undefined | Better HN

0 pointsNateEag4y ago0 comments

To prevent a prototype or proof of concept from shipping, you need to leave it feature-incomplete.

The mistake people often make with such things is building it thoroughly enough that it can be shipped.

If you hit that problem, you didn't build a proof of concept - you built sloppy production code.

0 comments

Good point, but I have found that just doing it right the first time works for me. In fact, I'm doing it right now. In the Xcode window, I'm building a test release that the team will run and review for usability issues and bugs.

If they find any bugs or issues, I fix/address them before moving on to the next function implementation.

The significant advantage that this confers, is that the app is constantly in "release-ready" form; although incomplete.

Useful, for when we want to ask people to give us money. We just get an NDA, loop them into the TestFlight group, and let them have at it. No need for chaperones from Marketing, or sacrifices to the demo gods.

NateEagOP4y ago

Perfectly reasonable workflow.

I lean towards POCs these days because I have experienced the requirements turning out to be all wrong far too often. It's hard for people to know what they want or need before they can try something sort of real.

LandR4y ago

The problem i have is I get told to write a fast proof of concept. I make it clear that its hacky, poor quality code. Then ill be told to make it live to test it.

Then it ends up in production. Then they want to add stuff to it, which is a nightmare as the code is terrible.

Every time.

2 more replies

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse