Now that I catch your attention, let’s have a coffee while reading this article?

We’re used to our body responses to physical and mental efforts – we get tired. Bad sleeping, running, practice sports, working… these are all situations that increase our fatigue. And this happens because of some biological responses behind!

During the day, our body produces Adenosine, that binds to specific brain receptors, inhibiting the nervous system and causing tiredness. Basically, this process is essential for us to feel sleepy, helping the proper functioning of our circadian rhythm.

In this case, where does coffee come in and how does it help us to feel more awake?

The composition.

Coffee, and other products such as certain teas, chocolates and even ice cream, have caffeine in their composition, which binds to various molecular receptors in our brain, functioning as a stimulant for our nervous system.

When we drink coffee, caffeine molecules enter our circulatory system, traveling to our brain.

Both caffeine and adenosine are molecules from the xanthine group, this is, part of their structure is identical. This makes caffeine an antagonistic molecule for adenosine receptors, which means that they will compete for the same cell receptors in our brain.

Image: Adenosine vs. Caffeine molecules. Green highlights indicate the similar structure regions between both molecules.

It’s nothing but healthy competition!

When there are adenosine and caffeine molecules traveling in our blood system, is more likely that the cell receptors bind to caffeine molecules. Thus, when competing for these spots, the caffeine molecules reduce the number of adenosines that bind to the receptors and, consequently, the sleeping sensation is reduced, and the alertness is increased.

So, this is how coffee helps us to have energy for coding, you may ask?

Negative, my friend! This action does not exactly promote energy production in our bodies.

Its action is to prevent you from feeling drowsy and tired, since the molecules responsible for this sensation are deprived of doing their job.

Image: Caffeine and Adenosine competition for brain cellular receptors.

We can say then that caffeine tricks our brain to fell less tired, avoiding the sleepy signs.

When caffeine leaves our body, adenosine molecules still ager to do its job and the feeling of tiredness sets in again. It’s time for another cup of coffee, the Kryptonite of our sleep!

But be careful, you need to pay attention to quantities!

How much is too much?

Attention now! Caffeine also causes neuronal excitation in the brain, which is recognized by the pituitary gland as an emergency and stimulates the adrenal glands to release adrenaline – the source of the “fight or flight”!

This makes us react more quickly, instead of acting deliberately. Such an effect may be excellent if we are being chased by a wild lion, but not so good when we must find that crazy lost comma in the middle of a code with hundreds of lines.

Did you know that… caffeine also raises the dopamine levels? This substance works as some opioid drugs, binding to neurotransmitters responsible for sending messages between the brain and the body. Although on a much smaller scale, this is why some scientists defend caffeine as an addictive product.

Beware of too much caffeine!

The truth is that this molecule can disturb our sleep cycle, make us sleep worse and therefore reduce our quality of life. Sleeping is essential for the body and the brain to launch their nightly Jobs of restoring the system, ensuring its proper functioning, with the best response from all its “APIs”.

Without a good night’s sleep, our body is unable to have the energy it needs for all the metabolic and physical processes we need daily.

In addition, caffeine excess can also increase our heart rate and make us feel more jittery and anxious.

As it is a molecule that causes some dependence, the lack of caffeine can also cause a reduction in cognitive performance and have a negative impact on our mood. To get back to normal, you need a new dose of caffeine, which can bring good performance, but it will only be for a short period.

But I drink coffee and I’m still sleepy…

It’s true, there are people for whom coffee has no effect. And genetics appears to be the primarily responsible! However, even what we eat (the nutrients) can influence this effect.

This is a subject that has been studied and the scientific community already lists some factors for the difference in the effect of caffeine in humans:

• Different ability to metabolize (digest) coffee.
• Number of neurotransmitters (receptors) available to receive caffeine.
• Binding capacity (affinity) between receptors and caffeine molecules (genetic issues).
• The body’s resistance to caffeine molecules, where receptors are no longer fooled, due, for example, to excessive consumption.

In fact, coffee doesn’t help you Coding because it doesn’t know any technology, but if you’re lucky, if your genetics allow it, and if you use the right dose, it can help you keep your senses alert!

I hope you have enjoyed this article!

Sincerely,

A coffee lover that doesn’t live without her morning coffee.

Flávia Leitão
Business Analyst at Polarising

My team was technically strong, so they have decided that the testing strategy would include only automatic tests. The scope of the project was initially closed. So, the risk that tests would have to be reimplemented was low, because of the change requests. This was a good start.

To make the tests implementation faster, automatic tests were immediately developed for every component. By doing so, whether it was an API, screen, event consumer, bpm process, or other, the backlog item was instantly closed. How wonderful!

The team implemented more than 5000 automatic tests, correcting some issues. And we delivered the project to the client for the User Acceptance Testing. We were confident that this would be a success!

