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.

PDFWix Free online PDF and document conversion Tool

1•PDFWix•1m ago•0 comments

Why Bulletproof React Became the Most Popular React Architecture on GitHub

https://jsdev.space/bulletproof-react-architecture-guide/
1•javatuts•4m ago•0 comments

We Are Witnessing the Slow Death of the Prestige Career

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/22/consulting-ai-prestige-careers
1•mindcrime•5m ago•0 comments

Manticore Search 27.1.5: Auth, sharding, conversational&faster vector search

https://medium.com/@s_nikolaev/manticore-search-27-1-5-5fe42cbc5787
1•snikolaev•7m ago•0 comments

Wrst – Build smartwatch apps with React and TypeScript

https://www.wrst.dev/
1•karolbisztyga•8m ago•0 comments

Smoobu website builder suffers from bad UX, I used their API instead

https://waldo.vanderlore.de/blog/str-booking-guide/
1•waldov•9m ago•0 comments

What happens when OKF runs inside an AI tool

https://tenureai.dev/writing/open-knowledge-format-ai-memory-benchmark/
3•jflynt76•10m ago•0 comments

Millions in UK could claim share of £3B after Apple case given green light

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c932d1r0p96o
2•fredley•11m ago•0 comments

SHOW HN: Huskmail - A disposable email with private inboxes and trial library

https://huskmail.xyz
1•draggodra•12m ago•2 comments

Sorites Paradox (Paradox of the Heap)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorites_paradox
2•chistev•19m ago•0 comments

Downed US pilot reported 'jellyfish' drone formation before crash

https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/23/politics/iran-drones-f-15-pilot-intelligence
1•farseer•20m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Neural Particle Automata

https://selforg-npa.github.io/
6•esychology•20m ago•0 comments

Show HN: SharpSkill, a LeetCode alternative built in 15 spoken languages

https://sharpskill.dev/en
2•Enjoyooor•21m ago•2 comments

The secret cause of the industrial revolution

https://www.worksinprogress.news/p/how-smashing-the-nimbys-created-modern
1•bensouthwood•21m ago•0 comments

Dunky State-Machine

https://www.dunky.dev/state-machine
1•ivanbanov•22m ago•1 comments

Show HN: Continuum – an open, local-first memory layer for your Mac

https://github.com/nikhilkagita04/continuum
2•nikhilkagita97•22m ago•0 comments

Most of What You Read on the Internet Is Written by Insane People (2018)

https://old.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/9rvroo/most_of_what_you_read_on_the_internet_is_...
2•downbad_•34m ago•0 comments

AI Built a Nuke and Still Lost

https://www.lwilko.com/blog/i-gave-an-ai-a-civilization
6•kensai•35m ago•0 comments

China's CATL bets battery swapping will cut costs for Europe's electric trucks

https://www.ft.com/content/c2175609-d106-4a9c-b6a3-56aac71c569a
2•JumpCrisscross•42m ago•0 comments

Ralph Harness, a tiny guarded loop for coding agents

https://github.com/rxdt/py_ralph_frame
1•rxdt•43m ago•0 comments

Ionos warns of acute capacity shortage in Frankfurt, Germany region

https://cdn.imgtree.co/images/jvJVQIZy.jpg
1•nor0x•48m ago•1 comments

36 Hours with Fable

https://tossrock.substack.com/p/36-hours-with-fable
3•fragmede•48m ago•1 comments

New £1.1B plan to back chip firms, boost computing and skills for the AI

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/a-decisive-shift-to-power-british-ai-new-11-billion-plan-to-ba...
1•rbanffy•49m ago•0 comments

Artificial intelligence-based law firm wins in court

https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366644941/Artificial-intelligence-based-law-firm-wins-in-court
2•TMWNN•52m ago•0 comments

Zero Weights Language Model (MSE-GLM)

https://aircityshops.com/index.php?url=city/mse_blog
2•fodokidza•53m ago•0 comments

I built an AI memory engine in 10 days, then needed a project to prove it works

https://parametric-memory.dev
2•EntityOne•53m ago•1 comments

Show HN: Ideate a trading strategy with an Ex-Citadel Trader

https://sean-but-ai.vercel.app/
9•Entropnt•55m ago•4 comments

Generated this marketing video in just 12 minutes using this tool Clickcast.tech

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ow0JWuBLCgA
1•clickcasttech•57m ago•1 comments

How to turn compute into a financial asset

https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2026/06/22/how-to-turn-compute-into-a-financial-a...
2•zczc•59m ago•2 comments

How sad should I be about ChatGPT? (2022)

https://robertheaton.com/chatgpt/
4•reasonableklout•1h ago•0 comments