September 2022 Summaries

The Courier hackathon offers over $1K in prizes for building a cool project that integrates with the Courier API. The goal is to infiltrate an enemy Discord server, send encrypted messages to civilians, and alert them about the situation so they can escape. To achieve this, participants must create a Discord bot using Node.js and the Courier API, which will automate sending daily automated messages encrypted in Morse code. The bot will use the Morse API to translate English messages into Morse code, and then send these messages through the Courier API to reach the enemy server. Participants will also need to set up an automation that runs this process every day, using the Courier Automations API. By completing this challenge, participants can win prizes such as $1000 in cash and a Keychron Keyboard, and have their project showcased on the Courier website.

As a product manager, dealing with notifications can be complex due to the close ties between notifications and application code. This complexity often leads to notification projects being postponed or not started at all, resulting in stagnant notification experiences. However, decoupling notifications from application code can make these projects less complex and less risky for product teams. By making templates accessible to non-engineers, enabling configuration of notification logic without requiring re-deployment, and providing self-serve analytics, PMs can work with notifications directly, improving the notification experience and driving growth metrics.

A well-designed notification experience is crucial for the success of mobile and web applications. It encompasses everything users see, hear, do, and feel when interacting with notifications from an app or software service. Notification channels, such as mobile push, email, chat, SMS, and in-app notifications, play a central role in this experience. Choosing the right channel for the right message is essential to avoid user frustration and annoyance. A good notification experience should consider factors like timing, customizations, and platform best practices. Product managers often struggle with designing effective notifications due to limitations on customization and analytics, but by exploring available platforms, conducting user research, and focusing on small deliverables, they can create a great notification experience that delights users.

The author argues that the proliferation of unnecessary notifications on mobile devices is leading to a systemic collapse where users will opt out entirely, mirroring the sub-prime financial crisis of 2008. He suggests that app developers are contributing to this problem by overusing notifications in an attempt to remain competitive for attention. However, he proposes that collaboration among developers can lead to industry-wide standards and principles for trustworthy notifications, such as timeliness, targeting, brevity, and control. By adopting these guidelines, developers can break free from the notification crisis and create a better user experience. The author references various examples of industries adopting voluntary self-regulation and pledge systems, such as the Comics Code Authority seal, to demonstrate that a lack of public trust can be addressed through collective action.

Our lie detector serverless application uses Azure Cognitive Services for facial recognition, integrating with Courier API to send alerts based on deceiving emotions detected. The application consists of four parts: creating a serverless function using Azure Functions, authorizing Courier to send messages via Gmail and Twilio APIs, sending single and multi-channel notifications from the Azure function, and analyzing emotions with the Face API to detect deceitful faces. The application detects anger, neutral, or contempt emotions in the face being analyzed and sends alerts to our spy network if any of these values are greater than 0.

"I was able to make an enormous impact as the product manager for Courier's Preferences feature. The problem we experienced at Courier was that we'd offer Preferences (V3) to our customers, but the entire product feature's strategy wasn't fully fleshed out. Allowing only global opt-in/out is a problem because it constrains end users' notifications options and can lead to inbox flooding. I learned about the importance of channel and content selection through a toggle/grid style layout for preference centers, which became the backbone to our summer project. We solved the visibility problem with V4, which was the main "fail" from V3. Our customers and their end users now had the ability to control the content they received and the channels they would prefer. I worked closely with the Lifecycle team on Preferences, and everyone was so kind and offered fantastic feedback. The environment at Courier felt like working on a side project with close friends, which helped me produce great work. I learned how to prioritize tasks, stay organized, and educate others on our product vision. I also gained experience in breaking down tickets, creating a slide deck for presentations, and selling products to customers."

The concept of user experience extends beyond the application interface, encompassing various aspects such as notifications, which have a significant impact on users. The experience of notifications is often controlled by teams outside of the product team, including operations and marketing/growth teams, rather than being managed by the product team itself. This ceding of territory leads to limitations in delivering a better user experience. To solve this problem, new tooling or internal solutions are needed to enable the product team to send targeted notifications directly from their platform, improving the overall user experience both within and outside of the app.

The Courier API will be used to send notifications and messages through emails and texts. The first hackathon is launching next week, offering over $1K in prizes for participants who successfully integrate the Courier API into their projects. A tutorial is available to guide users through the process of sending multi-channel notifications using Node.js. The tutorial covers integrating the Gmail and Twilio APIs, setting up routing for single or all channels, and converting messages to Morse code using the Fun Translations API. Participants will be required to send a secret message encoded in Morse code via both email and text, with the first five successful submissions receiving a gift from Courier. The hackathon registration link is provided, along with additional resources and documentation for the Courier API and other relevant tools.

### Summary of wispy compiler in 1 paragraph` The wispy compiler is an open-source implementation that compiles wispy, a new WebAssembly language. The compilation process involves several phases, including parsing, lexing, and code generation. The `compile` function takes the abstract syntax tree (AST) as input and converts it to a set of executable instructions in WebAssembly format using the binaryen compiler toolchain. The compiler also handles tricky optimizations like dead-code removal and code folding. It generates machine code by calling the block function on binaryen, which takes a block name, an array of compiled expressions, and a return type as input. The `compileFunction` function is used to compile function definitions, while the `registerStandardFunctions` function maps primitive WebAssembly instructions to names for reference within wispy. After compilation, the resulting WebAssembly module can be executed by a host Node.js/v8 runtime.