A few days’ time, we started getting not so good news… in fact, bad news. Some bugs were found, there were several unmet requirements, problems in processes that included more than one component, and some status machine had issues. Finally, some solutions met the requested requirements, but some requirements no longer made sense to the customer.

We were stunned; we had implemented automatic tests for all the components. Why had this strategy failed causing so many problems?

To answer that question, we needed to analyse the methodology used to manage the project scope and its deliveries. And the test strategy.

So, we went through all the requirements with the client. It looked like everything was perfect, but because we hadn’t done this in the first place, we caused ourselves some problems:

• Some requirements no longer made sense for the client when we implemented them. If we had reviewed them with the client, we would probably conclude that other requirements would make more sense, or the same ones but with some differences.
• How could some requirements not be being met, despite having implemented a solution for those requirements? Because in the beginning of the project we did not understand the real needs and pains of the client (we thought we had!). If the topics had been revisited during the project, we could have had a better understanding of their needs and more knowledge on their business. Continuous communication with the client allows us to understand their real pains.
• We developed the project using sprints, but we only delivered all features to the client in the end of project. Hence, we did not receive any feedback during all the development phase, and because of that we didn’t adjust the features to the client’s real requirements.

Automate didn’t kill manual tests.  

So, about the test strategy, we made a huge mistake: to believe that having almost 100% coverage of Automatic Unit Tests (functional tests) would result in almost zero bugs. We were so naive!

When we automate tests we need to ensure that the test is correctly implemented and really tests the requirement. When this is done by the person that develops the feature, then tests are influenced by this person’s knowledge about the implementation, and not by the requirements.

For example, if the developer misunderstood a business rule or implemented it wrongly, the test that he’ll implement will be according to his understanding, so it will be wrong and it won’t validate the business rule when executed.

If another person implements the test, they will look for the business rule specification and do the test without being influenced by its implementation.

If the test is not correctly implemented, this is not an issue because it will fail when executed. Someone will analyse the feature (and the test) and will fix the component with problems.

On the other hand, unit tests are not enough. Integration tests and system tests are essential to ensure that the system works holistically. Even so, testing each component singly with a 100% coverage, does not mean that the system has no bugs.

In fact, there are still bugs that can exist, like errors on the design or specification, incorrect assumptions about the meaning, units, or boundaries of the data being passed between, failures in message interpretation between systems, or other.

To mitigate this, every time an interaction between two components, systems, packages or microservices is developed, a set of integration tests must be executed. These tests are strong candidates to automation. 

Even when all integrations are working, the system testing must be executed because it “focuses on the behaviour and capabilities of a whole system or product”, validating that the system is complete and all processes work as expected.

For example, in a state machine implementation, sometimes some non-final statuses are forgotten and the transition event is not implemented. Other example is in event-driven systems, when sometimes an event is produced but no service consumes it and the process remains unfinished.

These kind of problems are usually found by executing system testing. These are the most important tests for any business, in my opinion. As ISTQB syllabus teaches us, testing includes checking whether the system meets specified requirements, but not only. It also involves validating whether the system will meet the client and its business needs in their operational environment(s). We need to understand if one process or functionality makes sense and works end-to-end.

What knowledge base to use? 

Automatic testing is a strong testing tool, but it cannot replace all manual tests. We need to evaluate the whole system characteristics and environment to understand what tests we should execute manually, and what tests we should automate.

To decide the test strategy it’s important to understand the advantages and disadvantages of each approach.

Manual testing is a knowledge science activity that includes human judgment and capacity to analyse if something makes sense. If we do not execute manual testing, we lose the advantage of experience-based test techniques, and the human capacity to analyse if the solution makes sense for the business and meets the requirements.

Manual testing give us a chance to find extra bugs that automated tests would never find, because it allows us to follow that gut feeling that “something smells bad” and explore themes that may not have been tested or required.

Even when we decide to implement automated testing, we should test the software manually before running the automated tests. First, to be sure that automation is possible, and then to ensure that this automation is correct.

Automated testing is an exact science that ensures accurate results. It is software testing other software.

Testing a new feature manually could be fun, but testing the same features time and time again to prevent regression issues can be demotivating, leading to frustration and wasting time. That is why regression tests automation is a very important mechanism to save money and spare the test team.

And how about performance and load tests? It is insane to execute those tests manually! You could try but you’ll take a lifetime, and probably the tests won´t be accurate and the test coverage will be smaller. The greater the software and the more stable the feature scope, the greater value of testing automation.

When a part of the testing process is automated, you have many advantages:

• The productivity increases because the test execution is faster.
• Your confidence grows since you’re more reliable and error proofing.
• Your team is more efficient because the tests after implementation are repeatable without human intervention, and the team can use their energy on non-automated tasks.

