This month’s most useful tools for developers — November 2017
Tags: Ruby, React, Programming, Software Development, Mobile App Development

Some are about new thinking or new techniques, some are about old or legacy technology and some are just useful resources for different languages or platforms. The brief is simple — if we think they’re useful, you might too.

Simplified App Signing with Secure Files in Visual Studio

Install apple certs and provisioning profiles into VSTS for Xamarin builds. New and very useful.

Xamarin.Forms 3.0

From performance improvements to new platforms, here’s a look at what’s coming down the road for Xamarin.Forms developers.

RubyMotion IDE

Lets you quickly develop cross-platform native apps for iOS, watchOS, macOS and Android. RubyMotion

Define dynamic user groups based on predicted behavior

If you’re using Firebase then Google will now predict which of your users will spend money or leave your app, and let you know. As our man Paul said, “Wow.”

We like the look of Viper

“Good architecture is not what makes a product successful, but it does make a product maintainable and helps preserve the sanity of the people maintaining it!” Architecting iOS Apps with VIPER.

Revenge of the Algorithms (Over Data)… Go! No?

How do we tease apart what’s real vs. what’s hype when it comes to the (legitimate!) excitement about artificial intelligence and machine learning?a16z Podcast.

What are the Most Disliked Programming Languages?

Despite the provocative title, this is an almost academic data-analysis study of Stackoverflow tags (with graphs and everything), with a surprisingly balanced conclusion. The tech we want to work with — and the tech we don’t.

Farewell old friend

When it came out in 2005, Firebug was the first tool to let programmers inspect, edit, and debug code right in the Firefox browser.

Saying Goodbye to Firebug.

Human-centred Machine Learning

“As more and more experiences are built with ML, it’s clear that UXers still have a lot to learn about how to make users feel in control of the technology, and not the other way round.” 7 steps to stay focused on the user when designing with ML

Devhints — TL;DR for developer documentation

A ridiculous (in a good way) collection of web development cheat-sheets. “ a modest collection”

30 days of React

Fancy learning react, but don’t know where to start? Well then, a free introduction to React in 30 bite-sized morsels might be just the thing.

Why did you update?

Puts your console on blast when React is making unnecessary updates. Checks for unnecessary re-renders with your components. Very handy.

Reakt (with a K)

If you’re forced to do React, why not React Kotlin? A Kotlin wrapper for Facebook’s React library.

WebWorkers

In this Supercharged Live Code Session, Mariko and Surma show you how to use WebWorkers to keep your main thread jank free.

“Planetary-scale applications” Golly.

How Earth Observation data on AWS can be used in your startup, enterprise, or research institution. Build planetary-scale applications in the cloud with open geospatial data. Golly and indeed gosh. Earth on AWS

How To Code Like The Top Programmers At NASA

As our recommender Adam says “Most of this is for lower level languages, but an interesting read nevertheless.” 10 Critical Rules

Any cryptographers fancy €5 Million?

EU Officials Reveal €5 Million ‘Blockchains for Social Good’ Contest. Winning entries must have a clear social impact, be decentralized while allowing for transparency, and still be both useful and scalable. Easypeasy Kerching.

Look maybe, but probably best not to touch

WikiLeaks Releases Source Code of CIA Cyber-Weapon.