Dawid Ostrowski’s Post

Just back from NoCode Nordics with Idea Link and wow! NoCode is changing the game! 🚀 It's not just for techies; everyone from small startups to big corporates can tap into its power. Some quick thoughts: 1️⃣ NoCode isn't just another tech trend; it's leading the charge into a new era. It's reshaping how we think about problem-solving and innovation, making tech development accessible to all. 2️⃣ The reach of NoCode is incredible. Whether it's a small startup looking to disrupt the market or a large corporation streamlining complex processes, NoCode tools are proving to be invaluable assets. 3️⃣ There's a synergistic relationship between AI and NoCode. NoCode isn't just surviving in an AI-dominated world; it's thriving, making AI more practical and applicable for all sorts of businesses. In a nutshell, NoCode isn't just shaping the future - it's actively building it today. And I, for one, am excited to be part of this journey with IdeaLink. So as our slogan says, NoCode > Code, Change my mind 🚀. #nocode #ai #nocodenordics

Solving for Scalability before Product market fit is usually not cost effective .

Very well said.. trying to build highly scalable system early on when your product/idea is not even validated, is not the right focus. Start with monolith, with architectural clarity in mind about how some of these "services" might be separated out in future - as needed. Challenge is to know "when" to do it.. waiting too long will likely impact your business scale up and might also impact customer experience.

I completely agree with this perspective. Using advanced technologies and complex architectures without validating your product-market fit can lead to wasted time and resources. Having worked with startups, I've often found myself ensuring that our tech stack or design is aligned with delivering the product to users as quickly as possible. It's essential to focus on solutions that meet immediate needs rather than inflating the architecture for future scalability issues. As someone once said, beware of "CV-driven architecture," where decisions are made to enhance resumes rather than the product.

Over-engineering kills many projects before they can reach market. We forget that platforms like Facebook started as a simple PHP webpage that then evolved to what is now, even pioneering frameworks like React. Create meaningful, well defined and context bound building blocks, allowing you to fail fast... Re-Engineering is not a sin but a requirement as the application evolves:)

I'm starting to think that some of the best experience you can get is working on and troubleshooting problems integrating new technology with legacy systems that older companies have. There are pros and cons to either side, but just because you don't work for a big tech company doesn't mean you're not going to get valuable experience and skills there.

I’ve been in startups where this was the honest truth, and scaling never was worth it, and others which were built far too rapidly but did need to scale from day one! Sometimes what you are selling, say live sports, is so crucial to get perfect that your startup needs to build on established distributed tech like k8s. Why not build it right from the start? It’s honestly not much more effort than running off a single virtual machine. Try delivering a custom manifest reliably every four seconds to all of America/world in an affordable way, realtime, scalable, with a margin of error of no more than a second latency. You might then see the importance of load tests, performance optimization and using established scalable tech.

💯 agree... except on the GraphQL aspect. Not sure why this is labeled a shiny toy. It's an API choice between it and say REST (once a shiny toy?) or GRPC (which could also be seen as a shiny toy). GQL is a great choice for many reasons which I won't fully list, but they include over fetching and type safety. I wouldn't always choose it by default, we are barely using it on Narrative (a collaboration app we're currently building), but in general for web apps that also need mobile access — which is the majority — it is indeed a good default choice and has nothing to do with scaling. instead of a controller, you have a resolver. Then you carry on :) Should you need to scale, you might start looking at Apollo Federation, just like you might look at API Gateways if using REST. As I said, I love the book cover (lol) and agree with the general sentiment, but let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater!

"You are not Facebook, Google, or Uber; you don't have their scalability challenges. Then why do you use shiny toys like GraphQL, microservice meshes, heavy Kubernetes configs, or spend too much engineering resources when open source or commercial solutions are available - like analytics, data analysis, charting, etc." These are some of the questions I ask startup/scaleup technical teams. And usually, I don't get a good answer and seems a lot of teams are just solving problems they don't have. However, this is a dangerous path for a startup/scaleup with limited resources and a limited runway. Focusing too early on scalability, while you are still validating your product can kill your company, since you are focusing on the wrong problems. Early on, every startup must focus on finding its ideal customer profile and market fit. Scalability challenges (if the startup survives) will come after that, not before.

Testing, testing. Is anyone listening? I’d like to run an experiment. I've been working in tech for almost 25 years. My first gig was a co-op at Microsoft in 2000. I’ve held a leadership position at the worlds fastest growing company (RIM/BlackBerry), I’ve built all kinds of stuff at startups, I’m a 2x CRO, 1x CEO, I have raised a bunch of cash at all stages and been through a couple different exit events. I’ve made millions of mistakes. But I’ve learned so much, I’ve learned experientially, I’ve learned the hard way and I have learned from some of the best in the business. I have sawdust man; the stuff that piles up on the floor when building something. I have lots of it. I take a friendly call or two a week from folks just looking for help (digging through the sawdust). I’ve never considered myself a writer, but it’s something I’m doing more and more of lately. Ideas garbled in my head become clear when I write them down. My sawdust needs a home. I think it may help a few people. I think it may help me. If I start to write some of this stuff down, is anyone listening?