People first leader, technologist, and indie hacker.

I’m Max, a people first engineering leader and indie hacker based in San Francisco. I write about engineering leadership, technology, and the indie hacking community.

Zero-Downtime Deployments with Docker Compose

With a little bash scripting, a modern reverse proxy like Traefik, and Docker Compose, we can put together a fairly robust and simple approach to zero-downtime deployment. Moreover, this approach is flexible and scalable, even for dynamic container backends.

Three Years to Shake Your Head

There's an old saying regarding the difficulty of learning the Japanese bamboo flute, known as the shakuhachi, "It takes three years to learn to shake your head." This is in reference to the difficulty of mastering even seemingly simple techniques. The only way around this is to make small progress, through practice, each day. This is applicable to any craft we might seek to master.

We Need To Talk About Vercel

Vercel's hefty price tag promises to be worth it if the developer experience and product hold up. But in my recent experience, the product and especially customer service, do not.

People-First Leadership

Investment in people is absolutely essential to building a business that's not just getting by but actively thriving. People-first leadership offers an approach which consistently cultivates an environment where folks can show up and do their best work, propelling the business forward in ways that are otherwise almost impossible to replicate.

A Newsletter to Share My Knowledge

I built this site to share everything I know about leadership, building startups, and indie hacking. This newsletter is another way for me to provide that value to you.

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