frontpage.
newsnewestaskshowjobs

Made with ♥ by @iamnishanth

Open Source @Github

fp.

Open in hackernews

How to get up to speed on software development from the top down

1•dave2299•6mo ago
Hi everyone, I am a non-technical founder. I’ve bootstrapped a tech-enabled services company over the past year that’s growing, profitable, and close to 15K a month in revenue. I, by nature, prefer to be involved in the weeds of what’s happening in each domain of my business at first, even if that results in slower business growth. I built my company with a white label portal software (Copilot.app), Airtable, Squarespace, AppSheet,and some ChatGPT scripts.

Now, I need to start building out custom tools. I want to take a deep dive into software development, starting with front and back end web development from the top down, rather than starting from the bottom up as a coder.

If I keep growing eventually I will end up bringing on technical employees, but I want to understand the lay of the land before I start down that road, and I found that I’m able to do a lot once I understand the domain using low code and no code tools. So for example, things like Retool, etc. will accomplish most of the next phase of building I need. But I want to have a reading list of 10 or 20 books or blogs or courses or podcast, etc.. That will help me start getting the way of the land on how to architect software.

I know basic python, basics of the building blocks of programming at the intro level. I just read Designing Data-Intensive Applications (2nd ed on O’Reilly). Does someone have a list of 10 modern books that would help me understand big picture topics like this?

Comments

sherdil2022•6mo ago
I offer personal / 1:1 training, mentoring and technical consultancy for founders and co-founders.

Please feel free to reach out to me. My throwaway email is in my profile, and I will respond.

Show HN: Workmux – Frictionless parallel development with Git worktrees and tmux

https://github.com/raine/workmux
3•rane•5m ago•0 comments

SHA1-Hulud, NPM supply chain incident

https://snyk.io/blog/sha1-hulud-npm-supply-chain-incident/
1•tsenturk•6m ago•0 comments

EU council reaches position on Chat Control

https://www.consilium.europa.eu/de/press/press-releases/2025/11/26/child-sexual-abuse-council-rea...
1•Aldipower•9m ago•0 comments

Alice – new build system for OCaml

https://www.alicecaml.org/
1•birdculture•10m ago•0 comments

Mystery of the Quintic [video]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HIy5dJE-zQ
1•marvinborner•10m ago•0 comments

My Car Is Becoming a Brick

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/2025/10/electric-car-software-updates-tesla/684643/
1•Gedxx•11m ago•0 comments

LHR London – Live 3D Flight Tracker – Air Loom

https://objectiveunclear.com/airloom.html
1•emreb•11m ago•0 comments

Azure APIM Cross-Tenant Signup Bypass

https://github.com/bountyyfi/Azure-APIM-Cross-Tenant-Signup-Bypass
1•chili-salsa•15m ago•1 comments

Decker is a multimedia platform for creating and sharing interactive documents

http://beyondloom.com/decker/index.html
1•TheTaytay•24m ago•0 comments

I Read the Terms of Service for My Smart TV and Now I Sleep with One Eye Open

https://jxself.org/smart-tv-tos.shtml
1•Gedxx•30m ago•0 comments

Cryptology firm cancels elections after losing encryption key

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c62vl05rz0ko
1•ColinWright•31m ago•0 comments

Creepy AI Toys

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/15/arts/ai-toys-curio-grem.html
1•I_Nidhi•35m ago•0 comments

Amazon faces FAA probe after delivery drone snaps internet cable in Texas

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/11/25/amazon-faa-probe-delivery-drone-incident-texas.html
2•jonathanzufi•35m ago•0 comments

Porn Giant Calls for Device-Based Digital ID

https://reclaimthenet.org/porn-giant-calls-for-device-based-digital-id
1•uyzstvqs•38m ago•1 comments

Secrets in unlisted GitHub gists are reported to secret scanning partners

https://github.blog/changelog/2025-11-25-secrets-in-unlisted-github-gists-are-now-reported-to-sec...
1•petercooper•38m ago•1 comments

Await Is Not a Context Switch: Understanding Python's Coroutines vs. Tasks

https://mergify.com/blog/await-is-not-a-context-switch-understanding-python-s-coroutines-vs-tasks
17•remyduthu•40m ago•1 comments

Devenv 1.11: Module changelogs and SecretSpec 0.4.0

https://devenv.sh/blog/2025/11/26/devenv-111-module-changelogs-and-secretspec-040/
1•domenkozar•40m ago•0 comments

Practical Intro to Operational Transformation

https://archive.casouri.cc/note/2025/practical-intro-ot/
1•casouri•43m ago•0 comments

Estimating AI productivity gains from Claude conversations

https://www.anthropic.com/research/estimating-productivity-gains
1•kerim-ca•56m ago•0 comments

Show HN: ConfluenceMeter Beta, live panel for crypto confluence

https://www.confluencemeter.com/mvp
2•Paugallego•58m ago•1 comments

Show HN: ~$root-dir: a command-line community for devs, builders and creators

https://www.root-dir.com
2•madsmadsdk•1h ago•0 comments

Formal Specification for Authorization: Clarity Before Implementation

https://blog.gchinis.com/posts/2025/11/formal-specification-for-authorization/
2•gchinis•1h ago•0 comments

Hamas attack victims sue Binance for allowing payments to militant group

https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/hamas-attack-victims-sue-binance-allegedly-allowing-paym...
2•barredo•1h ago•0 comments

Alphaproof paper (IMO 2024 Silver) is finally published in Nature [pdf]

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09833-y_reference.pdf
2•zuzatm•1h ago•1 comments

Show HN: MenuPhotoAI – AI food photography that keeps dishes real

https://www.menuphotoai.com
1•redp314•1h ago•0 comments

Canva is considering porting Affinity to Linux

https://techcentral.co.za/affinity-for-linux-canvas-next-big-move-could-reshape-the-desktop-softw...
7•methuselah_in•1h ago•0 comments

Dutch public broadcaster NOS quits X over disinformation

https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/dutch-public-broadcaster-nos-quits-x-over-disinfor...
7•giuliomagnifico•1h ago•2 comments

Skyscrapers engulfed in flames after fire spreads on bamboo scaffolding

https://metro.co.uk/2025/11/26/three-skyscrapers-engulfed-flames-fire-spreads-bamboo-scaffolding-...
1•perihelions•1h ago•1 comments

Coffee

https://chrispymm.co.uk/coffee
1•worez•1h ago•0 comments

Invisible Details of Interaction Design

https://rauno.me/craft/interaction-design
1•bfirsh•1h ago•0 comments