#17 - Almost Summer
Hey friends!
Last week, we talked about interns - and how we wanted to do something for those with cancelled internships. This week, I’m happy to share that our project is under way!
It’s called “Summer of Shipping”. Kickoff was last Thursday. 30 participants joined over Zoom and it’s been viewed 110 times on YouTube! 🚀
School is still mostly in session, so this gives us ~2 weeks to work through the kinks with a smaller group of students. In a couple weeks though, we intend to expand the project and encourage more people to watch the videos/join the weekly Thursday meetings.
I feel like it’s safe to say that the adrenaline and novelty from COVID-19 has mostly worn off - the fight or flight instincts are fading, and now we just need to get through to the other end. In every project I’ve ever been a part of, there’s this long, boring middle section that just requires endurance.
Summer of Shipping is still new, but the establishment of weekly rituals should help improve endurance both in our students, and in our own ability to ship products.
We didn’t think we’d be in this situation at this point in 2020, but Nick and I are looking forward to being intern mentors once again!
Change Log
Summer of Shipping kickoff. Currently setting up the community infrastructure (Discord server, picking moderators, setting up the recurring calendar meetings, Calendly for booking office hours, and preparing for potential communication failure modes - there have already been a few)
Software Mentor reached 200 subscribers
On March 30, I published the first issue of Software Mentor (softwarementor.substack.com), a newsletter aimed at accelerating the careers of junior engineers. It had 0 subscribers *🦗* Today's April 30, and it's at 200+ 🥳 More importantly! Kicking off a related project tonight 😬Getting our REST based Auth solution ready for alpha testing! It’s almost there!
Miscellaneous
📊 A few weeks ago - one of our mini-project ideas was to do roundups of companies on topics that we found interesting. Well, the other day, we found a newsletter that does something very similar: Trends VC
We’re big fans and recommend you check it out!
🚫💻 One trend that’s been on our minds is what’s known as the “No Code” movement. As developers, this is fascinating because it’s a new way of building products and services without any code at all. At first, these tools were limited to just static sites such as landing pages, blogs, and content websites (think SquareSpace and Webflow). But now, you can build fairly complex apps.
That said, “No code” is still quite limited. Right now, we’re still in a world of growing hype:
That is to say, we haven’t reached the “Peak of Inflated Expectations” yet. But in time, I expect the challenges of No Code (scale, performance, security, lack of features, etc.) will bring us to a Trough of Disillusionment (and we’ll start seeing reactionary posts like “Why No Code is useless” and “No Code is dead”).
But what gets me excited is that No Code has the profile of a Disruptive Innovation. It’s worse than “Code” solutions - less performant, less flexible, less secure. But it’s also better - much cheaper and faster to produce. Something that is worse at many things, but better in a unique/important way, can pave the path for disruptive innovation.
Or it could end up not competing with “Code” solutions and just become another tool in a company’s skill set.
Regardless, it’s a fascinating trend, and one that we - as developers - are watching with supreme interest. 👀
Stay safe, and look out for each other!
Phil