted. So what do you think? - Do you have a Trust-specific task in your backlog? - How do you measure the Trust in your team? - Did you have an experience where a lack of Trust became a blocker? inspired by https://lnkd.in/dGQCPi9v #LifeIsASoftwareDevelopment

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At Evoluted | Certified B Corp™, we've been using GitLab as our DevOps platform for years, and it's been fantastic. But as our Shopify client base has grown, we faced a challenge: no built-in GitLab-Shopify integration. Many developers solve this by building custom solutions. That's what I did! Over the past 6 months, I've developed an integration leveraging GitLab CI/CD and the Shopify CLI to automate theme deployments. Here's the benefit: Streamlined development workflows for Shopify stores on GitLab. It's not a silver bullet: This solution might not be as feature-rich as the official GitHub integration, but it's robust and ready to share. Calling all Shopify devs! Have you struggled with manual deployments? I'm sharing these scripts to help you improve your workflow, just like they've helped ours at Evoluted. Links to the full breakdown of the implementation: In the first comment. #shopify #gitlab #devops #ecommerce #cicd

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The word Medium......🤮 I can't use it. I cannot get it out of my mouth. At Itsavirus we use to work with naming our engineers like so many other companies do; junior, medior, senior, expert.... But the whole idea that we have "medior" people does not fit with my beliefs... at all. ➡️ First of all; people can never be 'medior'. We are all valuable in our own right. Calling people 'medior' sucks. ➡️ Secondly; I don't allow for any form of mediocracy in our company. It has no place at Itsavirus. We strive for the best. Any reference to 'medium' is just simply wrong. In my opinion engineers at Itsavirus are either skilled professionals that simply deliver or they are in the learning phase. And yes, also our skilled professionals keep on learning! This is one of the many reasons we have implemented IC levels. Below a rough description of how this works: 🐣 IC1 (Entry-Level): These team members are in the learning phase, focusing on growth and skill development. 🐥 IC2 (Proficient Professionals): Fully independent contributors who manage tasks autonomously, consistently delivering quality results. They provide reliable support and make substantial contributions to project outcomes. 🦆 IC3 (High Performers): Experienced professionals with a strong track record for excellence. These team members bring specialized knowledge, solve complex challenges, and deliver high-quality work and solutions. 🦢 IC4 (Leaders & Strategists): Our top-level experts who, in addition to providing exceptional work, also guide teams, offer strategic insight, and take on leadership roles to drive projects forward. The implementation of this model has more positive consequences 🛑 Junior Engineers No Longer Offered: Previously, having junior engineers in our offering made sense for handling simpler tasks. However, with the advancement of AI, many of these tasks can now be executed more efficiently using tools. 🛣️ Clear Career Path for Engineers: Our engineers have a well-defined growth path without the need to move into management roles unless they choose. This allows them to focus on their strengths and passion, building on technical expertise. 🫧 Transparent Growth and Fair Rewards: The IC model provides clarity on expectations and accomplishments, ensuring that career progression and compensation are transparent, fair, and aligned with performance and skills. 😎 Enhanced Client Experience: With defined IC levels, clients like you can have a clear understanding of the expertise and contributions each team member brings to your project. When we assign someone to your team, you know precisely what to expect based on their level. Added a picture to look tough ⬇️

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"Two front-end developers are sitting at a bar. They have nothing to talk about." I first heard this quote from Chris Coyier in 2019, but it feels even more relevant today. It's the idea that front-end has grown to cover so many different areas that it's *really hard* to be an expert at all of it. Some might be great at HTML/CSS and working closely with designers to implement slick designs and interactions. Others might be entirely focused on mastering a modern JS framework + metaframework to handle data fetching and building an architecturally sound front-end application. These are important skills, but mastering all of them is simply too much to ask of most front-end developers (especially juniors). That's why I think it's important to realize what you most enjoy working with, and then doubling down on that part. It's great to have an understanding of both "ends" of the front-end, but to really be great you probably have to narrow your focus. I'll also be diving into this a lot more in my upcoming course, so stay tuned for that 👀

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When someone talks about Portugal, what comes to your mind? The first that crosses my mind is that it's home to about 100K top-tier developers, 10K+ software companies, and a great place to hire an offshore team or even open an entire R&D center. And only then do I think about the ocean and the sun. Occupational deformation, what can I say. In recent years, Portugal has become one of the most attractive places to hire developers. Let's figure out why in our article: https://lnkd.in/dXutZfK3

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Dear Santa: All I want for X-mas is a stable stack. I don't care if it is frontend or backend, just make it with no breaking changes for a few months. ~ A pretty good hacker (in temperment not tech skillz) #frontend #backend #react #nextjs #node #typescript #python #openai #langchain #llamaindex #sst #opennext

