Simon Willison’s Weblog

16th August 2021 - Link Blog

Product Hunt Engineering Principles (via) Product Hunt implement “Collaborative Single Player Mode”, which they define as “A developer should be able to execute a feature from start to finish -- from the database to the backend, API, frontend, and CSS. The goal is never to get blocked.” I’ve encountered this principle applied to teams before (which I really like) but not for individual developers, which I imagine is more likely to work well for smaller organizations. Intriguing approach.

They also practice trunk driven development with feature flags: “Always start a feature with a feature flag and try to get something to production on day 1.”

And “If a product decision is missing, try to make this decision yourself—it’s better to ask for forgiveness rather than permission.”