software engineering archivos

How to Detect Technical Debt Before It Blocks You

19/08/202612/02/2026 by cesar

A comparative meme divided into three levels about technical debt. Top: A smiling Junior Dev standing in front of a clean whiteboard with a new feature idea. Middle: An overwhelmed Mid-level Dev next to a chaotic tangled mess of cables representing the current codebase. Bottom: An exhausted-looking Senior Dev in front of smoking servers, holding a 'Do Not Touch' sign, with a speech bubble that says: 'Better not touch that… it works.'

Unlike credit cards or personal loans, technical debt doesn’t appear on any bank statement. There is no clear figure, no automatic alerts, and often, there isn’t even an awareness that it exists… until it starts to hurt. In the best-case scenario, this debt is taken on consciously: it’s documented with a TODO, a task is … Read more

Is your app growing, but problems are growing faster?

19/08/202621/01/2026 by cesar

Auditing an app doesn’t always mean spending months analyzing every line of code. Sometimes, what you need is an Express Audit: a clear, actionable, and prioritized diagnosis to know where to focus first. This is the process I follow to identify what’s holding a project back: 1. Active Listening (The Context) Everything starts with talking … Read more

Alistair Cockburn’s Hexagonal Architecture: Still Relevant

25/05/202524/04/2025 by cesar

Yesterday I took 45 minutes to watch Alistair Cockburn’s presentation on Hexagonal Architecture—the model he proposed decades ago.
It still holds up.

Rethinking Architectural “Best Practices”: The Case for Progressive Domain Models

06/11/202305/10/2023 by cesar

image of one-way bridge that crosses from left to right, prominently labeled "Progressive Domain Model" in bold. The bridge connects island one with island two. At the left, island one has an old-fashioned, crumbling building, clearly labeled as "Google Architecture". At the right, island two is a modern, nicely placed and solid building clearly labeled as "Clean Architecture".

In the fast-paced world of software engineering, everyone’s searching for the ultimate shortcut. The one secret sauce that will let you skip all the hard work and dive straight into coding heaven. And when Google, the giant of the tech world, waves the flag for a particular approach, it’s easy to think you’ve found the golden ticket. But let me tell you, in the realm of Android app architecture, what seems like a shortcut might just lead you down a treacherous path. I’m talking about Google’s Guide to App Architecture, the so-called “Google architecture” – a roadmap that may look promising at first glance but is riddled with pitfalls. Buckle up, because we’re about to dive into the controversial territory of Android’s approach to app architecture, and you might not like what you find.

A Clean Architecture implementation for Android in Kotlin

16/10/2020 by cesar

In this post, a Clean Architecture implementation for Android using the Kotlin language is presented and discussed. An example App is also provided to support the discussion. The full source code can be downloaded from GitHub.

If it works… don’t touch it!

12/10/202004/09/2020 by cesar

I have always been concerned about quality when it comes to software development. Being a Computer Engineering student I remember some of my fellows told me: “if it works, don’t touch it!”. I could understand that point but I never agreed.

I always had the sense that code has not only to work but also to look organized, well written. Once, a friend of mine told me: “Cesar, yes I know, you like well-made things, but…” as an apology for handing me a little crappy piece of code. We passed our joint assignment and got a good mark, after all, his code worked.