The Blog
Exploration Of Thought
Thoughts on autonomy, self direction, digital business and life.
Ruby Script for Telegram Notifications
Skip paid alerting services. A small Ruby script and Telegram bot let you send yourself server notifications for free using MarkdownV2 messages.
Donn Felker – October 15, 2024
The Decline Of Mobile Development
Constant forced OS updates, mandate deadlines, and over-engineered patterns are driving mobile developers to abandon native apps for the web.
Donn Felker – July 25, 2024
Obtaining More Freedom (and Money) with Freelancing
I once worked straight through a client's company holiday by accident. It's a reminder of why freelancing trades meetings for freedom and money.
Donn Felker – May 29, 2024
I Removed JetPack Compose from My App
Why I ripped a Compose AppBar back out of Jumpstart Android in favor of a plain XML Toolbar to make Turbo Android and Strada integration simpler.
Donn Felker – April 15, 2024
Why Grandparents Spoil Grandchildren
A theory on why grandparents spoil their grandchildren: it's a second chance to do right what regret and exhaustion got in the way of as parents.
Donn Felker – January 16, 2024
Make Every Second Count: Strategies to Unleash Creativity and Success at Any Time
We all get the same 86,400 seconds a day. How I cut phone time from 6-9 hours to reclaim mine and used small 10-minute blocks to ship more.
Donn Felker – November 28, 2023
Bootstrapping to 7k MRR with WordPress and No Code
How I built Caster.IO into a $7,500 MRR membership business on WordPress, RestrictContentPro, and Wistia without writing a single line of code.
Donn Felker – November 13, 2023
Why Kotlin Multiplatform Won’t Succeed
Kotlin Multiplatform is impressive tech, but human nature, ego investment in tool choice, and a scarcity of polyglot devs will keep it niche.
Donn Felker – November 6, 2023
Listomo – A New Cheaper and Easier Way To Build Your Email Lists
I was paying $400/month across multiple email list providers, so I built Listomo: one account, unlimited contacts, bring your own SMTP.
Donn Felker – November 1, 2023
Native Where You Need It (Hybrid Mobile Apps)
Why hybrid Native Where You Need It apps -- native only where it matters, web everywhere else via Turbo and Hotwire -- beat building native twice.
Donn Felker – October 30, 2023
The Power of the Clarity Doc: Your Tool for Clearer Thoughts
An 8-step writing exercise for breaking analysis paralysis: dump your thoughts, weigh pros and cons, war-game the worst case, then decide and act.
Donn Felker – October 14, 2023
Bootstrapped vs. Self-Funded
Bootstrapped and self-funded get used interchangeably, but they're not the same thing. Here's the real difference and why it matters.
Donn Felker – August 31, 2023