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How-to guides, tooling tips and real-world advice for developers and product managers tired of broken software. Let’s fix this mess together.

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Line drawing of a rocky mountain peak with a base camp and people building structures

Quality you can’t generate: AI is only as good as your constraints

AI changed the cost structure of software. It didn't change the value structure. The value is no longer the code you write. It's the taste, judgment, and constraints you encode into the system that shapes what AI produces.

Dave Mosher

A figure looks off towards the horizon. On the left is a giant robot, on the right a splash of vibrant color, connected nodes and a city unfurl.

Why we're not chasing the AI hype (And what we're doing instead)

Todd Kaufman

Process flow machine with fluffy imaginary creatures making it work

Speed is a side effect of making the system work

Doc Norton

Maximize software investment

Rubber duck in fedora and trench coat stands next to a vintage microphone

IndyPy Talk: Pydantically perfect in every way

Kyle Adams

Software tooling & tips

Double Takes

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Double Takes

TDDing with Claude is like having a pair that removes all the failing assertions every time you go to the bathroom.

Steve Jackson

State machines are the answer for those seeking determinism in the era of AI agents.

Dave Mosher

A Slack conversation left Doc reflecting on what bug bashes say about the systems we work in.

Doc Norton

Test-driven development is to programming what double-entry bookkeeping is to accounting.

Neal Lindsay

The fundamental character flaw of the software creator is not the misguided belief that they can solve any problem with software. Instead, it is the belief they can understand how their own software works before they create it.

Steve Jackson

We may need a SaaS appendix for Zawinski's law:

Any SaaS platform attempts to expand until it is a social network.

Matt Jones

Team of business professionals runs around an empty office while screaming

5 rules to avoid the 95% AI project failure rate

MIT research shows 95% of corporate AI pilots fail. The problem isn't the technology—it's transformation. Based on decades of implementation experience, here are the 5 non-negotiables every C-suite needs to master for AI success.

Ed Frank

ai-ml

communication

leadership

ROI

Person at a desk focused on their laptop

Keep your coding agent on task with mutation testing

Code quality tools are helpful guardrails for humans, but coding agents benefit even more. Mutation testing is a rarely-used tool showing new promise as we leverage AI to write more and more software.

Neal Lindsay

ai-ml

node.js

testing

A triangle connects a minifig, toy suitcase, and toy laptop

AI in the workforce: A shifting talent equation

AI is transformative: reshaping the workforce, blurring roles, and breaking career ladders. Explore how orgs can balance people, technology, and business in this new era of work.

Jonathon Baugh

ai-ml

assessments

consulting

productivity

teams

Massive anvil surrounded by little anvils

The anvil of alignment: The value of monoliths over microservices

Before dismantling your monolith for microservices, understand its crucial role in organizational alignment. We explore hidden costs, Conway's Law, and strategic insights for leaders making architectural decisions.

Dave Mosher

Maximize software investment

architecture

budgeting

scaling-challenges

teams

tech-debt

Rubber duck wearing a fedora and trench coat on a remote call with another rubber duck

Build common (virtual) ground with unstructured remote calls

Taking remote work to new levels takes new techniques. Explore how unstructured remote calls can help build trust.

Tyler Sloane

Communication & teams

communication

consulting

remote-work

Rubber duck shrugging its shoulders next to a broken, old desktop computer

Understanding legacy application rewrite vs. refactor tradeoffs

Understanding legacy application rewrite vs. refactor pros and cons can be difficult, especially if you’ve never experienced the possibility of changing it for the better. Let's look at a few examples to learn more and outline a small decision making framework to help you evaluate your path forward.

Shawn Rinehart

Legacy modernization

legacy-modernization

tech-debt

assessments

Rubber duck holds a book titled The Developer's Book of Names

Pydantically perfect: Seamlessly handle non-Pythonic naming conventions

Learn how to use external data with different naming conventions in Python with Pydantic. The guide covers different approaches and pitfalls using Pydantic's alias and alias generator features.

Gabriel Côté-Carrier

Gabriel Côté-Carrier

Software tooling & tips

python

Field Report: Rails World 2025

Double Agent Mike Bowman shares a field report on the Rails World 2025 experience, including highlights from favorite talks, the venue, and the Ruby Embassy.

Mike Bowman

community

conference-talk

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