About → Technical Competencies
What we use, and why we picked it.
Our technical stack is deliberate. Every choice below is in our toolkit because it earned its place — by being honest about its limitations, having a strong fit with how we work, and aligning with what our customers actually need. We've listed our competencies with the reasoning attached, so you can see how we think about technology selection — not just what we know.
AI & Context Engineering
Our flag-bearing discipline. More on our AI engineering practice →
Anthropic Claude (Claude Code, Anthropic SDK)
Our daily working stack. Code generation, decision support, content authoring, internal automation. Claude is woven through how we operate — not bolted on for marketing.
Context engineering
The discipline of structuring AI inputs — memory, prompts, examples, tools — for repeatable, traceable, production-grade outcomes.
Prompt caching, structured outputs, tool use, agentic flows
Production techniques that make AI economically viable at scale. We use them daily; we configure them for clients.
Model Context Protocol (MCP)
Bridging AI assistants to live business systems — Xero, calendars, ticketing, file stores. Turns AI from a chat partner into an operational tool.
Memory systems & second brains
Durable, queryable knowledge bases that serve both human teams and their AI assistants.
Modern Web Development
Front and back, modern and maintainable.
TypeScript
Our default language for new code. Type-safety pays for itself in maintenance and refactoring confidence.
SvelteKit + Svelte 5
Standard for SME-facing builds. SSR/SSG support, low bundle weight, filesystem routing — small team, big productivity.
Astro
Static-first builds with optional islands. Powers Tier 1 Ignite — fastest possible load, smallest possible attack surface.
Tailwind CSS v4
Utility-first styling, design-token-driven. Fast to ship and easy to evolve without painting the maintenance bill onto the next developer.
Node.js + Bun
JavaScript runtime for development and production. Bun's fast install + native TS execution materially improves DX.
HTML + CSS fundamentals
Semantic markup, accessibility, modern CSS layout. The web's foundations done right — because frameworks are tools, not substitutes.
Cloud & Infrastructure
From customer hosting to internal infrastructure.
AWS
Default cloud for Forge tier hosting and our internal infrastructure. EC2, RDS, S3, Lambda, ECS — the building blocks we're most fluent in.
Microsoft Azure
Preferred cloud for MS-aligned client estates — App Service, Azure SQL, Functions, Entra ID. Where the customer's existing identity and licensing already live, we stay in-platform.
UK reseller hosting platform
White-label UK platform underpinning Ignite + Kindle tier hosting. Provisioned via 170+ endpoint API for full automation.
Docker & containers
Reproducible deployments. Same image runs locally, in staging, and in production — no "works on my machine" surprises.
CI/CD pipelines
Automated build, test, and deploy via GitHub Actions and similar. No manual deploys to production.
Networking & On-Premise Infrastructure
Where the cloud meets the office floor.
Ubiquiti UniFi platform
End-to-end UniFi designs — from simple WiFi to full Network, Protect (video surveillance), and Access (door entry) infrastructures.
Network architecture for SMEs
VLAN segmentation, guest network isolation, firewall rule sets, site-to-site VPN. Enterprise patterns sized for SME budgets.
Data & Databases
Relational, dimensional, and the long-tail legacy.
PostgreSQL
Default relational store. Robust JSON support, strong transactional guarantees, deep ecosystem (Drizzle, pgvector, logical replication).
MySQL
PHP-aligned customer sites and shared-hosting deployments — wherever portability matters more than feature depth.
SQL Server
Enterprise MS-aligned client work. Reporting Services, Integration Services, and Always-On where the customer's existing scale demands it.
Microsoft Access
Deep familiarity with the long-tail legacy stack still running mission-critical SME systems. Foundation of the Acçodus™ modernisation product.
ORM layer — Drizzle & Dapper
Type-safe data access without the heavyweight abstractions. Drizzle for TypeScript projects, Dapper for .NET / C# stacks — lightweight, predictable, no surprises at scale.
Data modelling (operational)
Schemas designed for transactional integrity — normalised where it matters, denormalised where it pays off. Done before code, not after. Dimensional + analytics modelling sits in our Data Engineering section below.
Data Engineering & Analytics
Enterprise data platforms and the discipline of turning raw data into trustworthy answers.
Microsoft Fabric
End-to-end analytics platform — OneLake, Synapse, Data Factory, Power BI under one roof. Our headline data-engineering capability, with rare-skillset experience delivering medallion-based enterprise data solutions.
Medallion architecture (Bronze / Silver / Gold)
Lakehouse pattern for turning raw ingest into trusted, query-ready data. Bronze for raw, Silver for cleaned and conformed, Gold for serving — the structure that makes analytics auditable.