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☝️ Things I didn't knew CSS could do. ...but now I do! 💡 On the very first edition (and the very first day even) of #FrontendNation, the largest free online frontend conference, I took the virtual stage to talk about CSS. About generous amount of features that were added to the #CSS spec and can replace your #sass or #JavaScript solutions. It's also a talk about learning about knowledge gaps and taking action when identifying them. It's okay to not know every latest technology (and there are plenty in the frontend space), as long as you know what to do if you encounter lack of knowledge. ...and that talk is online, free to watch: https://lnkd.in/eVMi28Fe 🍿

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Developers these days are so darned lazy. And cheap. OK, sorry, that was not fair. Developers have always been lazy and cheap. I was really surprised by this when I started out as a software developer, fresh out of college 25 years ago. I noticed that whenever my more experienced colleagues were asked to add new functionality, the first thing they did was to check if there was pre-existing code that did the job. Preferably free. This blew my mind. But as I thought more about it, it made sense. Especially after I attended a Business Strategy class at Southern Methodist University SMU Cox School of Business. Build vs Buy vs Reuse is a part of Business Strategy. Why build or buy something if it is freely available? When we start with something good-enough that is freely available, we can customize it to our needs. And if it is well-maintained, we get free upgrades. This frees up more time and money for us to build things that no one else can build as well as us, which makes customers very happy. It reduced the TCO (total cost of ownership) of our solutions and it increases our EBITDA, which usually makes investors very happy, which makes the board of directors very happy. So it turns out that developers are not only lazy and cheap, but they are also strategic and there is a lot we can learn from them. Especially when it comes to building Software Product Development Lifecycles. You may be tempted to reject the pre-existing frameworks and build your own because none of them are good enough for you. Newsflash! You might think you are unique and special and nobody is solving the specific kinds of problems you are. Maybe yes, maybe no. You are just as unique as every other snowflake. And while you might be doing something nobody else has done before, you don't need to develop your own SDLC. Think like a developer. Be lazy, cheap and strategic. Start with a pre-existing framework, make use of all the free training available on the market, and customize only what you need to. Your EBITDA will go up and your customers, investors and Board of Directors will be happy. You are welcome.

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Challenges with Storyblok in dev teams? This is how we guide you through. We work closely with development teams and get deep insights into their specific challenges with Storyblok. Even experienced developers sometimes encounter obstacles they can't overcome by themselves, which can raise doubts about Storyblok as a CMS. Here’s our process when developers approach us for assistance: 👉 We actively listen to understand the developers' issues so we can address them effectively. 👉 Then we provide tailored guidance to help developers to solve and overcome these challenges. 👉 We organize weekly calls to continually refine the developers use the platform and to fasten their technical growth. This approach ensures that all team members can use Storyblok efficiently and reliably. What challenges with Storyblok have you faced?

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Bolt.new latest AI based solution from StackBlitz to develop web/mobile application ready for deployment and try out prototypes 🚀 with such strong tools being available for developer we can free up some great minds to focus on solving the actual problem than just writing code, fixing bugs, testing and maintenance tasks. Sky is the limit.🚀 Zero to $4m ARR in 4 Weeks with 100k+ users! ⚡The interesting thing is all these things are done with the team size of <20 from StackBlitz. ⚡We can also start from Scratch with our preferred tech stack, they support lots of Available tech stack Boilerplate to kickstart. ⚡ Even we can directly deploy our apps with just one click on Netlify . Try it out guys 🚀 Definitely it will give u a Wow fact! Btw still we can't make our Complete Application from End-To-End, but still it will increase our productivity by boosting our Development 🚀 #AI #AITools #codeGen #LLM #ArtificialIntelligence #bolt #MERNStack #netlify Link to Bolt.new ..https://bolt.new/ StackBlitz is a collaborative, browser-based integrated development environment (IDE) designed for web developers. It streamlines the development process by eliminating the need for local setup, allowing developers to focus on coding directly in their browsers. I just give a simple prompt to build me an Job Portal and it gave such a nice new new interface which is ready to be hosted. Its going fuel the entire startup industry as entrepreneurs with GTM. #AIML #ML #AIM #Learning #Growing #leadership #MLops #LLM #NLP #NLU #GenerativeAI #Deeplearning #Innovation #MachineLearning #DataScience #DeepLearning #BoltNew #AI #AIPowered #NoCode #LowCode #FullStackDevelopment #DeveloperTools #StackBlitz #AIPlatform #WebDevelopment #CodingMadeEasy #AppDevelopment #SoftwareEngineering #Programming #DevTools #Automation #AIforDevelopers #Replit #AIinTech #TechTutorial #WebAppDevelopment #Innovation #FutureOfCoding #DigitalTransformation #TechCommunity #Productivity #LearnToCode #DevelopmentPlatform #CodeFreeDevelopment #MachineLearning #TechExploration #Startups