Check the following table to see when each test is more suitable:

Bet your money on the right testing.

So, the one-million-dollar answer to the question on how 5000 automated tests were made and the project failed is simple: the test strategy was wrong!

We need to find the right balance between automated and manual testing, because each one has strengths and weaknesses. Their value only exists when they are applied in the right environment.

As an agile company, Polarising implements automated tests to save teams, time, and above all, to deliver high-quality software. However, to ensure that the solutions bring value and are the right ones to your business requirements, manual tests are also performed.

Márcia Catarino
Business Analyst

Links
https://www.testim.io/blog/test-automation-vs-manual-testing/
https://www.guru99.com/difference-automated-vs-manual-testing.html
https://www.testingcompany.com.br/blog/teste-manual-de-software/
http://www.tecnisys.com.br/noticias/2019/teste-manual-vs-teste-automatizado
https://www.softwaretestingmaterial.com/automation-testing-vs-manual-testing/

To be agile you must focus on several elements such as the continuous value of your product, the constant adaptability to changes in the requirements, the capability of delivery on a short term, the interaction between all the project actors, the end-users and the self-management competence of the teams, among others.

Well, now you kind of know what is to be agile… but do you know how to make sure that you are really doing it?

And please, don’t answer that you “just know” because you feel you are a “flexible and fast thinker” … This is not a job interview, and believe me, when you need to justify to the company board why Agile is the way to go you will need data, numbers, facts! Because information is power.

Be multidimensionally agile.

First you need to know what to measure exactly, and for that you must understand for which dimensions the Agile methodology looks for in a company and how those dimensions are impacted and, subsequently, how to evaluate or measure them.

There are four dimensions impacted by Agile and each one of these dimensions will be the platform to check different pulses:

Let’s start with Business. Here you will measure effectiveness by assessing how your delivery is reaching the goal. We could make a giant list of agile metrics, but let’s keep it simple!

Choose a major question instead: Are you solving the business needs? The Fitness For Purpose Score is a good way to check that. You must understand the customer’s purpose for consuming what you’re offering. Then, you can create the appropriate fitness criteria metrics. You can set this score, considering: Net Fitness Score [NFS] = % satisfied customers – % dissatisfied customers

Another valuable metrics for effectiveness are the Pirate Metrics: acquisition, activation, retention, referral, and revenue. Maybe you will encounter some products where some of these indicators won’t fit, just apply the ones that do. Check this cool illustration to help you understand these 5 steps really quick:

Image: Startup Metrics for Pirates by Dave McClure

Let’s now travel to the next dimension: Organizational, where you will measure efficiency. This is the moment to put your team under the microscope and evaluate their overall performance.

One of the most important agile metrics that will help you do this is the Lead Time: how long are you taking from “To Do” to “Done”? This is one of the easiest, simplest, and accurate metrics you can use, especially when you are supporting your tasks management with Kanban methodology:

Image: Kanban Board

You can apply the metric to the total time from the point of agreement to the point of delivery and/or to how long the tasks/features last in each phase. It’s also important to verify the Waiting Time (how long an item continues between the conclusion of one phase to the next one).

You should associate the Lead Time with others like, WIP (Work in Progress) and Throughput. The WIP considers what is “Ongoing” but also the tasks from “To Do” to “Done”. By attending to this you will help your team to focus on finishing the tasks already started before starting new ones.

The Throughput will tell you the average work units per time units. It will help you, for instance, to know how many items your team can deliver in a week and if that number is increasing or decreasing through the life cycle of the project (so you can identify either possible blockers and facilitators of their workflow).

Image: The Lead Time is improved by shrinking the WIP

Let’s now check the Technical dimension to see the excellency of your work. Meaning: does your team works fast, but has the result real quality?

The measures you use here are known and not exclusive of Agile: how many bugs do you have? How much of the product do your tests cover? And what about the infrastructure? Is it robust enough to support your product? Does your code have 15.000 lines that you just realized that aren’t used for anything?

If you work for an IT company and still need explanation on how to measure this, maybe you should rethink your career … just kidding! (no… for real, question yourself!)

For last, but not (at all) the least, we imperatively must look at the Cultural dimension to check the ecosystem. To be agile your organizational culture must be agile. There is no way to jump this step.

How happy is your team, the organization in general, the project participants? Is it even possible to measure emotions? Oh yeah! For instance, through Burnout Tests or the Happiness Radar, using just a simple white board where your team members can mark the areas they’re happy, neutral or unhappy about. Ok, it’s a little corny, but I’ll take my chances… just feel your team’s heart!

Image: Hapiness Radar

Don’t be just any agile-cherry on top.

As you can see you have many metrics to check up your agility (and we are just giving you a few examples), so please don’t go crazy and megalomaniac and start applying every metric you know every step of the way!

