How to Use Design Thinking Principles for Your Dev Project

In 2009, Tim Brown published his now famous book “Change by Design”. His idea: Design strategies and techniques can be used at every level of business. In 2018, Design Thinking has become a methodology and is used for innovative activities by project teams around the world.

We explore: How can design thinking help you when you are building new products? What strategies can you use? And how can you integrate Design Thinking into agile software development?

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Sprint: How to test new ideas with your dev team

Jake Knapp’s sprint concept and his book “Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in just Five Days” are used in teams all over the world and has become a staple in agile process management. The idea is to explore new ideas, prototype, and get new things off the ground in a limited time and without making huge investments.

We take a look at Jake Knapp’s famous sprint concept and take you through his design of a sprint week, from planning to prototyping and testing.

Ready for a sprint? 🙂

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What your dev team can learn from Greg McKeown’s principle of essentialism

Everyone wants to get more done in less time. However, that is not what Greg McKeown’s New York Times bestseller book “Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less” is about. It is rather a book about getting the right things done and focusing on the things that are essential while eliminating the clutter.

In the last few weeks, we covered productivity and communication topics here on our blog and asked how they can be applied to working together with your dev team.

In this article, we want to take a look at the tipsMcKeown’s is suggesting and ask how they can work when you are building digital products with your dev team.

Happy reading!

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4 reasons why you should integrate visual communication into your workflow

Our communication is becoming more visual every day. We send emojis, gifs, pictures. We Instagram, Snapchat, or use the latest Facebook Filters to add some visual elements to our video chats. Visual communication is everywhere – and it’s faster, more effective, and fun.

Business communication is not exempt from integrating visual elements and giving everyone more and more opportunities to communicate visually. From Trello boards to Basecamp organization to our very own Usersnap (a visual communication tool for web developers – check it out!), visual communication is everywhere!

Why should you care? And why should you make sure to integrate visual communication into your daily work? We have 4 reasons for you to make you love visual communication even more!?

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Is your dev team lost in communication?

Communication is a key strength that is required no matter what you do for a living. Since tech companies have defined the “team” as the basic unit of an organization, communication skills take on a new significance.

However, not every developer possesses the same skills, when it comes to communicating ideas, exchanging feedback, and articulating thoughts on a new product update or feature.

In this article, we are looking at ways to improve communication for your dev team and show how visual communication can help you not only communicate faster and more effectively, but also in a way that’s fun. Continue Reading “Is your dev team lost in communication?”

How to collect feedback & track bugs with the new Jira Experience!

In 2002 the software world looked quite different.

Bugzilla was the main bug tracking tool available, and a small company named Atlassian just launched its software, named Jira.

Jira, in reference to Gojira (Japanese for Godzilla), was intended to be a modern alternative to the market leader Bugzilla. Fast forward to 2018: Jira is used by more than 75,000 customers globally, who use JIRA for their entire software development lifecycle.

While all sorts of department and teams use Jira, its core use case is still its issue tracking and ticketing functionality.

And with this article, we show you how to collect feedback from colleagues, and track bugs with Jira integration more effectively.
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What the best dev teams do differently

Teams have become the fundamental unit of an organization. That’s the reason why there has been a lot of research on how to improve team culture, collaboration, and communication. The question is no longer around what individuals can do, but how they can work together. Especially when it comes to web development projects, teamwork is key. In this article, we want to spotlight a few things that the best teams get right.

We take a look at three critical things: 1) communication, 2) culture of learning, and 3) psychological safety. Our goal is to provide a few tips of actionable advice so you can work better after reading this. Better as a team, of course.

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Which Programming Languages Should You Learn?

“Which programming languages should I learn this year?” is one of the most common questions I get asked.

It’s a valid question, but it’s difficult to answer without knowing more about you and what you want to achieve.

It depends on…

  • What is your current web development knowledge?
  • What is the purpose of you studying programming?
  • How much time do you have available?
  • Do you want to work for yourself or for a company?
  • Do you prefer frontend or backend?
  • How much are you willing to invest in learning?

In our post about the “Best Programming languages for 2017” over 10,000 readers voted for their favorite language. Here are the results. (Don’t worry: You get to vote this year, too. Just scroll to the end of the post) Continue Reading “Which Programming Languages Should You Learn?”

How to develop a chrome extension

Browser extensions in general and chrome extensions, in particular, are small “software programs that customize the browsing experience”.

If you’re thinking about building your own Chrome extension, we provide you with helpful resources and tips in this article.

Our very own Usersnap Chrome extension is used by thousands of people, and we are happy to share our knowledge on how we built (and maintain) our extension with you.

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