We are counting down to one of the largest technology events in Portugal, Building the Future 2022! Organized by Microsoft, it’s an exclusive forum to leverage your business through the networking with identified potential clients, partners, and peers.

From January 26^th to 28^th, this hybrid event will focus on digital transformation and cover some unique perspectives on how companies and people are contributing to this revolution.

How? Check out the Agenda.

Day 1, Beyond and Future: be prepared to go beyond imagination into a more distant technological future and explore the role of technologies such as AI, Machine Learning, Automation, Big Data, and more.

Day 2, People and Planet: discover how digital transformation is changing human life and exploring digital solutions to create a more sustainable future.

Day 3, Education: get to know the solutions that use technology to leverage the digital transformation by promoting learning at any time and in any place.

As sponsors for the second year, Polarising is even more eager to learn from the experts in technology, leadership and education that are coming together to share their vision and experience on how to empower people and organizations. 

Our Expert and Code Sessions.

But we also want to take an active role in contributing with our expertise to this unique event. So, Polarising is hosting one Expert Session and one Code Session during the event, both given by Nuno Cancelo, Polarising’s Microsoft Practice Lead:

26^th of January, 11:30 am
Expert Session: Towards high availability and beyond. (based on the article originaly published at Building the Future event website)

Abstract: Recently we were challenged by one of our clients to implement their new product. It should be cloud-based, scalable, with high availability, and it should be possible to deploy every new version of the application during office hours without losing service. Read the full article:

27th of January, 5pm
Code Session: Monoliths deprecated?! They need a facelift.

Abstract: In this session, we will start with a “monolithic” application and apply a set of strategies to decouple the application migrated and deploy it to the cloud.

More about the agenda here.

Job Pitch Challenge: talent is key.

It’s clear to us that in the center of this transformation are younger generations, so Polarising was also one of the many companies participating on the Job Pitch Challenge with the purpose of scouting the best talent.

Many candidates had the opportunity to know Polarising and some will join our Champions Academy, a program that will help to jumpstart an IT career by providing an outstanding and balanced work environment, exciting projects, and the required guidance to achieve personal and professional goals.

If you are interested to join our next class in February, just fill out the form and apply today!

Image from Microsoft.

Building The Future 2022: so… shall we do it together?

You still have time to attend this incredible event: get your ticket with Polarising’s code: and see you there!

Contact us to know more about Polarising’s services with Microsoft technology.

Someone once said, “If you can dream it, you can do it.”. Our partners dreams are our dreams, and we partner with them to reach those dreams.

Recently we were challenged by one of our partners to implement the new version of their product. From their experience of the previous version, our partner had some challenges that they wanted to overcome, avoid or minimize the impact in day-to-day activities.  

This new product must have a web, Android, and IOS mobile application, be cloud-based, scalable, and of high availability. It should be possible to deploy every new version of the application during office hours without losing service. 

I will not discuss monotonous topics like solution architecture or application design. Still, I’ll guide you through some challenges and decisions made to deliver value and, in some cases, reduce day to day costs.

Choice of an Agile Platform.

Our first main decision was which agile platform would we use, on one hand to support the development team, and on the other to allow the project continuity once it enters in maintenance. From our experience from other projects, we have chosen to work with Azure DevOps.

Azure DevOps has a pleasant free tier for small development teams and unlimited stakeholders and covers all project sections. With Azure Boards for specifying Epics and Backlog definitions, going through Azure Repo (for source code control), Azure Pipelines (for continuous integration, delivery, and deployment), and Azure Test Plans to test the applications. With another great benefit: all related activities (Epics, User Storys, Application Changes) are available on the same workspace.

Building web source code.

Given the solution complexity, several repositories were created to keep the multiple components decoupled and cohesive, supporting each other with a single responsibility. This approach leads us to our next challenge, building and testing and deploy all these projects, since these activities take time and there is a limit of build minutes on the Azure DevOps platform. 

Azure DevOps free plan comes with 1800 build minutes for a single agent. Anything more has an extra cost. To overcome this limitation, we installed some on-permisses agents and configured them on Azure DevOps. With this approach, we were able to build agents for specific needs (Eg: allow SonarQube runs, build Java, React, and other solutions) and have several projects to execute them.

Building mobile source code.

While this scenario allows most of the project solutions to be built, one of the product requirements is to develop a mobile application targeting IOS and Android. Although it is possible to create Azure DevOps built pipelines to make these applications, the necessary effort doesn’t make much sense for an out-of-the-box setup. 

There is an alternative with easy integration and with a set of excellent features (like Analytics and Diagnostics for free). Visual Studio App Center enables continuous integration (with 240 build minutes), delivery and deployment for mobile applications, as well as to integrate with significant git hosting providers. Unfortunately, it doesn’t support on-premises git hosting. 

