The hottest Metrics Substack posts right now

And their main takeaways
Category
Top Technology Topics

Quality Engineering Basics: Quality Metrics

QUALITY BOSS • 39 implied HN points • 25 Mar 24
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Metrics help show how good a product is and can lead to improvements. They can boost quality and user happiness.
  2. Bug metrics track issues like how many bugs are found after release and how long they take to fix. This helps teams focus on areas needing help.
  3. Product and automation metrics can include customer satisfaction and how well automated tests work. They help understand what's going right or wrong in the product.

Why We Founded SaaSGrid

Bottom Up by David Sacks • 541 implied HN points • 06 Sep 23
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. SaaS companies need a dedicated dashboarding platform for their metrics.
  2. Problems faced by SaaS companies include lack of proper metrics, errors in data, and lack of real-time availability.
  3. SaaSGrid provides a solution by automating the calculation of key SaaS metrics and offering real-time dashboards.

The 3 Pillars of Observability in Distributed Software Systems[System Design Sundays]

Technology Made Simple • 99 implied HN points • 19 Jun 23
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Observability in distributed software systems is crucial as they grow in complexity and scale.
  2. The 3 pillars of observability are logs, metrics, and traces, each offering unique insights into the system's operations.
  3. Combining logs, metrics, and traces is essential for building tools that enhance observability and improve system performance.

Bits, Bytes, and Bylaws: Timeless Computing Laws (Part - 2)

Wisdom over Waves • 59 implied HN points • 28 Dec 23
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Adding more people to a late software project can make it even later due to various factors like onboarding time, increased coordination needs, and additional deployments causing outages.
  2. When a measure becomes the target, it loses its effectiveness, leading to actions like renaming variables or engaging in practices that prioritize metrics over true code quality.
  3. The structure of the software often mirrors the communication structure of the organization that designed it, showcasing the impact of company dynamics on software architecture.

Choosing the right UX metrics - Part 2

UX Psychology • 158 implied HN points • 03 Oct 22
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Identifying clear goals is crucial in choosing the right UX metrics, involving team and stakeholders can help define meaningful and actionable metrics.
  2. Mapping goals to signals helps track progress towards goals; gathering user feedback and reviews can be essential signals to measure UX success.
  3. Refining signals into specific metrics is the final step, where data scientists can assist in ensuring metrics are measured accurately; focus on key metrics and avoid adding unnecessary data.
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Seduced By The Machine

The Ruffian • 368 implied HN points • 16 Dec 23
📖 Philosophy Metrics
  1. Humans are becoming more like machines by allowing apps and corporations to define their values and goals.
  2. Metrics and rankings from technology and organizations can shape our values, making us prioritize quantifiable standards over personal fulfillment.
  3. Value capture by external agents can lead to a loss of individuality and hinder personal growth, as people conform to standardized metrics and neglect their unique aspirations.

Naive metrics 📈 😶 ☁️

The SaaS Baton • 78 implied HN points • 15 Feb 23
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Prematurely focusing on a small number of metrics can create blind spots.
  2. Having too many metrics can lead to confusion and complexity in understanding their relationships.
  3. Establishing clear communication and alignment with co-founders/partners is crucial for startup success.

On investor updates

Luba’s Newsletter • 78 implied HN points • 09 Mar 23
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Investors usually want to help your startup, prioritize good investors
  2. Keep investor updates concise, under 1.5 pages, and send regularly
  3. Include key asks, key metrics, and management discussion in investor updates

How to calculate P/E ratio

Shivansh • 19 implied HN points • 26 Apr 24
💰 Finance Metrics
  1. P/E ratio compares a company's stock price with its earnings per share, providing insight into investor perception and market sentiment.
  2. Calculating P/E ratio involves dividing the current stock price by the company's earnings per share (EPS).
  3. Different types of P/E ratios like trailing and forward help in assessing past performance and future earnings, aiding investors in comparing valuations and identifying trends across industries.

Choosing the right UX metrics - Part 1

UX Psychology • 119 implied HN points • 20 Sep 22
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. UX metrics are vital for making evidence-based UX decisions instead of relying on opinions and beliefs.
  2. Using a combination of attitudinal and behavioral metrics can provide a comprehensive understanding of user experience.
  3. The HEART framework - Happiness, Engagement, Adoption, Retention, and Task Success - offers a structured way to select and track UX metrics for data-driven decision-making.

