This post outlines the filesystem structure I use for my SaaS web applications. The design is guided by three primary objectives: The ability to atomically revert to a previous version of the application. Support for running multiple instances with their own configurations while sharing the same …

Beware that this article is controversial to many people's opinions. It is no Docker-bashing prose! The following text is based on my situation why I consider wrapping my reverse-proxy (Nginx) with Docker as a disadvantage. Your situation is likely different. I believe that Docker is a useful …

Every change to a database can be split up into a series of so small chunks then when applied one-by-one together with coordinated changes to the application everything keeps running if nothing has happened. It works because the application always stays compatible with the database. In the next …

Software gets complex very fast over time. Developers and business people alike tend to underestimate how costly software development is. To illustrate the point we make up a fictious restaurant table reservations system. It should be a sufficiently generic problem domain that the reader can follow …

Performance in software development matters less than you might think. I bet that you waste plenty of CPU cycles and memory for zero good reasons somewhere you aren't looking at and wouldn't look at by intention. Example: binary vs textual encoding Today I had a talk to a fellow developer who …

Beware! You will get insight into my unglamorouse server setup. I host web sites and web applications on my own hardware which resides at my home. Previously it was a Raspberry Pi 1 Model B and now it's an Odroid M1 with 8 GB of RAM. Dynamic DNS makes sure that my server is reachable from the …

Meetings can be frustrating especially when they are long and there's no valuable outcome at the end. The time feels wasted. You're exhausted. I've been there and you likely too. I claim that meetings don't need to be frustrating. They can be effective and a good mechanism to make important …

Developer-centric products often want to send newsletter with embedded code snippets. Some of them already write their documentation in Markdown. Why not write the newsletter in Markdown too and turn it into nicely formatted HTML email...!? This idea sounds quite nice and it doesn't seem to be only …

Ever thought about why your online purchase can be delivered in one day or even a couple of hours? I made it possible for you. Ok, this sounds salesy! At least I contributed a part to it. I worked for a worldwide market leader in intralogistics who equips the biggest warehouses with software and …