Last piece of advice, simply follow these two rules:

1 – Be aware of toxic metrics: don’t start measuring a team member or comparing teams. This will only undermine your environment. Promote collaboration, not competition.

2 – Take it easy, understand which metrics make more sense to your team/project/product and start your own agility barometer!

Now, you are ready to go.

Dulce Monteiro
Polarising Business Analyst

Contact Polarising for tech that works: info@polarising.com

The market is competitive but there are some more “resilient” collaboration tools than others. In 2005 Linus Torvalds presented to the world a new distributive source-control management (SCM), which he named git. A few years later it has become the most adopted SCM in the world, dethroning some of the most popular ones, such as SVN or CVS.

Nowadays, git is primary a hosting provider for large companies like Microsoft, GitHub, Gitlab, Bitbucket and it is used by millions of users every minute. This video series from Scott Hanselman is very complete, if you have a chance, watch it.

There are tools and Git Workflows.

There are several collaboration strategies; from the simplest one where every member of the team commits to the same branch, to a more structured workflow approach, such as the notorious Gitflow.

Most community collaboration projects follow a Fork and Pull Request (PR): the user creates a copy of the project to themselves, implementing the fix or adding a feature, to finally create a PR to the origin repository that the owner(s) can accept, request changes or reject.

But the GitLab flow and the GitHub flow are both intended to simplify the workflow, making it more “agile” in continuous deployment models. Atlassian has a nice article comparing several models, including the Centralized Workflow, Feature Branch Workflow and the Forking Workflow.

Go with the Gitflow.

The Gitflow workflow model was proposed by Vincent Driessen in 2010 and ten years later it is one of the most used models by development teams. Its core resides on multiple branches with suggestive naming and semantic meaning.

Image from nvie.com 

Main and Supporting Branches.

There are two main branches In Gitflow: master and develop. The master branch is considered when the code is ready-to-go to production and it’s the root of all truth.  As to the develop branch, it is considered as the current state of the project development.

When the release management establishes that development is finished or the developed features are Done (i.e. respects the project definition of done, passes the tests, etc), a new Release should be made by merging the code from the develop branch into the release branch, do some maintenance task and then merge into master branch, usually through a pull request.

There are three more supporting branches from the original model, like Feature branches, Release branches and Hotfix branches:

Feature branches are the ones that reflect the application development features, like bug fixes or project work items, that will not break the application day to day activities.  If it is something with serious impact on production, you should consider using the Hotfix branches. Once the feature is done the code is merged into the develop branch through a pull request and all remaining feature branches should sync with it to import the latest changes.

Released branches are created from the develop branch and reflect a new release version to be prepared. Within this branch, several activities like bumping the release version are in order. Once the release is closed and considered done, the code is merged into the master branch as this version is on production environment.

Finally, the Hotfix branches is where critical application errors or bugs are going to be fixed. Once implemented the are merged into the master branch so they can be deployed into production environment and then into the develop branch, so the fix would be integrated into all in progress developments.

Vincent Driessen also makes available in his GitHub repository a collection of git extensions to provide repository actions to relate to Gitflow mode.

Why using a Collaborative Model?

Choosing your team collaborative model should be a thoughtful decision that needs to also consider the release management model. But most important, this model must adapt to the project needs, always having in mind that there is no such thing as a model that fits all.

A structured and defined released model makes any collaboration model simpler, turning CI/CD pipelines more effective. The more chaotic the release model you select, the more complex it will be the collaboration flow model, and in these cases I recommend an extra branch called prerelease branches.

These prerelease branches are created from develop branches and merged from feature branches as pull requests. This way you can combine features into new branches to be “deployed” and “tested” in user acceptance test environments, validating any feature that may not be approved right away.

If you’re are still in doubt about the best Collaboration model for your project, I hope this article brings some clarity: the Gitflow model can be adapted to your’s and your team’s more complex needs, having some automations that can be made like automatic semantic versioning through gitversion or through git TAGs.

Nuno Cancelo
Polarising Consultant

References: https://git-scm.com
https://www.toptal.com/git/git-workflows-for-pros-a-good-git-guide
https://nvie.com/posts/a-successful-git-branching-model/

We already read about the benefits of remote work, they are undeniable; at Polarising is not new to anyone, as we have the flexibility to do it when we feel it will improve our performance.

But if there has been a general underestimated idea of this context, now we know how equally important both office and remote work are to that work-life balance companies and employees are always advocating.

So, Polarising decided to re-open the office in that assumption: just because things cannot be as they were, it does not necessarily mean we have to exclude any of the options!

República’s office is open since June 1st with limited capacity, and for that we had to come up with a solution that allows anyone to see if there’s place available to go and take care of business or just have a relaxing day outside home.

The challenge.

