Practical, opinionated writing on bootstrapping businesses, Microsoft Dynamics 365, software architecture, UK tech policy and life on the road in a motorhome.
A motorhome habitation check is not the same as an MOT and skipping one can cost you a lot more than the fee. Here is what it actually covers, and why I book one every year without fail.
Read the articleMost small SaaS teams either ignore monitoring until something breaks or drown in alerts nobody reads. Here is the setup that actually works.
Read moreMost founders spend six months building an MVP that should take four weeks. Here is the process I actually use to go from idea to launched product.
Read moreEmployer National Insurance went up in April 2025 and the threshold dropped too. Here is what that actually costs a small UK software business per hire.
Read moreDynamics 365 running slow is rarely a Microsoft problem. Here are the real causes of poor Dataverse performance and how to actually fix them.
Read moreCash flow, not revenue, is what kills bootstrapped SaaS businesses. Here is how I actually manage it across four self funded companies.
Read morePicking a database causes more founder paralysis than it should. Here is the framework I actually use, after shipping four SaaS products.
Read moreMotorhome insurance in the UK is full of gaps most owners never spot until it is too late. Here is what I actually cover and why, after two vans and one proper claim.
Read moreHMRC's crackdown on R&D tax credit fraud is catching genuine software businesses in the net. Here is what actually qualifies and how to claim without trouble.
Read moreFeature flags let small dev teams ship without fear, but most guides are written for companies with a platform team. Here is how I actually use them.
Read moreShould that Dynamics 365 automation be a plugin or a Power Automate flow? Here is the decision framework I actually use as a technical architect.
Read moreUK government IT procurement is meant to help small suppliers win public sector work. In practice it locks them out. Here is why, with real examples.
Read moreCompeting with VC funded startups as a bootstrapped founder feels impossible until you stop trying to win their game. Here is what actually works.
Read moreIs a motorhome a good investment? As someone who has owned two, here is the honest answer on depreciation, running costs and when it actually makes sense.
Read moreGetting 429 errors from Dataverse? Here is what Dynamics 365 service protection limits actually are and how to design integrations that do not hit them.
Read moreMost small SaaS teams get API rate limiting wrong by either ignoring it or over engineering it. Here is the practical approach I actually use.
Read moreCompanies House ID verification for directors is now rolling out under the Economic Crime Act. Here is what it actually involves and who needs to act first.
Read moreConfused about motorhome licence rules in the UK? Here is what your car licence covers, when you need a C1, and the mistake that catches new owners out.
Read moreShould you sell your SaaS business or keep building? Here is the honest framework I use, built from bootstrapping four businesses over 17 years.
Read moreMost Dynamics 365 projects fall apart in the gap between environments, not the design. Here is how to manage ALM and solutions without a DevOps team.
Read moreMost small teams either skip CI/CD entirely or build a pipeline meant for a hundred engineers. Here is what actually matters when it is just you and a few others.
Read moreThe unfair dismissal qualifying period drops to six months from January 2027. Here is what it actually means if you hire people.
Read moreEveryone will sell you a solar panel and tell you it solves everything. It does not. Here is what actually keeps a motorhome powered away from hookup.
Read moreFounder burnout creeps up quietly. Here are the warning signs I ignored while bootstrapping several businesses, and what actually helped.
Read moreThe platform is rarely the reason a Dynamics 365 project fails. The partner delivering it usually is. Here is what to actually check before you sign.
Read moreI have run CampSuite as a multi-tenant product for years. Here is what the architecture decisions actually cost me, and what I would do differently starting again.
Read moreMaking Tax Digital for Income Tax went live this April for sole traders and landlords earning over £50,000. Here is what the quarterly reporting burden actually costs in practice, and what to do about it.
Read moreA decent 4G signal used to be the difference between a working day and a wasted one. Here is my honest experience running Starlink from a Swift Kontiki while working full time on the road.
Read moreMost small SaaS businesses have a backup. Very few have a disaster recovery plan. Here is the difference, and a practical plan you can actually build in a week.
Read moreSecurity roles are the bit of a D365 project everyone leaves until the last fortnight. Here is how to design them properly the first time.
Read moreAfter 17 years as a developer and consultant, here is what actually fills the pipeline. No cold emailing, no awkward pitches, just approaches that work.
Read moreThe exodus of British talent to the US is not a mystery. The reasons are hiding in plain sight and the people who could fix it are not listening.
Read moreBeing a generalist feels safe. After 17 years I can tell you it is not. Here is why specialising was the best business decision I ever made.
Read moreThe rules around wild camping in a motorhome are more complicated than they look. Here is what the law actually says in the UK and across Europe, and what works in practice.
Read moreEvery few years I ask myself whether it is time to move on from .NET. Every time I arrive at the same answer. Here is why I am not switching anytime soon.
Read moreMicrosoft's AI assistant for D365 looks brilliant in demos. Here is what it actually does on real projects and whether the licensing cost is worth it.
Read moreMost freelance developers price themselves wrong and leave significant money on the table for years. Here is what I learned the hard way.
Read moreI have sat through more licensing conversations than is healthy. Here is what you actually need to know before you sign anything.
Read morePeople picture a NED as someone collecting a fee for turning up twice a year. The reality is quite different, and the role is one of the more underrated ways to apply experience at a board level.
Read moreFive years since the private sector rollout and the damage is everywhere. Fewer contractors, higher costs, slower projects, and a brain drain that shows no signs of stopping.
