Michael Boston

It’s another Sunday, so let’s write some more databass! Join me at 1:30pm CDT. Reminder, I’ve moved my stream to YouTube. Follow this link to catch today’s session: https://lnkd.in/eFnqnrNQ In your time zone: https://lnkd.in/eVUxXh7x #RustLang #Databases #LSMTree

1

1 Comment

Reminder to devs, designers, PMs, BAs, QA, etc. Accessibility is all of our responsibility. Not just for compliance with ADA, but to help maintain an open and accessible internet. It doesn't take much effort to educate yourself on the bare minimum. W3 WAI provides a free course to get started here

10

Hey folks, I won’t stream today. See you next week! In the meantime you can follow my YouTube channel if you want to catch the next one or see past episodes: youtube.com/@seancribbs #RustLang #Erlang #Databases

8

Quick question for my network! I recently got a new job working for the library and was looking into what kind of tech roles they offer, and it looks like they are running Drupal with Twig. After doing a little bit of research, it looks like Drupal is pretty robust and used for large scale apps (or apps that need scalability). I want to pick up some skills with Drupal, but starting my own project feels silly because I don't really have any ideas for something that would necessarily need this stack. I'm curious if anyone knows of any open source projects that I could jump in on, or if anyone has created their own projects with Drupal? Any and all tips accepted! #Drupal #DevQuestion #DevAdvice #OpenSource

3

6 Comments

As a VA Lighthouse Alumn, I cannot say enough positive things about Dave and how incredibly impactful this opportunity is. AMA about building the developer experience at the VA. VA’s digital transformation strategy https://lnkd.in/gjPsBBsv

3

If you're the kind of person who's excited about all the recent S3 feature announcements (bucket policy unlocks via temporary root sessions, up to millions of buckets per account, pagination and region filtering for ListBuckets, conditional writes, ListCallerAccessGrants API) and you're attending re:Invent, then you should come to our storage track session, STG306 Advanced security patterns on Amazon S3. Learn how to use all the exciting new stuff securely in the most interactive format available at re:Invent!

94

2 Comments

It was a privilege to share our best tips for creating accessible representations of data, and the importance of building accessible charts, graphs and visualizations in products. It was an honor to be a part of such an amazing lineup of speakers at the World Usability Congress this morning. #dataaccessibility, #datavisualization #a11y

19

1 Comment

Jr. Devs, You need to start thinking outside the box when it comes to your career. I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday and they were telling me about a small business their children (12 and under) had started. I won’t reveal what it is to protect their small advantage. :) But basically, it's providing a simple service that takes very little time for very little cost. It's offering a convenience. Anyway, as he was telling me about it, it was so simple, so obvious, but something I would have never thought of on my own. I’m not really an idea person. I need something to start with, a clear problem to solve. I often need a pre-defined path to follow. Many Jr. Devs need to be less like me, trying to follow the pre-defined path, and more like my friend, looking for things other people might be missing, opportunities no one may notice. Think about ways you could implement what you are learning to help individuals, small businesses, local governments… virtually anyone; to fix a problem, meet a need, or simply make someone’s life easier in areas they may not have thought of themselves. The traditional route into development is clogged right now, so perhaps it’s time to look around and see opportunities from a different perspective. Find a non-traditional route to begin using your skills in a career that might look a little different from everyone else. Who knows, you just might stumble on the next Uber or Airbnb or maybe you just build a great list of clients who need simple work from a trustworthy developer. Take a fresh look at the problem and find a creative solution. #juniordeveloper #mentoring

14

1 Comment

Fellow Hiring Managers, Be a knife collector! A Swiss Army Knife collector to be specific. In 2024 when AI has memorized every coding language, you should be looking for a software engineer who can pickup a new language over the weekend and make something with it vs a coder who has memorized 0.000001 of what AI has. Look at their accomplishments and if you give them a coding challenge, don't look for immediate proficiency, instead look for adaptability. Have them code in a language new to them but don't do it over their shoulder. Your software engineers need to be Swiss army knives, not encyclopedias. We have AI for that now.

