Michael

just a visionary building systems🦇
founder @lymorahq
senior developer @zirostack

[Michael @_mgbah]

@sflorimm https://t.co/OLhtN4uCBv

[Michael @_mgbah]

spent way too long trying to get VS Code remote-ssh working on shared cPanel hosting.
kept failing. shared hosting just doesn't allow it.
found a simpler fix instead: connect straight from my terminal into the server. now i can sync code changes, set everything up, and apply updates directly on the live site, while still writing everything locally on my machine.
@tonyewills0 been in my ear about getting a vps. about to see if this setup holds before i make that move.

[Michael @_mgbah]

this is already happening tbh just not at the scale the framing suggests.
most serious devs i know aren't choosing between remote global work and local ecosystems. they're doing both. remote income funds local building.
think of that as a survival strategy that has been running quietly for years before anyone put a name on it.
your $2k–$6k figure is also the other half of the moniepoint story from way back. local companies can't compete with that, so they call it a talent shortage when it's actually a pricing gap.
european firms won't need to engineer "structured partnerships." the bridge already exists. it's just informal, dev-led, and invisible to anyone only looking at the corporate level.

[Michael @_mgbah]

@Blue_Footy likewise
but looking at the financial aspect
we'd do well with at least Europa

[Michael @_mgbah]

I find it very hard to believe.

a hiring pipeline that actually works would surface engineers from everywhere. not just people who fit a specific mould.
500 empty seats isn't a referendum on nigerian developers. it's a reflection of how you're looking for them.
necessity builds skill in ways a classroom never will.

[David Hundeyin @DavidHundeyin]

The real issue is that the "500 job openings" at Moniepoint do not exist. It's a popular corporate scam where you constantly recruit without actually hiring anyone, because showing a large number of job vacancies while advertising your aggressive recruitment campaign is a growth metric you display to investors. It shows that the company is "growing fast" which means they should invest more money.

"We can't fill 500 job openings" in an absurdly deep job market like Nigeria is just a fintech bro performing for USD to locate him from whichever venture capital or private equity investor he's targeting. It's the same thing as when an NGO lawyer jumps on every trending human rights case without really achieving anything - it's a performance for the oyibo with USD to reward them.

Motion without movement. Fake activity scam.

[Michael @_mgbah]

@Blue_Footy why is rosenior still your pfp?

[Michael @_mgbah]

@0xAdesola saw this
but I couldn't find the prem channels
you know which?

[Michael @_mgbah]

building a product in nigeria that leans into foreign market pricing means you're already handicapped.

naira devaluation. settlement gaps. chargeback exposure. infrastructure fees that don't exist in other markets.

you can try to take the freedom fighter route and attack em, but you'll learn that your business model should be architected around it.

in my models I usually treat exchange rate as a variable, not a constant. i have a multiplier that absorbs naira movement before it touches my margin so by the time the rate shifts, my model already accounted for it.

naija tax is real tbh. but it's avoidable.

[Michael @_mgbah]

just dropped something new on https://t.co/vXxt8UsMFo.
bespoke website templates built for specific niches.
hotels, law firms, dental practices, schools, real estate.
not surface level tho. each one has a curated system designed around how that business actually converts for your use-case.

https://t.co/liyUifMR50

[Michael @_mgbah]

well...
just brainballing here
I feel most senior devs, think ahead, like some of the threads you've written on architecture changes, readability all that.
senior devs see those and plan for it.
it also shows in the way they debug, not just surface level, debugging in a way that the system improves to not have that same fault
and I guess their decision making.

[Michael @_mgbah]

@darkinstagram @oneofwun02 i feel this just for clicks tbh
at the end of the day niggas be hyped cuz of the album coming

[Michael @_mgbah]

@darkinstagram @oneofwun02 crazy ragebait broo😂😂

[Michael @_mgbah]

pretty straightforward honestly.
we were already in a pivot period so the timing worked out basically, no active transactions running, low risk window.
swapped the API keys, updated the endpoint references. the backend PHP logic stayed almost identical because flutterwave and paystack handle transactions similarly at the core. initialize, verify, webhook all that. same flow, different provider.

[Michael @_mgbah]

a little thing for those of you breaking into the tech space.
when you're on the come up, talent alone won't cut it.
you need exposure. the right kind.

i've been privileged to have the best kind of mentors pull me through. shoutout @tonyewills0 and bosskings. these guys have seen it all, done it all. and that's exactly where i wanted to be. i learned from their wins and their mistakes. everything to push me, they did.

that shortcut is worth years.

most people in tech are learning everything the hard way because they won't ask, won't reach out, won't put themselves in rooms where the right people exist.
find someone 3-5 years ahead of you in what you're building toward. study how they think. ask real questions. absorb the mistakes they'll actually share if you ask right.

you could call it luck if you want.
i call it leverage.

[Michael @_mgbah]

appreciate that fr 🔥
to answer your question, yes, building is exactly how you get to know the why.
you don't read your way to understanding systems. you break them, fix them, build things that don't work, figure out why, and build again. that's the whole process.
the knowledge looks intimidating from the outside. from the inside it's just accumulated curiosity.
the only difference between where you are and where you want to be is what you decide to build next.
start something. it doesn't have to be big. just start.

[Michael @_mgbah]

been on Linux for a few months now and i'm soo not going back.
specifically for backend development. the difference is real.

on windows i used laragon running in the background just to serve my apps locally. a whole external server stack just to see my own code work.
on Linux i got tired of even that. so i built my own CLI. (totally different from create-php-starter)

one tool. spins up apache virtual hosts, generates SSL certs with mkcert, tunnels with ngrok, tails logs, all from one command per action.
debugging webhooks locally used to be a pain. now i just run wayne share and i have a live HTTPS tunnel in seconds.
on windows you work around the system.
on Linux you build on top of it.

took me a while to fully switch tho. still configuring things honestly. but the productivity difference for backend dev is hard to argue with.
if you're a backend dev still on windows, at least dual boot. give it a month.
you'll understand what i mean.

[Michael @_mgbah]

@Akintola_steve yeah true.
you can't prompt your way to understanding why a Lagos delivery behaves differently from Abuja. or why a vendor dispute needs a specific resolution path. or how to handle cash on delivery failing at the last mile.