Tech
As a front-end developer working on real-world applications, WebAssembly isn't something I can actually use, is it? Let's find out how easy it can be using AssemblyScript.
Tech
Styling in Android can be a difficult experience for developers not familiar with how the framework works. However, once you start to understand the "Android way" the development experience can be both logical and enjoyable (excepting a few Android quirks, but for the Android developer - c’est la vie).
Tech
React and Vue are two popular web application frameworks aimed to make developing user interfaces easier. This post summarises a few of the similarities and differences between them I found after using both.
Testing
Have you ever considered the similarities between learning a new human language and a programming language? I have always been fascinated by this topic and it has inspired me to write a blog post to help those like me, who worry when we see the code.
Tech
Is WebGL faster than Canvas for drawing 2D shapes, and if so can we harness that speed to visualise very large data sets? I wanted to learn WebGL so I decided to investigate this question and learn at the same time.
Tech
The 'Performance' tab of Chromium (Google Chrome) DevTools isn't always enough for analysing complex multi-window Electron web-desktop applications. In this post, I'll introduce the related but lesser-known Tracing tool, and show how it can be used with Electron.
Tech
Have you ever wanted to write your own compiler? ... yes? ... of course you have! I've always wanted to have a go at writing a compiler, and with the recent release of WebAssembly, I had the perfect excuse to have a go.
Tech
The d3fc cartesian chart provides a simple way to compose the most commonly used type of chart, while keep its API simple. But would it be possible to keep that simplicity while making a chart component that is more flexible?
Cloud
Using spaCy for Named Entity Recognition, summarisation and similarity analysis in an AWS pipeline. Lessons learned in a client project.
Cloud
A summary of my experiences attending AWS Summit London, 2019. Highlights from talks that I found interesting and/or informative. Topics are mainly focused on high-performance computing, security and distributed architecture.
Tech
Hooks are one of the most exciting features of React in recent times, allowing the developer to "hook" into React features without having to use class components. In this post, we take a dive into Hooks and learn how, when and why to use them.
Tech
Recently we've been looking at enhancing the D3 axis component to implement a number of common features including more flexible label placement (e.g. positioning labels between ticks) and rotation / offset of labels to avoid collisions. This blog post demonstrates some of these features and how they were implemented.
UX Design
Clean Design is the cleanliness of your design files and the practices of creating these files rather than the design outcome you generate from them. In this post, you can find a few tips on how you can start applying Clean Design.
Cloud
Comments systems appear across the web, I'll explain the process of using AWS' AppSync and DynamoDB to create a simple serverless version for use on a blog to provide a comment system that updates in real-time.
People
This is the summary of BCSWomen Lovelace Colloquium 2019 that I attended. I had a chance to attend interesting talks and to talk with women students who attended the event and were interested in ScottLogic.
Delivery
Adapted from a Lightning Talk this is a brief blog post visiting ten points about agile software development that people may recognise from their own experiences. The aim is to inspire readers to focus on a specific improvements for their own agile teams.
Testing
Apple’s XCTest framework can be used to write automated Unit and UI tests for iOS applications. It comes packaged with a range of capabilities which can aid you in your testing pursuit. It's not without its downfalls though. This blog explores the troubles XCTest brings and how we can tackle them to work towards peaceful iOS testing.
Tech
Can Kotlin, the latest language to join the JVM, supersede its predecessor Java? Let's compare the two languages that are currently battling for supremacy in the world of Android.
UX Design
We know that emotions can move markets through optimism and pessimism but what about apathy, stress and the embarrassment that we feel when discussing our finances? Designing for emotion is not a new concept but perhaps it has been overlooked in FinTech. In this post, I share my take on the FinTech Design Summit 2019 focusing on an angle that puts people’s emotions at the center of FinTech Design.