The software words founders keep hearing, made plain.
When you do not have a tech team, half the risk is in the vocabulary. People use terms like technical debt, scope creep, and vendor lock-in to take advantage of your lack of knowledge, or just assume you already know. These are short, honest definitions for non-technical founders, each one written so you can make a better decision the moment you finish reading it.
01 / How to use this
Each term is one page: what it means, why it matters to you, and what to do about it.
No condescension and no padding. If a term comes up in a quote or a contract, look it up here before you sign. When you want to see how these ideas shape real work, read our services or the guide to building without a tech team.
- Vibe coding, building from AI prompts without judging the result, and where it falls short.
- Secure by design, building security in from the start instead of bolting it on later.
- Acceptance criteria, the written test for whether the work is actually done.
- Scope creep, how a project quietly grows past its budget and deadline.
- Technical debt, the cost of shortcuts you pay back later, with interest.
- Total cost of ownership, what software really costs over its whole life, not just to build.
- MVP (minimum viable product), the smallest version that proves the idea works.
- Vendor lock-in, being trapped with a supplier you cannot leave without recoding everything.
- Fractional CTO, a part-time technical leader, and what they do and do not do.
Heard a term in a quote you want decoded? A short audit puts it all in plain language. Start a conversation.
Last updated June 2026 · Talk with Felipe
Your build
Taking on new builds
Have something in mind?
Tell us what you're making. We reply within a day with a fixed price and a date.