A solo developer's path from problem validation to a maintainable MVP

Independent Developer Roadmap: From Problem Validation to a Maintainable MVP

Independent development creates a seductive illusion: once the stack is chosen, the product is halfway built. I used to make long lists—frontend framework, database, authentication, payments, email, analytics, monitoring. The more complete the list looked, the safer I felt. But that safety came from the feeling of construction, not from evidence that anyone needed the thing. My rule is simpler now: the scarce resource for an independent developer is not code. It is the ability to place limited attention on the right problem. A stack should help you move cheaply, learn quickly, and reverse a decision while the evidence is still thin. ...

April 15, 2025 · 12 min · 2503 words · Xinwei Xiong, Me

GoReleaser v2 + GitHub Actions: Go Release Guide

The goal of GoReleaser is to automate much of the tedious work when releasing software, by using sensible defaults and making it simple for the most common use cases. Preparation: .goreleaser.yaml file: contains all configuration information. (For more information, see Customization ) Clean working tree: Make sure the code is up to date and all changes have been committed. SemVer compliant version number (e.g. 10.21.34-prerelease+buildmeta) GoReleaser running steps: The operation of GoReleaser is mainly divided into the following four steps: ...

September 16, 2023 · 53 min · 11224 words · Xinwei Xiong, Me