HR, LABS and Communication teams were already working together to prepare everything, and there were some ideas and possibilities on the table. Finally, I was contacted and asked to develop a registration app. There was a catch, thou… I had two days to do it!

This app had to be a quick and effective solution that allowed each one of our employees to book their day/ place and parking space in the office building.

A few months ago, I had decided to learn a little about Microsoft power apps, an Office 365 tool in which we all have a Polarising account. The concept is to develop no-code applications for PC, Tablet or Mobile. The data sources of these applications can be simple excel files, sharepoint or database repositories.

Another advantage is that it’s very easy to publish applications that can be used, for example, by integrating or embedding them in a website or in Microsoft Teams.

The requirements.

This app had to have some specific requirements, of course:

• an app that any and only Polarising employees can access
• a feature that allows to schedule the days at the office in each of the 3 floors and manage the number of people registered on each floor
• when seats run out on a floor, no more bookings can be made for that floor on that day
• it is possible for each employee to make only one reservation per day and to unbook a reservation
• a feature that allows to book and unbook a specific parking space and only one space reservation per day
• it is possible to check Booking and Parking Space details of all registered employees at any time
• booking history must be saved.

The solution.

After comprehending what was needed, I went to work! My biggest challenges were fields like Data and Calendar, as well as using the logged user information in to the App, so I could make the reservation on it behalf, two concepts that I hadn’t yet used working with power apps; and it wasn’t as easy as I thought!

Step by step and overcoming each challenge, I came up with a first draft version of the app; I was ready to run some tests, so I asked the team to do it covering all sorts of possible scenarios, and most important, to suggest improvements if necessary.

The tests went so smoothly and mission accomplished: Polarising has an “express-app” ready to welcome all on June 1st, according to all safety procedures!

Working as a team was fundamental to have this application ready and functional on time.

It’s great to be back!

Márcia Catarino
Business Analyst

So, don’t take any chances when it comes to your work! There are many trends that I have in mind in all my projects and that I know will determine the irreverence and quality of my designs. This was what led me to write this article and share some insights with you.

I had the opportunity to develop a real cool project at Polarising, for the Arte Institute. It’s called the RHI Think project and its mission was to promote the connection between arts and business, bringing awareness to the cultural sector and empowering artists to become more independent in managing their careers.

The RHI Think project consisted in a mobile app that would allow you to establish a route of artistic events happening in several Portuguese cities and contribute with a chosen amount. To design it I’ve implemented some of the most trendiest concepts, like mobile first, brutalism, loud and proud typography, bold colours and minimalism; shall we take a closer look on each of these concepts? Mobile First
Mobile-first is a trend that is quickly moving away from the trend status towards a good practice in web design. Every year, more people are looking at websites on their phones rather than on desktops.

Brutalism
Brutalism in digital design is a style that intentionally attempts to look raw, chaotic, or unadorned. Although can sometimes be upsetting, it also has the potential to be eye-catching, especially if used to create seamlessly functional and engaging business websites. For brutalism to be used correctly the design must be raw, unpolished yet not unpleasant, and convey a sense of in-your-face authenticity to the users. It will add a sense of visual tension that can be extremely powerful and long-term memorable.

Loud and Proud Typography
Another growing trend is big typography. Visually, big typography means titles with letters in large point sizes. For words to get to speak louder than the thousand words a photo might yell out, it’s necessary to deploy a big, bold and custom font. With more tools and devices available to support custom fonts, 2020 is a big year to make bold statements that set you apart from the crowd. This will only keep expanding in 2020, with more web design .

Hand-Lettering
Hand-lettering is becoming extremely popular because it adds a custom feel to something, most of times, is uniform. It’s a touch of uniqueness without having to be unique to every-single-visitor.

Mobile Dark Mode
Dark Mode, as adopted by both Google and Apple, is probably the top user interface design trend that app designers need to watch out for. In app design, this mode not only reduces the battery strain and the light emitted by the screen device, but alsoapp in dark environments without causing eyes stress.

Scalable Vector Graphics
In the past, websites with rich content had to suffer slower page-load times due to traditional file formats such as GIF, PNG, GIF, and other video formats. These formats are now notoriously anti-mobile. For website owners it’s time to make the early bird switch to responsive, mobile-first designs, prioritizing mobile components at the core of the process without sacrificing rich visual content that enchants visitors. And that’s where SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) comes in. SVGs ensure consistent quality of the user experience for all mobile visitors.

Bold Colours
Bold, bright, saturated colours help the brand stand out and go against the soft neutrals that a lot of companies have chosen over the past few years. Also, in 2020, web designers will put even more focus on using colour to evoke the mood(s) and feeling(s) a site is meant to convey.