Core 4 fails the vanity metric test

Dev Interrupted • 28 implied HN points • 24 Jul 25
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Not all metrics are useful. Some, like the Developer Experience Index, are hard to understand and can't show real improvement, making them less valuable for teams.
  2. It's important to focus on clear, actionable metrics. Rather than following complex frameworks, using simple and proven methods can help teams improve effectively.
  3. Measuring too much can lead to inaction. Organizations should spend more time improving their processes and less time on endless metrics and reports.

Claude Plays Pokémon

Teaching computers how to talk • 62 implied HN points • 28 Feb 25
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. AI playing games like Pokémon can show us how smart it really is. It might be better than other tests because games need quick thinking and problem solving.
  2. Recent projects like Claude playing Pokémon on Twitch highlight how slow and confused current AI can be. It took Claude a long time to beat just one part of the game.
  3. Today's AI tests often focus on math or coding, but playing games might give a clearer picture of intelligence. We should use games to see if AI can think and adapt like humans do.

Finding a better perceptual metric than FPS

Philip’s Newsletter • 24 implied HN points • 26 Jul 25
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Jitter is more important than average FPS in 3D environments because it affects the realism and immersion of the experience. If frames are delayed, it can surprise the brain and break the illusion of movement.
  2. The average FPS can vary greatly due to different hardware and complex user-created content. This makes it hard to rely solely on FPS as a measure of performance.
  3. New metrics like Normalized Jitter and Normalized Frametime Variation are being tested to better reflect user experience. These metrics consider the timing of frames and how noticeable the delays are.

4 key metrics to track for solofounders

Tiny Empires • 85 implied HN points • 13 Nov 24
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Track your monthly net profit to see if your business is healthy. If profits drop for too long, figure out why.
  2. Know your Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) to understand how stable your income is. This helps you plan for the future.
  3. Focus on a few key metrics for marketing and sales, like the cost per lead and conversion rates, to make better decisions. Don't get lost in too much data.

Beware value capture

SatPost by Trung Phan • 201 implied HN points • 19 Jan 24
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Tech apps influence our behavior through metrics, so don't blindly follow them
  2. Metrics like rankings, step counts, and likes can lead to 'value capture' influencing our decisions and behavior
  3. Be aware of how external metrics set by institutions in apps can guide our values and behaviors without us realizing

☁ How to Build an ARR Book (Part 1)

Hard Mode by Breaking SaaS • 39 implied HN points • 13 Nov 23
💼 Business Metrics
  1. An ARR book is essential in SaaS analysis to track customer contracts and calculate key metrics.
  2. The underlying data for an ARR book comes from customer contracts, detailing customer information and contract specifics.
  3. To convert contract data into an ARR book, organize logos and periods, calculate ARR changes, and categorize them into New Logo ARR, Expansion ARR, Logo Churn, and Downsell/Shrinkage.

How to Invent Math[Technique Tuesdays]

Technology Made Simple • 59 implied HN points • 25 Jan 23
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Understand the problem you're dealing with before inventing your own math.
  2. Basic operations like division, multiplication, addition, and subtraction are key for creating new metrics.
  3. Consider existing metrics but be ready to modify or create new ones to better suit your specific needs.

Week #5: Design Your Own Conformal Predictor

Mindful Modeler • 79 implied HN points • 17 Jan 23
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Designing your own conformal predictor involves picking a suitable non-conformity score and evaluating it
  2. Consider the non-conformity score as the key element in conformal predictors
  3. To evaluate conformal predictors, focus on metrics like marginal coverage, average region size, and conditional coverage

Evaluating Team Effectiveness with a Data-first Approach | Bhavini Soneji, Executive Leader (ex-Cruise, Headspace, Microsoft)

platocommunity • 19 implied HN points • 15 Feb 24
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Empowering people to discover their strengths and amplify their impact is key in leadership.
  2. When measuring team effectiveness, consider the three buckets: what (strategic value), how (execution), and who (team dynamics).
  3. Combining measurement with follow-through techniques is crucial to determine if you're measuring the right things and drive continuous improvement.

