InfoQ Homepage Culture & Methods Content on InfoQ
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Producing a Better Software Architecture with Residuality Theory
Software architecture is tough because it blends coding, math, and business systems. Due to surprises, architectures tend to become irrelevant over time, Barry O'Reilly said. He presented residuality theory, where he suggested stressing naive architectures to reveal hidden “attractors” in complex business systems. This allows designs to better survive change and uncertainty.
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How Software Engineers Can Grow into Staff Plus Roles
Software engineers can boost their impact by helping other teams, focusing on business-driven work, and building strong relationships, David Grizzanti mentioned at InfoQ Dev Summit Boston. Growth can come from mentoring, setting cultural norms, thinking strategically, and designing a career path based on what motivates you.
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DORA Report Finds AI Is an Amplifier in Software Development, But Trust Remains Low
Nearly 90% of technology professionals now use artificial intelligence in their work. But according to the 2025 DORA State of AI-assisted Software Development report, there's still a significant gap in trust between developers and the tools they increasingly rely upon. The report findings found that while AI adoption has become "nearly universal," there are still some organisational challenges.
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Growing Your Career towards Senior Roles in Software Development
Flexible working is key to career development, enabling people to stay in tech while balancing personal needs, Sophie Weston said. Flexibility widens the pool of potential talent and enables keeping the best talent. She has championed internal promotions and "squiggly careers," allowing role shifts, including in and out of management, to support long-term growth.
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Green IT: How to Reduce IT’s Environmental Footprint
Green IT focuses on reducing IT’s environmental footprint, by rethinking how you build, deploy, and power IT systems. At QCon London, Ludi Akue presented how her team did a lifecycle assessment, set a 10% emissions reduction goal, simplified architecture, and optimized frontends, to align with climate goals.
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Open Practices for Architecture and AI Adoption
Andrea Magnorsky presented on Byte-Sized Architecture at Cloud Native Summit 2025, as a format for building shared understanding through small, recurrent workshops. Ahilan Ponnusamy and Andreas Spanner discussed the Technology Operating Model for AI adoption. Both approaches drew on the Open Practice Library for human-centred collaboration and driving architectural evolution.
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Lessons Learned from Growing from Junior to Staff and beyond
Bruno Rey suggested thinking about career growth in circles: self, team, company, and customers. Success comes from understanding broader impacts, embracing compromise, and acting fast, especially in startups. He advised seeking mentors for honest feedback, being open to unexpected or crisis-driven opportunities, and thriving in change with an anti-fragile mindset.
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How Sociotechnical Design Can Improve Architectural Decisions
Sociotechnical design in software development emphasizes creating systems where people and technology thrive by fostering collaboration, emergent coherence, and shared understanding through enabling constraints, leading not only to improved architecture but also to more effective, adaptive, and fulfilling work.
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An AI-Driven Approach to Creating Effective Learning Experiences at QCon
An experiment was created around a certification program influenced by AI at QCon London, which included special events during the conference, a pre-conference breakfast where participants could learn about upcoming activities, and an AI-driven workshop immediately following the conference. Wes Reisz spoke at InfoQ Dev Summit Boston about a program he led using AI.
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Levelling Yourself up as a Software Engineer While Climbing through the Ranks
As software engineers grow into senior, Staff+, or principal roles, they take on greater responsibility, complex projects, and influence beyond code, Suhail Patel explained in his talk about growing oneself as a software engineer at QCon London. Growth isn’t linear; it requires mastering communication, strategy, and soft influence. Writing, speaking, and 1:1s can help to expand impact.
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How NASA Tests Their Software for the Space Shuttle and the Orion MPCV
NASA uses multiple testing levels, independent validation, standards, safety communities, and tools to ensure safety. Darrel Raines gave a talk about software development and testing for the Space Shuttle and the Orion MPCV. He explained how they learn from failures and near misses and continually improve their process.
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How Figma Uses AI to Support, Not Replace, the Designer
Figma has integrated AI across its design platform, from small tools like auto-naming layers to Figma Make, which can turn a text prompt, image, or design frame into production-ready code that teams can edit together in real time.
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How Empathy-Driven Platform Teams Can Support Software Development
Building empathy and understanding for product developers help platform teams figure out where to draw the boundaries of their scope to provide better support, Erin Doyle mentioned in her talk about empathy-driven platforms at InfoQ Dev Summit Boston.
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How Amazon Uses Guardrails in Software Development
Carlos Arguelles spoke about Amazon’s inflection points in engineering productivity at QCon San Francisco, where he explained that shift testing left can help catch issues early. He suggested using guardrails such as code reviews and coverage checks. Your repo strategy, monorepo or multirepo, will impact the guardrails that need to be in place.
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Kubernetes Introduces Post-Quantum Support for TLS
A recent Kubernetes enhancement aims to pave the way to future-proofing cluster security against quantum computing threats. In a blog post, the Kubernetes community highlighted support for post-quantum cryptography (PQC) via a hybrid key exchange mechanism integrated with the Kubernetes Key Management Service (KMS) plugin system.