11

I remember when I first transitioned from being a UI Developer to a manager of a software-engineering team. It was a challenging shift, but one that ultimately taught me the importance of effective team management. One key lesson I learned early on was the value of clear communication. Ensuring that team members are on the same page, understand their roles and responsibilities, and feel comfortable sharing their ideas is crucial for a successful project. Another important aspect of team management is fostering a positive and collaborative work environment. Encouraging teamwork, recognizing individual contributions, and providing support when needed can go a long way in boosting team morale and productivity. Above all, I've come to realize that being a manager is not just about overseeing tasks and deadlines, but also about empowering and developing your team members. Investing in their growth, providing opportunities for learning and development, and being a supportive leader can help your team reach new heights. As a manager of a software-engineering team, I am constantly striving to improve my skills and learn from my experiences. Team management is a continuous learning process, and I am grateful for the opportunity to lead and inspire my team to achieve great things.

1

Years ago Brian Pope and I "invented" Mob Design. We'd attended a Mob Programming workshop by Woody Zuill a year or so before and the next project we were on we decided to see if we could also do UI/UX design that way. The way it worked was we had a component library (read: small design system) and we'd go meet with our customer once a week to talk about their needs. They'd tell us specific things they needed their folks to be able to do. We'd ask a million questions to make sure we understood what they were really after. Then we'd return to the office and the whole team (Brian, 2 devs, and me) would grab a giant whiteboard and start talking about what the customer said. Brian would usually start with an initial drawing of what he thought made sense from the UI, but as he talked each of us would grab a marker and start adding or removing things. In under 30 minutes we'd have a design of what that part of the page would look like. And the really cool part was more times than not, by the time we were done talking about it, one of the devs would spin their laptop around and show us how it looked in Storybook. As we talked about this more and more we'd get questions about how it would work on a team bigger than 4 people. At first, we'd say, "I'm sure it'll work." But after talking about it amongst ourselves we realized all that we had invented was collaboration. So, we'd say something like "Yeah, Mob Design is just collaboration and communication, it works on any sized team." Turns out when you're collaborating and communicating a lot of good things happen.

24

5 Comments

The user experience for Government portals like The Department of Unemployment in Massachusetts is absolutely horrendous. Try to log in and the experience becomes a 1990s nightmare. A complete overhaul is needed, but for an MVP can we start with login pages? Here's my prototype of how it could be simplified and redesigned for a better user experience. Executive Office of Technology Services and Security #govtech #stateandlocal #UXgov #UnemployedUXUI #openforwork https://lnkd.in/etjNpHgV

2

1 Comment

Developer downtime: don’t overwork your devs. It’s memorial weekend and I’m lazily sitting on my porch. My kids keep coming in and out of the house, but get stuck because the sliding door keeps coming off the rails and won’t open. Well, since I’ve got nothing else scheduled for the afternoon I investigate the issue. Turns out sliding doors have a bunch of adjustment screws. I adjust them till the door slides smooth. Left in the broken state my kids learned to hit top left side of the door before opening it. Bringing this back to work, I know customer success teams that have a cheat sheet of these maneuvers. Give devs space to observe, we naturally fix these issues.

15

1 Comment

Y'all, I had a short conversation with a developer looking fr work who is deciding whether or not to put up a photo on LinkedIn and social media in general because he's worried people will judge him because he "looks" religious. Folks, this is 2024. We know ignorance is rampant in the world today, especially on college campuses and places where people are supposedly taught critical thinking skills. Hiring managers and HR/recruitment teams, from one hiring manager to another: If you're more concerned about what's on a candidate's head than what's under it, then they're not going to want to work for you anyhow. If you're more concerned about how a candidate presents themselves, or who they love, then how they do their job, and how dedicated and talented they are- check yourself. #loveislove #pridemonth #a11y #dei #inclusive #hiring (Photo credit: Nili Auerbach)

111

18 Comments

Kyle does a great job to highlight the pains of translating a shared design system into shared styles between React web and React Native. I do like the use of types to enforce existing style primitives compared to hard coding numbers, but I understand that native mobile developers are not used to the compositional nature of the first design system, compared to shared styles via StyleSheet, NativeWind, or similar. Fusing mobile and web beyond the data layer becomes more and more tricky. react-native-web often isn't the answer. As "headless" components grow to help fuse HTML vs React Native components, we still have a need for sensible styling.

8

One of my favorite topics, as the first article for June, how to get projects unstuck, when something gets in the way. Something every project manager deals with at some point in their career. #projectmanagement #pmi https://lnkd.in/gpBTEZqG

7