Minimalism
Minimalism, sometimes called ‘flat design’, isn’t a new trend in web design, but it has typically been associated with a lot of white space (think Apple). In 2020, contrary to popular belief, minimalism doesn’t have to be all white. Minimalism also involves simplifying the interface in several ways: hidden navigation bar, minimum of colours and buttons, and so on. Previously, it was popular to pay attention to any little thing but today the user privileges quick access to information.

Animations, Integrated GIFS, and Dynamic Illustrations
Small animations are a trend that’s been growing for a few years and it tends to grow in 2020. Micro animations are used for loading designs, backgrounds, decorative elements, and navigation.

Another project that I was part of was intraPol, our company intranet. As you know, intranets are core to internal communication and this platform needed to have everything an employee needs, from up to date information, documents and HR functional applications, but it also had to be appealing. I think this project is a good example of how we’ve took advantage of these trends because they are all over it, it was fun and challenging to do it!

Besides these, I can think of some other that are becoming relevant, like the Asymmetric Layouts, that reinforce the idea behind asymmetry: websites look less straight-edged and become more interesting to look at, although it’s important to have a visual balance.

3D is also becoming the next big thing, although I wouldn’t consider it a straightforward trend, this might change in 5 years from now. To fully implement it, 3D monitors are not enough because when their value decreases, part of the web design will be presented as information in bulk. A new level of interactivity is VR (Visual Reality) but the financial constrains are still a real issue. When this is possible, it’s likely that users won’t even need a mouse to navigate the website, just to blink or nod to switch pages.

The Push notifications are a controversial trend because it’s unpleasant to get a pop-up a message in the monitor while working or watching movies. Notifications can be blocked, which will eliminate their annoyance, but on devices like tablets or phones, they are often useful rather than unbearable. Most websites are already asking the users permission to send notifications. It’s important to properly configure the subject and frequency of these notifications, making them an element that can help users, not push them away.

One other project I enjoyed so much doing was the AKHQ.IO. This website aims to provide a user interface for the Kafka ecosystem in order to simplify its comprehension, usage and management in a single web interface.

You see, I used a lot of these trends, such as bold colours, big typography, minimalism, animations, and on top of the requirements was to make this website mobile first. It was another great project.

There are many other projects that I would love to tell you about, as well as other trends to discover. There’s no doubt in my mind that, as I’m writing this article, new trends are already emerging. This is a great challenge to any Frontend developer, and at Polarising we want to be ahead and create solutions that can be edgy and effective at the same time. And we can always use some more talent in this area!

Inês Branco
UI / UX Designer & Frontend Developer

REFERENCES
sondoramarketing.com/blog/2020-web-design-trends/ (Dennis Dubner, CEO of Sondora. October 2019).
merehead.com/blog/8-main-trends-of-web-design-2020/ (Olga Stashenko, Full Stack Developer. August 2019).
mobileappdaily.com/top-ui-design-trends (Ayush Mehta, Creative Head. October 2019).
theedigital.com/blog/web-design-trends (Megan Burgess, Digital Content Specialist. August 2019).
freepik.com/blog/8-web-design-trends-keep-mind-2020 (Orana Velarde, Graphic Designer. October 2019).
kijo.co/blog/7-useful-typography-trends-used-in-web-design (Mike O’Raw, Designer. August 2019).

What most stands out to me is “high-level visual summary” because over time there are changes in any product roadmap. For a start-up or a product in its embryonic state, this is very important. In fact, if the roadmap does not change it’s because something is wrong! So do not panic if this happens every week or month, it’s normal, in fact, it shows you are on the right track to respond to customer’s needs. Also, changing the product roadmap can mean that you are keeping up with the latest technology developments and this can only favour your product or business.

General Picture.
The only part of a roadmap that needs to be clear and sort of fixed, is its final goal and the overall vision for the product. Some good questions to ask yourself are:

• What are the required features the product needs to provide real value to the customer?
• What are the “nice to have” features that can be implemented in the future?
• Where will the product be 5 years from now?

When building new products, it’s good to think of the 80/20 pareto principle that defends the delivery of 80% of the product value with 20% of its features. Applying this rule can help answering all other questions.

An additional tip on how to define a clear product vision can be found also at Product Talk, just by following the link: https://www.producttalk.org/vision/. Also, if you share the roadmap and product vision with your customers and stakeholders, they will feel engaged and contribute to its evolution in time, maintaining their interest and investment from the MVP to the beta version.

It takes organization.
A good product roadmap takes time and planning. Make sure you organise and produce clear technical documentation explaining all stages and every final decision. It can be a small chapter together with the documentation or just an appendix. Starting with this kind of organization will pay off later since every step can be traced, as well as keeping future iterations aligned with the overall objectives.

