The ORBN journal

Insights &
updates.

The latest musings from ORBN Digital — products, people, and sometimes pet projects.

Is your vibe coded app ready for real customers?

If you have built a working app with an AI coding tool, you have already done useful work. You have turned an idea into something people can see and use. You may have tested a…

August 28, 2026 · 6 min read

Read the essay

All posts.

P/02 — P/26

P/02Should you use the strangler fig pattern on a legacy system?Aug 26, 20266 min P/03Can your systems support the customer you just won?Aug 21, 20266 min P/04How long does a customer portal take to build with AI?Aug 19, 20266 min P/05Why available equipment is not always ready to hireAug 14, 20267 min P/06Is your receipt data ready for digital waste tracking?Aug 12, 20268 min P/07Can AI process supplier invoices without losing control?Aug 10, 20268 min P/08How AI can organise facilities maintenance requestsAug 7, 20267 min P/09How to tell if you are buying AI slopAug 5, 20268 min P/10Does your workflow need Kimi K3's extra intelligence?Aug 3, 20268 min P/11Why two correct dashboards can show different answersJul 31, 20267 min P/12Does your system integration need to be real timeJul 29, 20266 min P/13When an architect's AI tool becomes a software productJul 27, 20267 min P/14What did your team rescue by hand this week?Jul 24, 20269 min P/15Why Ownership Matters: The Case for Building Your Own Operational SoftwareFeb 19, 20268 min P/16From Systems of Record to Systems That ThinkNov 3, 20254 min P/17The Foodservice Warehouse Health Check: 5 Red Flags That Cost You Time and MoneySep 29, 20254 min P/18Eliminating Manual Weight Entry in High-Volume Foodservice WarehousesSep 12, 20255 min P/19Time to modernise?Jul 23, 20253 min P/20Broken fulfilment process?Jul 7, 20253 min P/21The SME Guide to: Scaling technology WITHOUT overspending…May 7, 20255 min P/22The hidden costs of cheap softwareApr 9, 20255 min P/23Case Study Modernising Payment Systems for a National PublisherApr 9, 20254 min P/24How can SMEs avoid software overkill?Apr 9, 20254 min P/25A CXOs Guide to GraphRAG in Plain EnglishNov 27, 20246 min P/26Engineering Best Practices Are Good for BusinessNov 19, 20244 min

Evergreen resources

Practical decision guides.

G/01 — G/06

G/01

Legacy System Modernisation

Assess operational exposure, compare eight treatment strategies and plan a phased migration.

G/02

Custom vs Off-the-Shelf Software

Score fit, control, integration, ownership and economics to compare buy, build and hybrid paths.

G/03

Custom Software Cost UK

Use transparent delivery-cost arithmetic, planning ranges and a proposal checklist.

G/04

Foodservice ERP: Buy, Integrate or Build?

Choose a system of record and decide which wholesale workflows to buy, connect or build.

G/05

AWS Cloud Application Cost

Separate delivery, AWS consumption and support, then inspect the assumptions a proposal should expose.

G/06

Serverless vs Containers vs Kubernetes

Compare AWS compute options by demand, execution, recovery, team capability and operating burden.

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