Toptal Blog

The Toptal Blog is the top hub for developers, designers, management consultants, executives, and entrepreneurs, featuring key technology updates, tutorials, freelancer resources, and management insights.

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Toptal core team members share their experience, expertise, and perspectives on the Toptal Edge Blog

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A Software Defined Radio Tutorial: Images From the International Space Station and Listening to Hams With an RTL-SDR

Radio has used fundamentally the same technology since Marconi’s experiments in 1895. However, improved circuit design and signal processing techniques have allowed us to transmit much more and much farther out than before.

In this article, with a laptop and less than $30 worth of equipment, we’ll capture images transmitted from the International Space Station and listen to amateur radio conversations at a local repeater.

18-minute readContinue Reading
Amin Shah Gilani

Amin Shah Gilani

Amin is a Ruby Association certified Gold Ruby Programmer who is passionate about learning new applications for technology.

Looking at Failed IPOs in the Age of the Unicorn

For many years, the IPO market appeared dormant. 2019, however, is bucking the trend with a large number of high-profile tech companies going live on stock exchanges. Not all of these IPOs have been successes. What is the process and what determines success (or lack thereof)?

9-minute readContinue Reading
Natasha Ketabchi

Natasha Ketabchi

Natasha transitioned to venture capital after a career in banking built in prestigious firms such as JPMorgan and the ESM.

The Dart Language: When Java and C# Aren't Sharp Enough

Five years after Dart 1.0, Google’s rewritten open-source language is attracting increasing numbers of developers. What do C# and Java developers need to know to get started with it?

13-minute readContinue Reading
Star Ford

Star Ford

Star is an architect and developer with specializations in business processes, requirements writing, databases, C#, and web development.

The Complete Guide to UX Research Methods

UX research provides invaluable insight into product users and what they need and value. Not only will research reduce the risk of a miscalculated guess, it will uncover new opportunities for innovation.

7-minute readContinue Reading
Miklos Philips

Miklos Philips

Miklos is a UX designer, product design strategist, author, and speaker with more than 18 years of experience in the design field.

Google Apps Script Tutorial for Mastering Macros

Google Apps Script may appear familiar to those with knowledge of Microsoft’s Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) language. However, Google’s coding offers more integrations and the ability to harness workflows seamlessly across spreadsheets, documents, and presentations.

10-minute readContinue Reading
Stefan Thelin

Stefan Thelin

Stefan is the Director of Data-Driven Insights and Analytics for Cargotec, a leading provider of cargo and loading solutions. He has also served as an M&A director and a startup CFO, and led financial modeling and analysis as a leveraged finance manager at the Royal Bank of Scotland.

Aesthetics and Perception: How to Approach User Experience Imagery

Once designers better understand how people’s minds work with imagery, they are able to create better products that really make sense in a person’s life, while positively affecting the business itself.

8-minute readContinue Reading
Rian Dutra

Rian Dutra

Rian is an interaction designer with extensive experience in UX, research, and visual design.

How to Create a Swipeable UITabBar From the Ground Up

Apple’s iOS SDK features a bevy of built-in UI components, but what happens when you decide you need a bit more? What if you need to create a swipeable UITabBar?

In this post, Toptal iOS Developer George Vashakidze explains how he tried using a third-party library, and why he chose to create his own solution instead.

9-minute readContinue Reading
George Vashakidze

George Vashakidze

George is an extremely motivated and hardworking mobile developer with extensive experience working with iOS and Android.

A Road to Better Agile Testing

The yearly World Quality Report created by Capgemini shows that 42% of survey respondents list a “lack of professional test expertise” as a challenge in applying testing to Agile development. While the advent of Agile has brought the increased speed of iterations for software development, in some cases this has come at the cost of quality.

8-minute readContinue Reading
Vytas Butkus

Vytas Butkus

Vytas is a professional project and product manager leading products and projects in education, 3D graphics, eCommerce, and adtech.

How to Approach Modern WordPress Development (Part 2)

WordPress code, especially back-end PHP code, is often a mess—even in WP core! But legacy code is no excuse. Find out how to develop WP customizations the right way, so your code is readable and maintainable.

13-minute readContinue Reading
Andrey Shalashov

Andrey Shalashov

Andrey is a full-stack web developer and WordPress expert. Lately, his focus is on serverless computing and JAMstack.

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