Read moreWalk into any motorhome accessories shop and your wallet starts weeping. Here is what actually earns its place on board after years of trial and error.
Read moreYou spent six figures on a CRM implementation. Your sales team is still using spreadsheets. Sound familiar?
Read moreThe first thing you learn when you try to sell software you built yourself is that nobody cares about the code.
Read moreYou do not need a CISO or a penetration testing budget. But you do need to stop pretending security is somebody else's problem.
Read moreEveryone talks about SaaS as passive income. It is not. Here is what nobody tells you about what happens after you launch.
Read moreFed up paying top prices at big campsite chains every night? Here is every affordable option I have found after years on the road.
Read moreMost comparison articles are written by partners selling one platform or the other. Here is what it actually looks like when you have built real systems on both.
Read moreThe rewrite always sounds like the right answer. It almost never is. Here is what actually works for modernising legacy systems without torching the business.
Read moreThe honest guide to getting users when you cannot afford ads, a marketing team, or any of the things startup Twitter tells you that you need.
Read moreThe government wants the UK to be a global tech hub. The education system, the apprenticeship levy and immigration policy are all working against that goal.
Read moreNo code and low code platforms are brilliant for certain things. But the idea that they will make software developers redundant is nonsense, and here is why.
Read moreEvery Dynamics 365 go live feels like defusing a bomb while someone reads you the instructions over a bad phone line. Here is how to make it less painful.
Read moreEveryone has a side project idea. Very few people ship one. Here is what actually works when you are building a product around a day job.
Read moreChurn will kill a bootstrapped SaaS faster than a bad product ever will. Here is how to retain customers when it is just you and a support inbox.
Read moreI went from an Elddis Autoquest 196 to a Swift KonTiki 774 and the difference was night and day. Here is what I learned about knowing when to upgrade and what actually matters when you do.
Read moreI run three businesses and do consulting work on the side. People keep asking how. The honest answer is that most of it comes down to saying no to almost everything.
Read moreAfter over 25 years of writing code the old fashioned way, I have spent the last year working with AI coding assistants on real projects. Here is what actually happened to my productivity.
Read moreData migration is where Dynamics 365 implementations go to die. Here is what I have learned from doing it dozens of times.
Read moreYou do not need twelve services, a message queue and a service mesh to serve 500 customers. You need a monolith and a good deployment pipeline.
Read moreYou already know how to build things. The bit nobody teaches you is how to build things that people will actually pay for. That gap is worth closing.
Read moreEveryone talks about the freedom. Nobody talks about the diesel bill, the pitch fees and the mysterious rattling noise that turns into a four figure repair.
Read moreThe UK government loves talking about supporting entrepreneurs. The tax system tells a completely different story.
Read moreYou do not need a marketing budget to get your first paying customers. You need a thick skin, a decent product and the willingness to do things that do not scale.
Read moreThe line between configuration and custom code in Dynamics 365 is where most implementations either succeed or quietly start falling apart.
Read moreEvery codebase has compromises. The question is not how to eliminate technical debt but how to stop it managing you.
Read moreThe people writing the rules have never shipped a product in their lives. The people who will suffer the consequences ship products every day.
Read moreMost startups fail because the founder fell in love with a solution before checking whether anyone actually had the problem. Here is how to avoid that.
Read moreAfter rescuing a dozen Azure bills that quietly got away from their owners, here are the mistakes that blow them up and the habits that keep them sane.
Read moreAfter years of plugging Dynamics 365 into everything from accounting systems to warehouse kit, here are the integration patterns I keep coming back to and the ones I now refuse to touch.
Read moreEverything you need to know before driving your motorhome across the Channel for the first time. Ferries, routes, wild camping, tolls and the stuff nobody tells you until you are already there.
Read moreReal pricing lessons from building four SaaS businesses without investors telling me what to charge. Spoiler: you are probably charging too little.
Read moreThe honest numbers on a Dynamics 365 implementation. Why budgets blow out, what licences actually cost, and how to keep the whole thing under control.
Read moreI have built four SaaS products on four slightly different stacks. Here is what I wish someone had told me before the first one, and what I still get wrong occasionally.
Read moreNot a sponsored listicle. Not written by someone who Googled it. Actual places I have driven to, stayed at and would go back to.
Read moreNo VC money. No safety net. Just real problems, real stakes and a lot of lessons learned the hard way.
Read moreAfter twenty five years of building software and advising businesses, here is how I think about the build vs buy decision. Spoiler: the answer is almost always more nuanced than you think.
Read moreI have worked on Dynamics 365 implementations for utilities, financial services, housing and government. These are the mistakes I see again and again.
Read moreIt is one of those job titles that sounds impressive but nobody quite understands. Let me clear that up.
Read moreYou have a great idea and you need someone to build it. Here is how to find the right developer without getting burned, from someone who has been on both sides of the conversation.
Read moreIt sounds like living the dream. Sometimes it is. Sometimes you are sitting in a car park with no signal trying to join a Teams call.
Read morePower Apps, Power Automate, Power BI. You have probably heard the names but have no idea what they actually do. Let me explain in plain English.
Read moreForget the vanity metrics. When it is your own money on the line, here are the numbers that actually tell you if your SaaS business is working.
Read moreI have started businesses under three different governments now. The rhetoric changes but the problems stay the same. Here is what they keep getting wrong and what would actually help.
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