Reviews

I love to read books, mostly about entrepreneurship, productivity, product management, and programming. I also happen to interact with a lot of apps, websites, and other products on a fairly regular basis. Sometimes I’m compelled to share my thoughts with others, and when that happens, I’ll write a review.

It’s important to note that I am a HUGE FAN of makers 👨🏻‍💻. I have a tremendous amount of respect for people who are willing to put themselves out there and have their work judged by others. I try to only offer positive feedback and constructive criticism, because, you know, karma. That being said, I really dislike Facebook. 👎

Below is a collection of reviews I written. Please feel free to share your own experiences and thoughts with me in the comments.

Takeaways from Programming AWS Lambda by Mike Roberts and John Chapin

Posted in Reviews & Serverless on May 27, 2020

Recently, Symphonia co-founders Mike Roberts and John Chapin wrote a book called Programming AWS Lambda: Build and Deploy Serverless Applications with Java. I personally abandoned Java long ago, but I knew full well that anything written by Mike and John was sure to be great. So despite the title (and my past war stories of working with Java), I picked up the book and gave it a read. I discovered that it’s not really a book about Java, but a book about building serverless applications with the examples in Java. Sure, there are a few very Java specific things (which every Java developer probably needs to read), but overall, this book offers some great insight into serverless from two experts in the field.

I had the chance to catch up with Mike on a recent episode of Serverless Chats. We discussed the book, how John and Mike got started with serverless (by building Java Lambda functions, of course), and what are some of the best practices people need to think about when building serverless applications. It was a great conversation (which you can watch/listen to here), but it was also jam packed with information, so I thought I’d highlight some of the important takeaways.

Getting Things Done: the art of stress-free productivity (2015 edition) by David Allen

Posted in Productivity & Reviews on March 22, 2015
Last Updated: December 15, 2017

Let me start by saying that I’m a big fan of the GTD method. I read the first edition of this book back in late 2007 soon after I had finished The E-Myth Revisited by Michael E. Gerber. At the time I was running my web development firm and was in desperate need of some operational clarity and organization. While I didn’t commit myself fully to GTD all those years ago, I certainly wish I had. The principles taught in David Allen’s book are simple in theory, but sometimes hard in practice, especially for those of us that have had our own “systems” for so many years. It took me awhile, but once I moved on from my web development firm and began committing myself to more narrowly-focused startups, I found the GTD methods easier to apply. It was partly my own maturity, but more likely the fact that we had a project tracking system at my web development firm that was ingrained into my daily life, that made adoption so difficult. Once I started using the core principles of his system, I found my ability to stay organized and make more progress immeasurable.

Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal

Posted in Product Management & Reviews on March 4, 2015
Last Updated: February 6, 2017

A few years ago I was invited by a colleague to attend Nir Eyal‘s Hooked Workshop at Wentworth Institute of Technology. At the time I was still working as the CTO of Lifeables, and we were desperately trying to find strategies to keep our users engaged. Needless to say, the thought of being able to “hook” users and have their use of it turn into a habit was very appealing. The opportunity couldn’t have been more timely.

The workshop was a fantastic experience. I found Nir to be exceptionally well-versed in behavioral psychology and how it could be applied to the current technological landscape. I remember thinking at the time that his “hooked model” was a collection of common sense concepts simplified, organized and packaged in a way that made them actionable. I left that workshop excited and overflowing with ideas.