This platform handles all the hassle of the mobile application lifecycle, and the analytics/diagnostics features consolidate helpful information about application usage.  

Environmental Variables.

Polarising’s solution design specified the decoupling of the frontend application from the backend and other services, and with this decision, different challenges emerged. 

For the frontend application, the chosen technology was React. Like any other frontend technology, the application property configurations (such as services endpoints) are defined by the build (then minified) task for each environment (Development, Users Acceptance Tests, Production), raising considerations while defining the build pipeline.

Once again, Azure DevOps proves to be the right choice by providing some actions to replace the application configurations before the build and having a user interface for setting those properties only in one location. So, for each build pipeline, for each environment, the correct configurations are applied.

Image from Dreamstime.

For the backend applications, dotnet core was the chosen technology. With this approach, we only have one build pipeline to do the build, test, and code analysis tasks and generate a single artefact deployed on the different environments. For environmental variables and configurations, there are three main possibilities:

1. On the release pipeline, define all environmental configurations and then apply and replace them on configuration files. 
2. On Azure WebApp Configuration, set up all configurations for each environment.
3. Use Azure App Configuration to store non-sensitive information, use Azure Key Vault to store sensitive information, and configure the Azure WebApp Configuration to use the data from these sources.

The last option extends the second option and provides a more secure and centralized data storage. This approach allows multiple application uses for the same data without replicate the information between all applications. If we have to update any key, we only have to edit it in just one place. 

Control application deployments.

If while deploying into a development environment, it shouldn’t provide many hazards. When deploying for more crucial environments, the challenges start to uprise. To overcome this sensitive checkpoint, within the release pipeline, we apply pre-deployment conditions to activate the pre-deployment approvals and set up the person(s) that must approve the pipeline execution.

For instance, to deploy into the User Acceptance Tests environment, the Product Owner must support this deployment, and for Production it must be the Product Owner and the IT Supervisor. It could be any other recommended person, someone related to the project or maintenance team.

The platform keeps track of the versions deployed for each environment, making the artefacts versioning, or rolling back, much more manageable.

Deploy without losing Service.

By now, we can take a few minutes from committing a source code change to deploying it into the Azure Cloud, making it available to application customers. 

Everyone remembers those days when IT teams planned to deploy new versions of the application at night, near the weekend, and had to turn down the service, and for the maintenance timeframe, the system didn’t process any requests.

There are many deployment strategies and most of them target specific complex use cases. The simplest is the “Blue-Green Deployment.”, where we deploy our application to one node (Blue), the partner users do regression tests on the significant features, and if everything is OK, we swap with the “Production” (Green) node (which has the previous version). Afterwards, if any malfunction is found, we can roll back by switching the node again.

Within Azure, we can achieve this goal by using deployment slots, where we have the “Production” slot and create another space for a “Blue” deployment and configure it. The swap action will tell the infrastructure that the current production version will not receive more requests and handle the current ones. Any new bids will be accepted by the new application. This action may take a while, but by the end, the production slot will have the most recent version, while the “blue” place will have the previous version.

Application High Availability.

Most application users will complain about the slowness, or even loss of service, of the application, and the time it takes to do some operations, especially in high demand periods when many application users interact with the applications.

One of the many features of “Azure App Service” is autoscaling, where we can auto-scale in or out according to defined rules. Those rules are defined in two factors:

1. Schedule based: specified by a time frame.
2. Metrics bases: determined by metrics of usage such as CPU.

For the solution in hand, we applied both strategies. By daylight, we configured to auto-scale based on metrics (such as CPU, Memory or Network) and once the peak goes by, apply auto-scale out rules. Don’t forget, for every scale-in control, you should set up a scale-out control.

By night, the application usage is much less, so we created other rules that do a scale-out at night and apply a scale-in at the beginning of the morning. 

This strategy increases the application’s high availability and resilience and attracts savings by reducing the night capacity and optimizing infrastructure usage.

Conclusion: dreams can come true.

To make our partners dreams into a reality is always challenging. It is more than creating a new application or following code best practices. It is also about looking ahead and build an infrastructure that allows the team to have a pleasant application maintenance experience and reduce the time and cost of building and deploying new features (and fixes) into the cloud.

It is also essential to provide the application consumers with a pleasant user experience by having service availability and optimizing the infrastructure cost by reducing the infrastructure during the low usage timeframes.

We have faced more challenges, but these were the ones with the most impact.

(This article was originaly published at Building the Future event website.)

Nuno Cancelo
Microsoft Practice Lead at Polarising

The numbers for this year’s Web Summit are impressive, considering that we have just started to comeback to in person events: 42,751 attendees and other hundreds and thousands figures to go over.

With a 10-year history and the last 3 in Lisbon, the Web Summit continues to be the largest tech event in Europe, mainly due to its inspiring speakers and relevant content.