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What type of #iPaaS does your product need? Consider #NativeiPaaS to provide the integrations like you built it yourself!! 👍

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Bringing new developers on board can often be a lengthy endeavour, stretching over weeks or even months before they're fully integrated into a team and project. Consider this: during the onboarding period, every hour counts, both in terms of time and cost. Imagine a scenario where the average hourly rate for developers is $70/hr. If a new hire spends 60 hours onboarding, that translates to a significant investment of $4,200 just to get that developer up to speed. But that's not all. It's essential to consider the opportunity cost as well. A new developer, depending on their experience level might take over two months to reach full productivity. During this time, their output is not just limited; they're also more than twice as likely to leave due to ineffective onboarding. In essence, the true cost of onboarding extends beyond the dollars spent on training—it includes lost productivity, increased turnover, and missed opportunities. By streamlining your onboarding process with EaseIn(https://easein.io), you can not only save time but also maximise the return on your investment in new talent. #developeronboarding #onboarding #Productivity #Retention #Onboarding #employeeexperience #techonboarding

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I made the decision to port a long time website I implemented in Kotlin to... Rust. Why? Well... because Rust has won me over. It's a much more crude language than Kotlin, lacking a large amount of quality of life features (overloading, default values, named parameters, smart constructor syntax, and so much more) but... its tooling makes it such a joy to work with. I wrote one of my personal websites in Kotlin almost... eight years ago, I think? It's been running like clockwork for all that time, me making just a few minor changes or bug fixes now and then. I received a bug report a few weeks ago about that Kotlin inplementation and that prompted me to go back into it, and... I couldn't even build the thing. Mind you, I feel pretty knowledgeable about build tools on the JVM (after all, I created one! [1]) but the whole thing just... failed to build. I'm not even talking about building something I changed. I changed nothing: just pulled the repo. attempted to build it with the most recent version of Gradle, and it just... basically died after 20 seconds with some cryptic error. After silently cursing Gradle like I have been doing on a regular basis for the past twenty years, I realized I lacked the resolve and courage to investigate that failure so I guess I just... moved on? I have yet to encounter a `Cargo` target that exhibits the same failure, so that prompted me to ask myself... "What if I rewrote this Kotlin web server in Rust???". Answer, learnings, and conclusions in the next post. [1] https://lnkd.in/gk2SMXRK

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A bit more than a month ago, Bending Spoons announced their acquisition of WeTransfer, an Amsterdam-based company. Today it's reported that the new owner will lay off 75% of the staff (~260 people) and it made me feel a bit pensive. If you don't know Bending Spoons, it's an Italian tech company which acquires existing products and apps. Their strategy so far has been to buy assets that are past their high growth phase, and to make them (more) profitable. Over the last 2 years they bought a few well-known names like Hopin/Streamyard, Evernote, Meetup, and now WeTransfer, on top of lesser-known ones. Each of there products has a number of devoted users and stable revenue, most if not all of them are profitable, though at least some of them failed to meet their potential: * Evernote was valued at $1.1B back in 2013, but since then has fell of a cliff and has laid off most of their staff * Hopin raised more than $1B and was worth $8B at some point, driven by the pandemic-related need for virtual events; since then they shut down all their original products, the only one remaining were acquired apps like Streamyard * Meetup is still the go-to place for finding local hobbyist events to attend, but changed owners 3 times in the last 7 years Bending Spoons' model is similar after every acquisition – lay off most or all of the staff and bring the development in-house to lower the costs. Their operations and development in Italy is significantly cheaper than in US, and their products have trusted, if maybe sometimes tarnished, brands that can keep their existing users and potentially bring new ones. Does this work? Private equity companies have proven that acquiring companies and optimizing their costs can work, however since these transactions are private they often remain undisclosed, so it's hard to say how profitable it is. So far Bending Spoons has raised more than $500M and is valued at more than $2.5B, and this year they have been on acquisition spree. Back to WeTransfer, this one hurts a bit. While I was never a heavy user, I've always seen WeTransfer as a special company – they are a certified B Corp, they've been using their advertising platform to promote artists and culture, they commissioned a short film that won an Oscar. They were also about to go public back in 2022, but their struggled with their business model under the new reality of higher interest rates. So it stings a bit that a local, Amsterdam based, quirky company with such an impact on culture ends up as just yet another product in a large portfolio. Good luck to Bending Spoons though, it's good to see a European tech company growing so quickly!

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