Summary Juli/August
Maurice Renck
While the Summer in northern Germany was pretty rainy most of the time, the heat now arrived. Time to cool down a bit and look what happened during July and August.
Sociabli Blog Launch
As you know we are working on Sociabli for quite some time now. We decided to start a blog to gather some attention and help users understand all those networks and platforms.
We will write about Mastodon, Bluesky and Sociabli itselv, giving you some tips and tricks to make using them more fun. We chose 11ty as our tech stack and were able to integrate it fairly easy into our exiting stack.
Take a look here: https://sociab.li/blog/
Server Side Stories
Let's stay on the content topic. We published new episodes to our podcast since our last summary. If you are into gaming, you might want to listen to Max talking to us about game development, as well as our summer episode where we go down memory lane and talk about the computer games of our childhoods.
In another episode we talk about NodeJs deployments and its pitfalls. We talk abou talternatives to Amazon and Microsoft and our own experience with hosting scripts.
Eventually we have an episodes about ideas. How are we able to fill blogs and podcasts with so much content? Where do all the ideas come from?! We'll tell you in episode 19!
https://konzentrik.de/en/server-side-stories
Tools
We also added two new plugins to our new Tools shop. We published a free auto publish plugin for Kirby, as well as a Calendar plugin for all of you who want to see upcoming posts in their calendar:
Development
Talking about tools: we had a hard decision to make for a customer project. Buy or build? We decided to buy even though the price was very hight. What did we buy? Well, a date range picker field. Doesn't sound like much, but we thought about how long it would take us to build it on our own and the conclusion was that we can buy us time.
We also had some fun with React Native UI frameworks. Two of them created more problems than they helped us speed up development time. We finally switched to Reusable. Which is more of a component library than a framework. This helps us get components ready fast while still being flexible.
What we read
Master TypeScript's Satisfies Operator (And Save Hours of Debugging)
What it is: A TypeScript operator that can prevent countless debugging headaches
TypeScript's satisfies operator is one of those "hidden gems" that can literally save you hours of frustrating debugging sessions. This simple trick helps you catch type errors before they become runtime nightmares, ensuring your objects conform to expected shapes without losing type inference benefits.
Why you need it: Instead of spending your evening tracking down why your API responses aren't matching your expected types, the satisfies operator catches these issues at compile time.
Learn the satisfies operator trick
DevToys: Your Swiss Army Knife for Development
What it is: A compact desktop app packed with essential developer utilities
Every developer has those moments when you need to quickly encode/decode something, generate a UUID, format JSON, or convert between different formats. Instead of hunting for online tools or writing one-off scripts, DevToys puts dozens of useful utilities right at your fingertips in a single, lightweight application.
Why you need it: It's like having a developer's utility belt on your desktop - perfect for those quick tasks that interrupt your flow.
Windmill: The Programmer's Alternative to Visual Automation
What it is: A code-first automation platform that bridges the gap between clicking and coding
While tools like N8N are great for visual workflow automation, Windmill takes a different approach. Instead of endless clicking through UI elements, you write actual code for your automation logic while still getting the benefits of a user-friendly interface for parameters and execution.
Why you need it: Perfect for developers who prefer writing code over dragging and dropping, but still want their non-technical colleagues to be able to trigger and configure workflows through a clean UI.
Neon: Modern PostgreSQL That Scales With You
What it is: A serverless PostgreSQL platform with developer-friendly features
Database management shouldn't be a headache, especially during development and prototyping phases. Neon offers a modern take on PostgreSQL with features like instant branching, autoscaling, and generous free tiers that make it perfect for both experimentation and production use.
Why you need it: Whether you're spinning up a quick prototype or need a production database that scales automatically, Neon eliminates the traditional database administration overhead.
Demystify TypeScript Types Once and For All
What it is: A practical guide to understanding TypeScript's most intimidating features
TypeScript types can be scary - especially the advanced ones involving generics, conditional types, and utility types. But once you understand the core principles behind how TypeScript's type system works, those complex type definitions start making perfect sense.
Why you need it: Stop being intimidated by complex TypeScript types and start leveraging them to write more robust, self-documenting code.