Think fast

What is an API Call?

API calls are one of the basic tools we can use for all kinds of development, integration, data sharing, and digital transformation projects. Whether we’re building solutions from scratch or simply hooking up a couple of SaaS tools - we’re probably going to need to make API calls. Today, we’re going to guide you through everything you need to know. We’ll start with what API calls are, what they’re used for, and how they work.

Ronan McQuillan

Jul 28, 2023

WebSockets vs WebHooks

Understanding how and when to use WebSockets vs WebHooks is a crucial element of modern application development. If we don’t know how to choose the right tool for the task at hand, we risk creating ineffective or needlessly over-engineered solutions. Today, we’re covering everything you need to know. We’ll start by examining the basic principles of both data transfer tools and their underlying technologies. Then, we’ll check out how and when each is used, as well as the tradeoffs involved in choosing between them.

Ronan McQuillan

Jul 7, 2023

System Integration vs Software Development

When we’re adding new technical capabilities, the first challenge is figuring out what our most cost-effective option is. More often than not, this means weighing up system integration vs software development. Specifically, we need to make a decision based on what we’re trying to achieve, the technical resources we have available, and what our current tool stack is capable of. Custom builds aren’t cheap - so it makes sense to get the most out of our existing tools.

Ronan McQuillan

Jun 16, 2023

What is API Integration? In-Depth Guide

What is API integration is probably one of the most common questions in the world of web app development. In fact, this is central to how almost all modern software ecosystems work, so it’s vital that you know what you’re dealing with. See, businesses today deal with a greater number of tools, data sets, and services than ever before. Managing this fact requires a high degree of integration. That is, all of these different nodes in our tool stack need to be able to talk to each other in order to pass data or other instructions back and forth - otherwise we’d face a mountain of boring and expensive admin work.

Ronan McQuillan

Jun 2, 2023

On-Prem vs Cloud Hosting in 2025

On-prem vs cloud hosting is one of the most fundamental decisions for any IT team - both at the level of individual development projects and your wider IT ops. Getting this right will have an outsize impact on your profitability, performance, security, compliance, and much more. The trouble is - this is a widely misunderstood issue. At least, there are a lot of outdated or just downright wrong assumptions that pervade the conversation here.

Ronan McQuillan

Apr 28, 2023

Relational vs Non-Relational Databases | What's the Difference?

Getting your data model right is the first step in any successful development or transformation project. Today, we’re exploring everything you need to know about relational vs non-relational databases. This has become a tougher decision in the past decade or so. Until relatively recently, the relational model was pretty much the dominant way of storing data. Today, it’s still by far the most ubiquitous option - but other approaches have also entered the mainstream.

Ronan McQuillan

Apr 21, 2023

Experimenting with RPA & Low-Code for CRUD Development

We’ve been having a little in-house debate about combining RPA tools and low-code development - that we decided to put to the test. Basically, we ran an experiment to see if we can answer two questions: Can we get an RPA tool to build low-code apps? Would anyone ever actually want to do that? See, at their core, low-code and RPA are both meant to save you time - but the tradeoff is that you sacrifice some of the flexibility that you’d get with doing things the old-fashioned way - either performing a task manually or coding an equivalent solution from scratch.

Ronan McQuillan

Mar 20, 2023

Custom App Development | Ultimate Guide

Custom app development is a huge undertaking - even for very simple solutions. It’s also one of the biggest investments your company is likely to make. When it comes to creating bespoke solutions for your team, it pays to get things right. The trouble is that there are so many distinct considerations to keep in mind. All sorts of technical, operational, and even creative decisions impact the ultimate success of your custom development project.

Ronan McQuillan

Mar 3, 2023