I write about problems I encounter while developing software and what I learn along the way.
I dropped RDS while looking at deployment costs. I considered serverless options too, but decided to start with the web apps, APIs, and PostgreSQL on one small EC2 instance. That also meant working through storage, backups, and S3 permissions.
The photo community uses GraphQL and Apollo; Game Mate uses REST and TanStack Query. How I chose their API contracts, database safeguards and tests, then added ESLint rules for code boundaries.
I specified the features and architecture, then gave an AI agent as much freedom as possible to implement them. Trying the services and reading the code led me back to screen layouts, anonymous account recovery, group permissions, message retries, and other missing details.
A sprint I considered finished after checking screens led to many hotfixes. I now read code to find paths to test, then check those paths and the actual UI separately.
I brought health checks from phone inquiries into portal selection and payment. Adding them to existing programs required separate decisions for registration rights, examination choices, and returning from payment.