Power BI
Semantic modelling, DAX, paginated reports, embedded analytics. Where Fabric-prepared data meets the people who need to act on it.
ETL / ELT pipelines
Data Factory + Synapse pipelines for ingestion and transformation. Modern incremental-load patterns, not nightly full-replace jobs.
Dimensional modelling
Star and snowflake schemas, Kimball-style fact + dimension design. The shape that turns analytics queries from slow to fast — and reports from suspect to trusted.
Reporting + BI strategy
Picking what to measure, designing reports people actually use, and building the data backbone underneath. The discipline that pays back across every other part of the business.
Microsoft Ecosystem
For clients living inside the MS stack.
C# / .NET
Enterprise client engagements where the existing ecosystem is MS-aligned. Strongly typed, mature, broadly known.
Blazor
Modern .NET web framework. Picked when the customer's existing skillset is C# and we want to keep handover simple.
Microsoft 365 administration
Identity, mailbox setup, advanced spam filtering, retention policies, Conditional Access. SME-grade configurations done properly.
Microsoft Graph API
Mailbox automation, calendar integration, Teams + SharePoint scripting — where MS becomes a programmable platform, not just a productivity suite.
Teams Calling & Voice
Virtual switchboard / PBX configuration on Teams Phone — direct routing, auto-attendants, call queues, voicemail-to-email. Replaces the on-prem PBX without leaving the M365 stack.
APIs & Integration
Enabling systems to talk to each other — cleanly, reliably, and on the right terms.
REST API design
Conventional, well-documented, predictable. Good API design is invisible — it just works the way you expect.
Stripe
Standard payments + subscriptions. Stripe Checkout + webhooks + Customer Portal covers most billing scenarios without rolling our own.
Sage 50 & Sage 200 Professional
UK SME finance integration — products, prices, stock, customer accounts, orders, invoices, payments. Sage 50 via SDK + COM; Sage 200 via its Web API + direct MS SQL. Bidirectional sync patterns proven on production engagements.
Xero API
Financial system integration — bookkeeping, invoicing, reconciliation, reporting. The accounting layer many of our customers already live in.
Twilio
Voice, SIP trunking, programmable messaging. Picked for VOIP + future PBX work — modern API ergonomics throughout.
Webhook + event-driven patterns
Reactive integrations where systems push state changes rather than poll for them. Lower latency, lower load, fewer bugs.
Security & Modern Auth
Where security meets usability — without compromising on either.
Better-Auth
Modern auth framework — passkeys first, TOTP standard, SMS deprioritised. Picked because it matches where auth is heading, not where it was five years ago.
WebAuthn / Passkeys
Phishing-resistant, biometric-bound device credentials. The credibility signal that says "modern auth."
TOTP (authenticator apps)
Free, robust, app-based MFA. Our default second factor when passkeys aren't viable.
SSO via OIDC / OAuth 2.0
Federated identity with Google, Microsoft, and similar — when the customer wants their team to use existing credentials.
Cyber Essentials posture
UK government-endorsed baseline. Required for many public-sector procurement processes; sensible posture for any SME handling customer data.
Outbound-only secure connectivity
A hard pattern to get right. Foundation of the DSX product — no firewall holes, no NAT pain, no static IPs on customer networks.
Microsoft 365 security stack
Defender for Endpoint (endpoint protection + EDR), Purview DLP (data loss prevention + classification), Intune (device management + Conditional Access). SME-grade configurations done to enterprise patterns.
Specialist Capabilities
The disciplines and products that distinguish us.
Legacy system modernisation
Real Acçodus™ migrations behind us. We know how to preserve operational quirks while moving the stack — not the other way round.
On-premise to cloud bridging
Founded the DSX product. We've productised the pattern of cloud apps reaching on-prem hardware securely.
Fractional IT leadership (CTO → Desktop)
From the board to the helpdesk — strategic technology leadership, hands-on user support, and everything in between. For businesses that have outgrown ad-hoc IT but can't justify a full-time hire across the seniority range.
Vendor due diligence & technology selection
Outside-view assessments before committing to a platform, supplier, or stack. We separate fit from fashion.
Data recovery referral (via Fields Data Recovery)
Specialist recovery routed through our UK partner — cleanroom-equipped, no-recovery-no-fee, ISO certified.
AI readiness assessments
One-day deep-dive into where AI fits in your business, with a written report. £500 fixed. More →
Need something not listed?
Our team brings in specialist capability where we don't lead with it. Tell us what you're trying to do — we'll be upfront about whether it's a fit.
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