Tiago Simões
Polarising Consultant

However, the IT industry is still maturing and some of the management models in place are relics from fellow engineering areas, applied to the challenges of a fast paced, quickly evolving, and always changing world. IT professionals could drastically benefit from a management model suited to the industry reality, and that is where the AGILE methodology with SCRUM comes rushing through the door.

So, what is Scrum?
Scrum is a framework that can help you develop, deliver and sustain complex products. It consists on a set of roles, events, artifacts and rules that bind the framework together to achieve a continuous delivery with the highest possible value. It also gives you the ability to analyze the work that has been done and identify points of improvement for future developments and releases.

Who takes part in Scrum?
Scrum teams are given the ability to choose how to best accomplish their work, rather than being instructed by individuals outside the team. They have a set of elements whose combined expertise assures that goals are accomplished without depending on others outside the team.

This model is designed to improve flexibility, creativity and productivity, so this team should have a specific development team with 3 to 9 elements that combine a set of skills required to deliver a ready and shippable product increment.

The Product Owner is also an important element, because it manages the product backlog and makes sure the development team has a clear understanding of those tasks.

This team is headed by a Scrum Master, who is the servant-leader of the team and educates on the scrum theory, practices, rules and values. It also coaches other development teams and helps the organization to adopt the Scrum values.

Also, it helps the product owner making sure all development teams are in in-sync and aligned, understanding all together the goals, scope and priorities.

When does the Scrum team meet?
Events are an important part of Scrum; in fact, you have a short meeting every day and three more each week. “What?! That’s a bunch of meetings, nobody has time for that! I’m getting out of here…” Wait. All events in scrum are time boxed and optimized to deliver the maximum value in the shortest time. Here’s how:

• Sprint Planning. During planning, the work to be done gets decided and packaged onto an artifact called the Sprint. Sprints are time boxed and should contain fully analyzed tasks with a closed scope estimated from two weeks to one month.
• The Daily Scrum. This is the part where you stretch your legs! Daily scrum is a 15 minutes time boxed event, held every day with the purpose to inspect progress and remove development obstacles, while improving communication between them.
• Sprint Review. At the end of each Sprint, a review is held for showing the produced increment to the stakeholders, with the objective of collecting feedback and give input on additional features that can add value to the product.
• Sprint Retrospective. The cherry on top of the cake! This event is an opportunity to identify points for improvement and work on removing non efficient practices.

Going through this for the first time may seem like a hard process to implement. Maybe you are thinking about the cost of having a scrum master, or the hours spend on scrum events, but if you give it a chance you may discover a process to improve your teams efficiency and the relationship with stakeholders. At Polarising we are using the Scrum methodology every day and already having good results. Read more about scrum on the official scrum guide and give it a go.

Tiago Diogo
Software Engineer at Polarising

There are three main paths to develop a mobile application: Web, Native and Hybrid. How can we decide which is the best approach? The answer isn’t simple, but I’ve done this exercise and will try to share my thoughts with you, going through each one in a simple way, analyzing pros and cons with the help some examples.

WEB APPLICATIONS
Let’s start with the cheapest one! Well, this doesn’t mean limited quality; we can say it’s a low-cost solution to deliver a mobile user experience, and in most cases, enough to satisfy user expectations.

Typically, Web apps are just like any website that is built in HTML5, CSS and JavaScript, running in a web browser. There are sets of tools which allow the development process to be fast and more efficient, although web apps are often oversimplified and do not provide the same features as a native one.

Web apps lack functionalities, although they are evolving over time. In fact, functionalities like sending push notifications or access to a vibration device and improved touch features, already exist. These new web apps are called Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) and are a mix of web pages and native apps. Unfortunately, only Google Chrome is compatible with PWAs, which means iOS users are not able to use them.

Web apps are good for news, weather, e-commerce, social and so on. Some examples are Medium, Gmail, The Washington Post, etc.

Advantages:
– No need to support multiple versions of the software
– Can be built for all OS as long they can run a web browser
– Less expensive compared to native apps
– Do not require approval from the app marketplace to be released.

Disadvantages:
– Require internet connection to function properly
– Slower and much less responsive than native apps
– Limited access to smartphone features
– Different user experience according to different web browsers.

Web apps are becoming a powerful business tool. Progressive web apps allow building cross-platform applications without significant disadvantages to the end user. If your project is simple and doesn’t require complex frontend and backend development, you should consider building a progressive web applications.

NATIVE APPLICATIONS
Native apps are the most reliable ones, showing extraordinary performance when compared to the others. Native mobile apps are the most common and they are developed for a specific mobile platform using a particular programming language and technology. For example, Swift and Objective-C for native iOS apps, Java or Kotlin for native Android apps, and C++ for native Windows and Blackberry apps.

High-performance applications like Google Maps, Facebook and LinkedIn are usually developed with native apps, since they are ideal to solve complicated tasks and deliver an exceptional user experience.

