Product6 min read
Say No to Ship Faster
Every yes is a commitment you will pay for on every release afterward. The teams that ship the fastest are usually the ones that say no the most.
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The Fieldnotes journal
Writing on the craft of building software.
Essays on engineering, design, product, and the teams behind the work. No hot takes, just what we have learned from building and shipping real things.
Featured
Design
Product design, interface patterns, and the systems behind good user experience.
5 min read
Whitespace Is Not Wasted Space
The instinct to fill every pixel is strong, and almost always wrong. Space is what tells the eye where to look, and where to rest.
By Tomas Berg
6 min read
Building a Color System That Scales
A pile of hex codes is not a color system. Here is how to build a palette that stays coherent as your product grows from one screen to a hundred.
By Tomas Berg
Engineering
Deep dives on architecture, performance, and the craft of writing software.
8 min read
Designing APIs That Age Well
Good APIs are quiet. They do exactly what you expect and keep working long after you stop thinking about them. Here is how to design for that kind of longevity.
By Mara Devlin
6 min read
The Real Cost of a Slow Build
A build that takes three minutes instead of thirty seconds does not just cost time. It quietly reshapes how your whole team works, and rarely for the better.
By Julian Ross
7 min read
Reading Code Is a Skill You Can Practice
We spend far more time reading code than writing it, yet almost all our practice goes into writing. Here is how to get deliberately better at the harder half.
By Priya Anand
Product
How teams plan, prioritize, and ship features people actually use.
Startups
Field notes on building, funding, and growing an early-stage company.
7 min read
Your First Ten Customers Are a Research Project
The earliest customers are not there to grow your revenue. They are there to teach you what you are actually building, if you let them.
By Julian Ross
6 min read
Hiring Slow Is a Feature
The pressure to grow the team fast is relentless, and giving in to it is one of the most expensive mistakes a young company can make.
By Priya Anand