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A dashboard full of data should help people act. See how DeveloperTown’s UX team designs data experiences around users and the decisions they need to make.
Rising SaaS costs? Learn how AI is changing the build vs. buy equation and when replacing your SaaS vendor with custom software makes business sense.
AI makes building faster, so it’s more important than ever to understand the problem before you start solving it.
Successful custom software design and development starts before the first line of code. Learn how to define the right solution before investing in development.
Choosing the right software development partner requires more than comparing proposals. Learn six practical signals enterprise teams can use to evaluate consulting partners before signing a contract.
The talent shortage isn’t temporary. Learn how demographic decline, AI tools and outside experts are reshaping how companies build workforce capacity.
AI has made software faster and cheaper to build, but that does not mean teams should simply build more of it. This post explores how organizations can use AI-assisted development to run smaller experiments, validate ideas sooner, and reduce business risk before committing to larger investments. It also explains why judgment, product thinking, governance, and real-world adoption matter even more as the cost of producing code continues to fall.
DeveloperTown’s shift from technology-specific practice areas to communities of practice reflects a broader need for engineering organizations to support both specialization and adaptability. This post explains how communities of practice can help consultants deepen expertise, explore new disciplines, reduce organizational silos, and share knowledge across teams. It also explores how this model creates a stronger foundation for AI-assisted delivery by giving practitioners a shared role in defining and maintaining quality standards.
Compare project-based delivery and staff augmentation to choose the right software engineering support model for enterprise initiatives.
UX research should continue beyond initial product discovery and remain part of the design, development, and post-launch process. This post explains how product teams can build ongoing user research pipelines using advocates, broader research groups, interviews, surveys, and prototype testing. It also highlights tools like Maze for organizing participants and gathering feedback that helps validate product decisions throughout the lifecycle.
Creating testable user stories requires close collaboration between developers, testers, and product owners throughout the sprint. This post explores how early QA involvement, clear product goals, collaborative refinement sessions, continuous communication, retrospectives, and feedback loops can help teams write stronger user stories. The result is better alignment, fewer surprises during testing, and requirements that are easier to validate against both business and user needs.
Choosing the right JavaScript framework depends on more than popularity. This post compares React, Solid, Vue, Svelte, Angular, and Qwik across syntax, performance, bundle size, ecosystem, scalability, and developer experience. It also looks at how each framework handles a simple component to help teams evaluate which option best aligns with their project requirements, technical goals, and existing development expertise.
Advanced prototyping helps product teams turn design concepts into clearer, more testable, and more collaborative experiences. This post explores how DeveloperTown uses prototypes to improve stakeholder collaboration, user testing, design critiques, and developer handoffs. By creating interactive representations of a product before development, teams can gather better feedback, reduce ambiguity, catch issues earlier, and maintain a shared source of truth throughout the design and build process.
Software security depends as much on people and process as it does on technology. This post explores how organizations can reduce human-related security risks by building a security-first culture, adopting secure development practices, enforcing role-based access and least privilege, strengthening authentication, and continuously monitoring for threats. It also highlights the importance of incident response planning and early vulnerability detection throughout the software development lifecycle.
Designing for accessibility helps create digital experiences that are more inclusive, usable, and effective for everyone. This post explains why accessibility should be considered from the beginning of the design process and shares practical tips such as following WCAG guidance, using clear language, providing alternative text and captions, maintaining strong color contrast, and creating consistent layouts.
The Microsoft Power Platform Center of Excellence Starter Kit helps organizations gain visibility into how Power Platform is being used across teams while establishing stronger governance, consistency, and support. This post explains what the CoE Starter Kit is, who typically manages it, and how its tools for monitoring, governance, analytics, and adoption can help IT and business leaders better manage Power Apps, Power Automate, and other Power Platform resources.
As Microsoft InfoPath reaches the end of its lifecycle, organizations have an opportunity to replace outdated forms with more modern, automated workflows. This post explains how Microsoft Power Platform can support that transition through Power Apps, Power Automate, and Power BI, helping teams improve data intake, automate repetitive processes, and make better use of business data.
Getting started with Microsoft Power Platform can feel overwhelming, but the best approach is to begin with a small, familiar task and build from there. This post shares five practical tips for Power Platform beginners: start with personal automation, research multiple approaches, experiment with the tools, document your work, and gradually take on more complex use cases. The goal is to make low-code automation approachable while building skills through hands-on experience.
Process automation doesn’t have to begin with a massive transformation initiative. This post shares three practical lessons for getting started: use tools your organization may already have, begin with a focused use case, and automate repetitive tasks in ways that help employees spend more time on higher-value work. The emphasis is on starting small, learning quickly, and building from there.
The tech talent shortage has made recruiting and retaining skilled IT professionals increasingly difficult, especially as demand grows for specialized expertise in areas like AI and automation. This post explores why the talent gap exists and shares practical ways companies can compete for strong candidates through better culture, modern technology, meaningful benefits, and clearer opportunities for career growth.
Wearable health technology has evolved far beyond basic fitness tracking. This post explores how smartwatches, biosensors, ECG devices, sweat patches, continuous monitoring tools, and other wearables are being used across heart health, hospital care, athletics, cancer detection, diabetes management, and everyday wellness. It also looks at how these technologies are making health data more accessible, actionable, and integrated into daily life.
Developer turnover is inevitable, but the disruption it causes can be reduced with better succession planning. This post explores how product teams can apply the idea of a minimum viable product to create a minimum viable succession plan, focusing first on the essential knowledge, processes, and onboarding needs required to keep work moving. By treating turnover preparedness as an iterative team practice, organizations can protect velocity, reduce burnout, and make transitions easier when team members leave.
