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Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

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Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#131

Post by cabaalis »

jrhurst wrote: post #63
dpcan wrote: post #55

I use Trello, then it gets messy, switch to Keep to start over, that gets confusing or messy, I have a txt file with my todos, that gets messy, I try a project management tool like Basecamp, doesn't do the trick, start over fresh on Trello, that gets messy.... I think you see where I'm going with this.

Could you elaborate on how things get messy?

For me:

Trello: boards get stale

Txt file todos: more todos are added each day, none get removed because of new ones added!

Basecamp: same issue as Trello.

In this second half of my career I've dealt mostly in startup development. MVPs just pivot too much. It's a ride.

Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#132

Post by mumblemumble »

I use a bullet journal.

I find that I can do the product and project planning much more efficiently with a pen and paper. Something about getting my eyes off of a screen really helps me refocus my thinking. I really like that, with a bujo, you have to periodically make an intentional decision whether to retain or forget any un-completed to-do items. (I've yet to find a technological solution that doesn't make it way too easy to accumulate clutter.) I like that the limited space forces me to focus on the essentials of each item, which helps me to stick to the agile principle of delaying decisions to the last responsible moment.

I don't bother with swim lanes, columns, task states, or anything like that when I'm working solo. All of those concepts were invented to help make it easier for a project manager (or scrum master, or whoever) to keep track of and coordinate the efforts of many people on a team. Humans suck at multitasking, so, if you're solo, you shouldn't have more than one or two items in progress at a time. Meaning you shouldn't have any need for techniques that are designed to help keep track of lots of things at once.

I don't find much value in a non-paper solution because the main advantage of electronic solutions is to help with intra-team communication on a geographically distributed team. If you're an army of one, there's no intra-team communication or geographic distribution to manage in the first place.

Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#133

Post by DougWebb »

dpcan wrote: post #55

I use Trello, then it gets messy, switch to Keep to start over, that gets confusing or messy, I have a txt file with my todos, that gets messy, I try a project management tool like Basecamp, doesn't do the trick, start over fresh on Trello, that gets messy.... I think you see where I'm going with this.

I have a very similar process, except I also insert "Let me start (over) building something to manage this properly" into each cycle.

Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#134

Post by DougWebb »

z3t4 wrote: post #47
forgotmypw wrote: post #7

I have a file called todo.txt, with the current tasks at the top, and everything else below that. It is in version control. As I finish stuff, I delete it out of the file. I add new stuff towards the top if I want to do it soon, towards the bottom if I want to save it for later. For things which are just ideas, I have a second file called brainstorm.txt.

Does anyone else have a problem that this file just keeps growing?

My problem is that I lose track of where all of my todo files are; I work on too many (client) projects to keep everything in a single file.

Luckily, over time todos tend to become todon'ts, so losing track of the old ones isn't generally a problem.

Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#135

Post by jamil7 »

dpcan wrote: post #55

I use Trello, then it gets messy, switch to Keep to start over, that gets confusing or messy, I have a txt file with my todos, that gets messy, I try a project management tool like Basecamp, doesn't do the trick, start over fresh on Trello, that gets messy.... I think you see where I'm going with this.

Allocate a few minutes everyday to clearing up and planning the trello board. Same as you would a kanban board.

Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#137

Post by getup8 »

tjchear wrote: post #34

I use Google Docs. It's accessible from my laptop and phone and anywhere I go. It also has offline mode and auto-syncs when I reconnect to the Internet. Here's my format: #Todos - todo1 - todo2 #Dec 2019 Mon 2019/12/30 - Done - Assessment - Next Sun 2019/12/29 ... I also have a big picture sheet for tracking multiple tasks at a high level. Each column is a project, and each cell is a milestone/task currently being wo…

I also use Google Docs. I think it's the easiest and fastest to keep up to date and synced across devices. I put main milestones ("version" releases) at top with core features I want to implement and then a bulleted (and sub-bulleted) list of ToDos by prioritized feature below that. At the bottom I have a dump of both future ideas and resources. Has worked well so far.

Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#138

Post by closed »

lliamander wrote: post #110
closed wrote: post #92

Many comments are focusing on kanban procedures, but the most important parts of solo development for me are social milestones. For example... * Who will I show X feature to? * When will I show it to them? * Can I show them a draft? To me, the biggest risk of solo development is not how I manage a todo list, but that I'll build the wrong thing, because I waited to get feedback. Some things that have helped me a lot..…

This is really good advice even if you are not a solo dev. A lot of devs that I have worked with (and this includes me at times) come with the expectation that they will be handed a task with a list of requirements, and all they have to do is check off the boxes and turn in the code. If QA found no bugs, then it's good. Even when things really are that clear cut, junior developers still often need a lot of feedback t…

That makes a lot of sense!

> Part of maturing out of that initial stage comes from when you can autonomously take a well defined task, break it down into steps, and execute it.

It seems like this is the scariest part--since often whether a task is well defined feels more like an assumption. In a lot of ways, I think this is the value of social approaches--you have to answer, "how could I convince so-and-so that this is well defined?"

Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#139

Post by sergeyk »

mumblemumble wrote: post #132

I use a bullet journal. I find that I can do the product and project planning much more efficiently with a pen and paper. Something about getting my eyes off of a screen really helps me refocus my thinking. I really like that, with a bujo, you have to periodically make an intentional decision whether to retain or forget any un-completed to-do items. (I've yet to find a technological solution that doesn't make it way…

> (I've yet to find a technological solution that doesn't make it way too easy to accumulate clutter.)

Try NotePlan (https://noteplan.co)

Re: Ask HN: Solo devs, how do you plan your development?

#140

Post by morganherlocker »

Leherenn wrote: post #130
morganherlocker wrote: post #127

I use github issues with custom tags (bug, feature, docs, tests, etc). I am not too picky about what goes into the issue list, as long as it has a good title and description. I use a github project board to prioritize what to work on with a simple kanban setup. The backlog column is ranked with upcoming items up top and never more than 2 features “in progress” at once. This setup helps me focus on what I need to knoc…

Why 2 features in parallel and not just one? Do you have external dependencies that block your progress, or is it to be able to switch between them and not always do the same thing? Or something else entirely?

Sometimes I like to alternate between two features or bug fixes just to stay motivated with a bit of variety. It does break the kanban spirit a bit, but I avoid allowing anything to hang out too long in the “in progress” column to prevent procrastinating on a tough issue. Most of the time I only have one issue in progress at a time.
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