Insights

The parts worth knowing before you spend anything

Written for the person paying, not the person coding. Every one of these is something we've explained on a call enough times that it belonged on a page instead.

Automate

The tools you already pay for probably already talk to each other

Before any custom automation gets built, it's worth thirty minutes checking whether the connection already exists inside a subscription you're already paying for.

4 min read

Automate

How to automate quoting without losing the judgement calls

Quoting is usually four separate jobs wearing one name. Automate the wrong one and you've bought a faster version of the part that was never slow.

5 min read

Automate

Chatbot, AI agent, or automation: what's actually different, and which do you need?

Every vendor calls their product an agent now. The plain-English distinction is about who's allowed to take an action, not how clever the conversation sounds.

5 min read

Protect

Vibe coding: what it actually means, and where the risk is hiding

The term describes building software by describing what you want and accepting the code back without reading it. The risk was never the AI — it's the not-reading part.

5 min read

Protect

Is Supabase row-level security on by default? (No — here's how to check)

Row-level security is the setting that stops one customer reading another customer's data. It's off by default on a new table, and "on" isn't the same as "actually protecting anything."

5 min read

Decide

Where should a small business actually start with AI?

Everyone's telling you to "use AI" and nobody's telling you where to start. The starting point is usually a task, not a technology.

6 min read

Decide

How to brief a developer when you've never done it before

A good brief describes the problem, not your guess at the solution. Here's what to put in it, what to leave out, and why the second part matters more.

5 min read

Decide

Build vs buy: does your problem actually need custom software?

The honest first move, before any quote, is working out whether you need software built at all. Most businesses have already paid for more of the answer than they realise.

5 min read

Build

How long does it actually take to build a working app?

"A few months" is the answer nobody questions until they're three months in. Here's where the time actually goes, and what genuinely shortens it.

5 min read

Build

How much does it actually cost to build an MVP in 2026?

"It depends" is the honest answer, but the things it depends on are countable. Here's what actually moves the number, and why two quotes for the same idea can be five times apart.

6 min read

Build

Why an agency quotes $80,000 for something a small team now builds in three weeks

The way software gets priced was settled when a working app needed six people to produce. That stopped being true. Here's what actually changed, and how to tell a real quote from an inherited one.

6 min read

Protect

Lovable, Bolt or v0 built your app. What now?

The prototype works and real customers want to use it. Here's what has to be true before you let them, in the order it matters.

6 min read

Decide

What a $45,000 AI quote is actually buying you

Big AI proposals are usually priced on the build, not on the problem. Here's how to read one, and the four questions that tell you whether the number is real.

5 min read

Protect

Your API key might be sitting in your website's code. Here's how to check.

If an AI coding tool wired up OpenAI, Stripe or a database for you, there's a good chance the key went somewhere every visitor can read. It takes about thirty seconds to find out.

4 min read

Have a question one of these doesn't answer?

Ask it directly. Thirty minutes is usually enough to tell you where custom software earns its keep and where it doesn't.