It is also the event that can create unforeseeable opportunities to network, showcase new businesses and ideas, and to discuss relevant and structural worldwide matters: this year’s agenda was focused on Climate and Cryptocurrency.

Polarising at the Web Summit.

Yvonne Kubbinga, Polarising’s Netherlands Country Manager, doesn’t miss the opportunity to attend a Web Summit since 2017.

Yvonne has been with Polarising precisely a year now. Taking on such a relevant role, she often travels to Lisbon to meet clients and colleagues at Lisbon’s headquarters, and combines it with spending some time in Alentejo where she has a family home.

After last’s year’s , Yvonne decided to get her sneakers out of the closet and gather a group of peers and business friends to join her at Altice Arena:

“Finally, we could go to the physical Web Summit again. It’s also the place to meet new and old business friends, to network and to get inspired. This year was all of that and more, since we had an interesting group, and with me was also Polarising’s Head of Sales, João Machado.”

The X Web Summit Factor.

Well, we could say that it was Daniela Melchior, the Portuguese actress that is rocking Suicide Squad, but in fact, one of the best things at Websummit, not just this year but all editions, is that you have a wide range of speakers and talks to choose from:

“During the day everybody selected their own program. There was a balance between interesting Start-ups and inspirational talks. For example, Kate Swanborg from DreamWorks Animation, she is so inspired by her job that her energy is still with me, even after some days.”

Kate Swanborg Keynote

The Web Summit is also considered the right place to see what’s out there in the world of tech. Check the Start-ups, follow the big corporations, and engage with other business associations that can bring interesting outcomes to level up your company’s strategy:

“One morning we had an insightful breakfast meeting with Boris Bend about how to attract, but more important, retain talents in our team. And Tuesday we were invited by the Dutch Ambassador via CCPH – Dutch Portuguese Chamber of Commerce for drinks with the Dutch attendees, which was a great moment to meet and have nice conversations.”

Until we meet again at Web Summit 2022.

One of the great things about Lisbon is that it is also a city that always has attracted many people from all parts of the world, and the Websummit became just one more good reason to visit it:

“At night we had fun and relaxing conversations over dinner. Superb combination. A few things stood out for me, like meeting business friends of business friends, as diverse as possible. Also having interesting and inspiring coffee meetings and dinners and listening to inspiring talks on stage. I’m looking forward to the Web Summit 2022!”

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/

Every year we gather a group of smart IT ladies and I return inspired and motivated to continue the road to digitalization. This year we did the same and got together in the Netherlands to an entirely online web event.

In fact, this year’s Web Summit had an agenda full of empowering and inspiring women. Starting with the opening speech of Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Union. She emphasized how 2020 is the digital decade by excellence, having forced governments and companies to advance years of innovation because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Another amazing session was hosted by Apple VP of Environment Lisa Jackson and Nobel Prize Malala Yousafzai. They’ve spoken about Apple’s and Malala Fund research project on the impacts of climate change on girls and young women. And the power of education to build resilience to future crises.

It’s all a matter of perspective (or not).

It wasn’t the same. Having a full online experience in such an exclusive event like the Web Summit has its downsides. It’s easier to press pause; to lose focus and get distracted responding to an urgent email. But most of all, I truly miss the energy of meeting people. And to wander between the pavilions, amazed with everything I see and engaging with other companies.

Of course, there are also immediate benefits to an online conference. I can name a few of them that are mostly time saving: no queues to get lunch and jumping from one session to another very easily! Also, being online gave me the chance to “be” at the speakers’ homes. So, I felt inspired more on a personal level.

Undoubtedly, technology is now perceived as a game changer. The urgency to embrace technology is here to stay. And we need to adapt, people and companies, make the most of it, and find new ways of getting the job done.

I was impressed with many of this year’s Portuguese speakers and tracks, like Inês Silva from Portuguese Women in Tech, Outsystems’s CEO Paulo Rosado, João Borga from Startup Portugal, José Neves from Farfetch, and Luis Castro Henriques from AICEP. All of them with such successful stories about their tech companies and ready to embrace this paradigm change in their businesses.

Brand new year, brand new wishes.

Last month I started working for Polarising. We are used to work remotely, but normally we combine this with personal meetings. Which makes working together easier, more productive, and more fun at the same time. Jason Fried from Basecamp explained it well: remote work is not the same as replacing office work by online work.

Working remote should free up a lot of time for thinking and balancing our lives. It allows us to mature ideas and write them, share them strategically and only expect a call when there is something to discuss. But the synergies that we create by going to the office and discuss ideas it’s equally important, and crucial to a solid company culture and goal achievement.

I look forward to next year immensely. Web Summit and sneakers are already in my agenda. But I’m certain that we will learn a lot from this years’ experience and achieved new breakthroughs.

Yvonne Kubbinga
Polarising Netherlands Country Manager

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