How to Scope an MVP in a Complex Domain
How to set MVP scope when your domain is complex, what must stay in scope anyway, a worked example, and the scoping mistakes that delay a first release.
Better Software Team
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Articles on product strategy, engineering principles, and building software that lasts.
Debugging Distributed Systems Step by Step
A twelve-step workflow for debugging production issues across services: confirm the symptom, set a time window, trace requests, test hypotheses, verify the fix.
Better Software Team
Product Vision vs Product Strategy
Product vision vs product strategy explained, how the two compare, six steps to write both, a worked example and the mistakes that leave teams directionless.
Better Software Team
When Logs and the Database Disagree
Logs and database state diverge through async lags, races and failed transactions. Correlate identifiers, then prevent repeats with tracing and idempotency.
Better Software Team
Why Integrations Can Beat New Features
Integrations beat new features when a product's value depends on data or workflows in other systems. Use these steps to decide what to build first.
Better Software Team
Writing a Post-Incident Review That Helps
Run blameless post-incident reviews that rebuild the timeline, measure impact, separate contributing factors, and end in assigned, tracked action items.
Better Software Team
How Non-Technical Founders Hire a First Engineer
How a non-technical founder can hire a first engineer, a seven-step process, how hiring options compare on cost, warning signs, and when the hire should wait.
Better Software Team
Cutting Unplanned Engineering Work
Measure unplanned work, trace it to root causes and observability gaps, and cut it with reliability capacity, blameless reviews, automation and change control.
Better Software Team
Introduce a Queue When Work Can Wait
A queue helps when an operation does not need an immediate response. It buffers load, retries failures and decouples services. Use these steps to decide.
Better Software Team
Features First Users Never Touch
First users often ignore customization, audit trails, broad integrations and advanced analytics. Learn how to scope version one around one painful problem.
Better Software Team
When Your MVP Is Really a V3 in Disguise
Why domain experts scope a V3 as their MVP, what that costs, how an MVP and V3 differ, and seven steps to strip MVP scope creep back to a true first version.
Better Software Team
Why Reporting Features Are So Expensive
Reporting looks like an easy add-on but often becomes the costliest part of a software product. See why naive reporting fails and how to build it iteratively.
Better Software Team