The Engineering Leader's Process for Continuous Improvement

Developing Leadership • 39 implied HN points • 25 Apr 23
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Engineering leaders have two main responsibilities: improving developer experience and delivering impact to end-users.
  2. The Engineering Leader's Process for Continuous Improvement involves identifying, discussing, deciding, aligning, acting, and measuring.
  3. It is important for engineering leaders to continuously loop through the improvement process, not just during times of issue.

Can My Open Source Company Raise Series A?

Open Source Startup Podcast • 39 implied HN points • 07 Mar 23
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Investors now require open source companies to have at least $100k ARR by Series A.
  2. Investors focus on metrics like users running the project in production and engagement in Slack or Discord.
  3. Other important metrics for open source companies include GitHub issues, stars, usage & retention, and unique contributors.

Data, Despair, and the FLOWBEE

Data People Etc. • 266 implied HN points • 13 Mar 23
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Data professionals may feel isolated due to externalized intelligence and lack of integration into daily activities.
  2. Thinkers in organizations may become untethered without proper recognition and integration with doers.
  3. To be effective, thinkers must be tightly integrated into their environment and endorsed by leadership.

What does it look like to be successful here? How is my performance evaluated?

Creating Value from Nothing • 79 implied HN points • 14 Mar 24
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Evaluation of performance in the Product organization focuses on inputs like quality of thinking over outputs.
  2. Avoiding using output targets to evaluate performance is important to maintain a customer-centric culture, prevent tunnel vision, and discourage risk aversion.
  3. While metrics are essential, team members are rewarded for excellent inputs rather than just meeting success criteria, emphasizing the priority of creating value for customers.

Dangerous metrics

Sunday Letters • 59 implied HN points • 20 Dec 22
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Measuring developer productivity is really hard. Common metrics like lines of code or bugs fixed often don't tell the full story and can even be manipulated.
  2. It’s important to think about how a metric could be misused before applying it. Focusing on the wrong metrics can lead to unhelpful outcomes and confusion.
  3. Organizations learn and respond to metrics, but sometimes they take things too literally. Choosing the right metrics carefully is crucial to avoid unintentional negative effects.

Beyond Code Generation: Rethinking Dev Productivity in the Age of AI

Maestro's Musings • 105 implied HN points • 14 Sep 23
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Software development involves more than just writing code; it's a symphony of collaboration, communication, and coordination.
  2. Developers spend a small fraction of their day writing code; other activities like collaborating, debugging, and planning play significant roles.
  3. AI can enhance developer team productivity by focusing on automated testing, augmented code reviews, automated project management, and more beyond code generation.

How Much Data Is Too Much?

Build To Scale • 19 implied HN points • 15 Sep 23
💼 Business Metrics
  1. Focus on a small set of key metrics at the executive level to avoid conflicting views and promote progress.
  2. Be cautious of over-analyzing data and creating a culture where analysis overshadows taking necessary actions.
  3. For startups, while revenue predictability is important, it's natural to experience volatility, especially in early stages.

A Quest for Accurate North Star Metrics

Balancing Act • 19 implied HN points • 07 Apr 23
💼 Business Metrics
  1. North Star Metrics are crucial for measuring business success, but accurately comparing them to competitors can be challenging.
  2. Real estate data, particularly from the MLS, provides companies like Zillow and Redfin with precise market insights for measuring market share.
  3. Selecting and refining a North Star Metric as a business grows is essential, and leveraging industry-specific data sources can improve metric accuracy.

Standardized usability questionnaires: which one to use?

UX Psychology • 79 implied HN points • 16 Dec 21
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Standardized usability questionnaires have many advantages like objectivity, reliability, and validity.
  2. There are various post-test standardized usability questionnaires available, such as QUIS, SUMI, PSSUQ, SUS, and SUPR-Q, each with unique features and applications.
  3. Choosing the right questionnaire depends on factors like the nature of the project, stage of research, goals of the study, and budget limitations.

How To Create Compound Efficiencies In Engineering

Dev Interrupted • 102 implied HN points • 20 Jul 23
🕹 Technology Metrics
  1. Efficiency improvements in engineering come from continuous habits, not just one-time decisions.
  2. Real-time visibility into metrics and guidance on 'good' metrics can drive organic productivity improvements.
  3. Automating pull requests & code reviews can significantly reduce cycle time and improve productivity in dev teams.