Advantages:
– Available in app stores, which grants them quality, security and device compatibility
– Superior user experience
– Better performance
– Access to the device built-in features.

Disadvantages:
– Support multiple versions of the application
– More costly for native than the others
– Difficult programming languages
– Not the best option for simple applications.

By offering great user experience, performance and accessibility, native apps can create a more personalized product. Even with higher development costs at the beginning, they often prove to be the best approach and cost saving solution.

HYBRID APPLICATIONS
Finally, hybrid applications are a compromise between native and web application development. They behave like a native app and work across multiple platforms. Like the web app, they are written in JavaScript, HTML and CSS, however, on the opposite side, they can be distributed over app stores and installed like a normal app running in a webview instead of a browser. It’s essentially a web app that incorporates additional native features, provided with a wrapper when it deploys.

To develop a hybrid app, you should consider two things: the backend code, always written in languages like JavaScript, HTML and CSS, and a native shell. This shell is downloadable and loads the code using a webview.

Hybrid apps are good for banks, news, media, for example, Amazon, Evernote, Netflix, etc.

Advantages:
– Access to device hardware and device internal API
– Only one code base is needed for several platforms
– Downloadable from the app stores
– Web development technology without web browser.

Disadvantages:
– Much slower than native apps
– Dependency of third-parties platforms to deploy
– Although not native, they look and feel native
– Require more customization, which costs more money.

Developing a hybrid app can be the source of issues to native and hybrid systems, which makes bug fixing really tricky. User experience is sometimes sacrificed in hybrid apps development, since it’s not possible to customize the app based on the platform that is running. Performance is also an issue because hybrid apps are loaded in a webview.

In conclusion, when comparing web, native and hybrid application development, none is better than the other. All have a downside and points in favor, depending on a specific business scenario.

Web applications are a must for startups and small businesses when time is critical. This approach is usually used for a minimal viable product, when time and money are limited. However, many companies use these apps not as a temporary solution but because they have a satisfactory performance and they’re easy to support.

When trying to get a better performance and wider functionality with limited money, consider using the hybrid approach. But if you are looking for the best user experience, then native app development is your best choice. It can be more expensive and require more effort, but the result is a consistent user interface and a faultless performance.

The choice between web, native and hybrid development is a conjunction of several factors like timeline, developer skills, business needs and app requirements, just to name some. Choosing a development method should not be determined by your budget but by the solution that better fits the needs of your business, providing a greater user experience. In case you need advice, you know where to find us: polarising.com/services, just challenge us!

Tiago Simões
Polarising Consultant

Here at Polarising, we strive to provide the skills and options that are better suited for each of our customers businesses. We know that some methodologies are more advantageous for small companies and others will hold better when there are massive scale or very complex data transactions.

But there are programming platforms that can be used to build pretty much any kind of software application and serve a wide array of business needs, from CRM to finance to supply management and redesign them as needed. That’s what .NET does, and we’re seeing how versatile it is first hand.

As of right now, two .NET programming languages, Visual Basic .NET and C#, are among the six most widely used programming languages for software development around the world, according to the May 2019 Tiobe Index. There are a few core characteristics that explain why: it allows the use of multiple languages, has super easy integration with Windows and Microsoft products (they built it, after all), offers horizontal scalability and consistent UI practices, and because the ecosystem is so large and powerful, all the tools have been pre-tested and can be easily accessed.

First launched in 2002, the .NET Framework is now in generation 4.8, the latest version freshly released and with several enhancements in critical areas, most notably security patches, bug fixes, and product improvements. But more trendy now is .NET Core, a more recent development aimed at simplifying development and testing with a free, open source, cross-platform solution.

This is a redesigned version of the .NET Framework that allows the deployment of apps in multiple environments, from mobile to desktop to cloud, and for Windows, MacOS, and Linux. It’s yet another useful tool to have in your skillset, as a specialist in this area, especially as it grows and develops. Core is potentially revolutionary and we want to be a part of that future.

Growth trajectory
The community of .NET developers is growing and Polarising, as one of Portugal’s Best Companies to Work, is part of that. We’ve got specialized teams working with these frameworks, which is another tool in our toolbox of software engineering, alongside a team of 60+ professionals dedicated to the Spring Framework, for instance. We belive that investing in this technology is to assure a wider know-how that allows any programmer to open doors into new career opportunities, providing our customers the best solutions.

These are skills for the now and for the future, as is superbly known at a time when demand for IT professionals with programming skills is at an all-time high, and both Europe and the U.S. show signs of an increasing skills shortage. Speaking of which, a recent study published by consultancy firm EY Global recognizes the problem and stresses that the most digitally mature companies tend to have higher productivity and lower staff turnover. It’s a good outlook to have when planning for the next five years, right?