frontpage.
newsnewestaskshowjobs

Open Source @Github

fp.

Open in hackernews

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

1•dave2299•1y 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•1y 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.

Any guesses about BS short name after FAANG, ZIRP and MAG7

1•kingleopold•14s ago•0 comments

FAA proposal: Supersonic airliners can fly over US cities if they're quiet

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/07/faa-proposal-supersonic-airliners-can-fly-over-us-cities-...
1•Bender•53s ago•0 comments

Ovaries Might Take on an Immune Function After Menopause

https://nautil.us/ovaries-might-take-on-an-immune-function-after-menopause-1282410
1•Brajeshwar•2m ago•0 comments

Japan APPI AI Training Exception Clears Lower House

https://techjacksolutions.com/ai-brief/japan-appi-ai-training-exception-clears-lower-house-what-com/
1•totetsu•2m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Muxer – open-source model multiplexer for Claude Code

https://github.com/DangerousYams/muxer
1•DangerousYams•2m ago•0 comments

How to play Doom online in Proton Drive

https://proton.me/support/play-doom-online
1•akyuu•4m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Fli – 18KB CLI file listing tool in no_std rust and Libc

https://github.com/tracyspacy/fli
3•yulkor•5m ago•0 comments

PSX Retro Tools for Blender

https://fawkek.itch.io/psx-retro-tools
1•bpierre•6m ago•0 comments

EU could announce social media ban for kids in September

https://www.euractiv.com/news/eu-plans-to-announce-social-media-ban-for-kids-in-september/
2•theanonymousone•7m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Search Console MCP – Talk to Google Search Console with Claude

https://github.com/sudomichael/search-console-mcp
1•ushercakes•9m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Bais.News – News Neutralization Piepline

https://bais.news
1•adam_public•10m ago•0 comments

Where's My Package? – Amazon's package delivery network

https://urbanomnibus.net/2026/02/wheres-my-package/
1•acid__•10m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Restore ArXiv's classic red banner (userstyle, 40 lines of CSS)

https://github.com/greysonbowser/arxiv-red
1•Topology1•11m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Endless Noir – a 1930s noir radio serial that writes itself

https://endlessnoir.com
1•geektechlive•12m ago•0 comments

Ledger – Find out who is investing in who

https://ledger.svi.solutions/explore
1•johnys•12m ago•0 comments

Show HN: I built custom movie dashboards for Apple TV

https://memovee.com/posts/creating-your-first-dashboard
1•zacksiri•13m ago•0 comments

Process API Improvements in .NET 11

https://devblogs.microsoft.com/dotnet/process-api-improvements-in-dotnet-11/
1•rellem•13m ago•0 comments

Happy Voluntary Lobotomy Day, Microsoft

https://www.uplevel.pro/p/happy-voluntary-lobotomy-day-microsoft
1•kh9000•13m ago•0 comments

Day 1: C# 15 Collection Expressions Just Got Superpowers – with()

https://medium.com/c-sharp-programming/day-1-csharp-15-collection-expressions-just-got-superpower...
1•sukhpinder0804•14m ago•0 comments

Trump admin and Anthropic haven't discussed the gov't taking a stake in it

https://www.reuters.com/business/trump-administration-anthropic-have-not-discussed-government-tak...
1•journey2s•14m ago•1 comments

Postgres Sorting at Scale Needs More Than Order By

https://www.tigerdata.com/blog/postgres-sorting-at-scale-order-by
1•rellem•14m ago•0 comments

Neurosky EEG Pov TikTok

https://github.com/eegG0D/neurosky-eeg-pov-tiktok
1•ervinzed•14m ago•0 comments

The Mental Models I Use to Work with AI

https://metedata.substack.com/p/015-the-mental-models-i-use-to-work
1•young_mete•14m ago•0 comments

The Parrot in the Machine

https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2025/07/24/the-parrot-in-the-machine-the-ai-con-bender-hanna/
2•1vuio0pswjnm7•16m ago•1 comments

China has 400 private space companies. the West is barely paying attention

https://fortune.com/2026/07/02/china-private-space-industry-landspace-geely-spacex-rainer-zitelmann/
1•Brajeshwar•17m ago•0 comments

After 30 years with Linux, I gave Windows 11 a chance and found 9 clear problems

https://www.zdnet.com/article/i-ditched-linux-for-windows-11-9-big-problems/
4•luismedel•18m ago•1 comments

Katri Vala (1901-1944)

https://authorscalendar.info/kvala.htm
1•jruohonen•18m ago•1 comments

Bank of England explores trading 'kill switches' to contain AI meltdowns

https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366645329/Bank-of-England-explores-trading-kill-switches-to-c...
2•rbanffy•19m ago•1 comments

Show HN: Clinch – I intercept iOS app opens to interrupt doomscrolling

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/clinch-break-the-scroll/id6777446562
1•vedant-jain03•19m ago•0 comments

TokenBudgeting: Our Conversations with Enterprises on Token Spend

https://newsletter.semianalysis.com/p/tokenbudgeting-our-conversations
1•rbanffy•19m ago•0 comments