Healthcare technology should make it easier for physicians to care for patients, but poorly designed tools can increase workload, frustration, and burnout. This post explores how excessive documentation, workflow disruption, and technology built without enough physician input can negatively affect both clinicians and patient care. It makes the case for designing healthcare technology around the needs of doctors as well as patients, with a focus on reducing friction and supporting natural clinical workflows.
Legacy systems can quietly slow down a business long before they fail outright. This post outlines common signs that an outdated system may be holding your organization back, from performance and security issues to poor scalability and frustrated users. It also explores practical approaches to modernization, including phased implementation, early testing, process planning, and evaluating whether to replace, integrate, or extend existing technology.
Microsites and traditional websites serve different strategic purposes. This post explains when a microsite makes sense, including product launches, events, campaigns, and other focused initiatives that benefit from a distinct brand experience. It also covers key differences in design, domain structure, performance, lifespan, and development complexity to help teams decide which approach best fits their goals.
Becoming a better software developer requires continuous learning, collaboration, and a willingness to expand beyond familiar tools and habits. This post explores three ways developers can sharpen their skills: becoming more language agnostic, learning through collaboration and open source projects, and building deeper technical knowledge through books and long-form learning. The focus is on developing broader problem-solving skills while continually improving your craft.
Successful digital transformation requires more than adopting new technology. This post explores how businesses can modernize operations, improve customer experiences, and rethink internal processes while managing the cultural and organizational changes that come with transformation. It also outlines common barriers, leadership considerations, practical planning questions, and real-world examples of how technology can create lasting business impact.
Rescuing a struggling software project takes more than fixing technical issues. This post outlines four practical steps for getting a troubled project back on track: gathering as much context as possible, objectively assessing the current state, addressing team dynamics, and recognizing that meaningful change takes time. The result is a more informed, people-centered approach to recovering projects that are behind schedule, over budget, or stalled.
What can software development learn from the nonprofit sector? This post explores how philanthropic thinking can bring a more empathetic, mission-driven perspective to product development. By identifying unmet needs, digging into their root causes, and fostering stronger Agile team dynamics, development teams can create products that better serve users while improving collaboration, adoption, and long-term impact.
Yarn V2 introduces major changes aimed at reducing some of the long-standing complexity in the JavaScript and TypeScript ecosystem. This post explores improvements including first-class workspace support, Plug’n’Play dependency resolution, plugin-based architecture, zero installs, and dependency constraints. Together, these features make monorepos easier to manage, simplify module resolution, and create more consistent development and build workflows.
Leadership during times of uncertainty requires honesty, empathy, and consistent communication. Reflecting on the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, this post explores how leaders can support their teams by sharing what they know, focusing on serving others, and creating regular opportunities for connection. The central message is simple: strong leadership is less about having every answer and more about showing up, communicating clearly, and helping people feel supported.
In a competitive hiring market, recruiting success often comes down to the candidate experience. This post shares practical ways to improve that experience through consistent communication, simpler mobile applications, clearer job descriptions, and stronger conversations around counteroffers. The goal is to help recruiters attract more qualified candidates, build trust throughout the process, and improve long-term hiring outcomes.
Not every project needs an expert, and knowing when to bring one in can make a major difference in the success of an engagement. This post explores the distinction between adding delivery resources and hiring true expertise, then outlines the qualities that set experts apart: strong communication, defensible opinions, the ability to navigate difficult conversations, and the judgment to recognize when they are not the right fit. It also explains how organizations can get the most value from an expert’s outside perspective.
Product Owners have to balance business goals, stakeholder expectations, and the needs of the development team without becoming a bottleneck. This post shares practical ways to manage that responsibility more effectively, including focusing on what needs to be built instead of how, writing clear acceptance criteria, participating in key Scrum ceremonies, and creating backup communication structures when time is limited. The goal is to help Product Owners stay aligned with their teams while protecting their time and keeping delivery moving.
Outsourcing software development can help organizations add capacity, access specialized expertise, move faster, and test new ideas without immediately expanding their full-time teams. This post explores when outsourcing makes sense, how offshore, nearshore, and local delivery models differ, and what to consider around cost, knowledge transfer, coordination, and long-term support. It also offers a practical set of questions to help determine whether an outsourced development partner is the right fit for a project.
Choosing the right external partner starts with understanding what your business actually needs. This post breaks down the differences between consultants and contractors, then explores how culture fit, capabilities, working style, and alignment with business goals should factor into the decision. It offers a practical framework for evaluating potential partners beyond price and technical skill so you can build a stronger, more sustainable working relationship.
DeveloperTown’s design and development workflow has evolved around tools like Sketch, InVision, and Zeplin, but handoffs still create friction, repetition, and room for ambiguity. This post explores the shift from simply bridging the gap between designers and developers to blending their workflows around a shared source of truth. It also looks at how design systems, reusable components, and design tokens could create faster collaboration, better prototypes, and more consistent digital products.
Great user experiences are shaped by more than strong first impressions. Drawing on Daniel Kahneman’s research into the “experiencing self” and “remembering self,” this post explores why the way an experience ends can have an outsized impact on how users remember it. It makes the case for giving offboarding, exit points, and the final moments of a user journey the same thoughtful attention we give onboarding.
A TeamCity build failure exposed a mismatch between the client’s development and deployment environments: the project was built in Visual Studio 2017, while the build server only supported Visual Studio 2015. This post walks through the troubleshooting process, from restoring the necessary NuGet package to modifying the .csproj import path so TeamCity could reliably locate the correct Microsoft.WebApplication.targets file. The experience highlights the importance of keeping build environments aligned—and how relative package paths can provide a sustainable workaround when that isn’t possible.
