makandra cards: knowledge database made in Augsburg

In the dynamic tech world, fast and accurate information is crucial for success. With our web-based application makandra cards, we have developed a platform that provides solution ideas, best practices and tips in the field of web development, especially with Ruby on Rails. makandra cards works similar to a notepad, i.e. a note system for collecting, organizing and networking information and ideas. Originally developed as an internal knowledge database for our own team to avoid the siloing of knowledge, makandra cards has quickly become an important resource in the global tech community. The knowledge platform has been used by many developers worldwide for years.

Most employees at makandra started with one of our two trainee programs to get to know our technology stack and our way of working. We developed makandra cards to document our expertise and to provide new employees with a broad collection of tried-and-tested knowledge. In addition to our general cards, we still manage our curriculum for the trainee program in the area of full-stack web development and the curriculum for the trainee program in the area of DevOps engineering there. In general, makandra cards serves as a practical support and knowledge base for anyone who wants to expand their technical skills or who encounters a problem and wants to benefit from solutions of experienced Rails developers and DevOps experts. Based in Augsburg, the knowledge platform has become an integral part of the tech & Ruby on Rails community. It stands for what has always driven makandra: to solve problems, the passion to share knowledge and continuously improve.

Since its launch in 2009, makandra cards has continued to evolve. Today, there are over 4,500 public cards created by makandra developers. Topics such as web development with an increased focus on Ruby on Rails and DevOps are particularly well represented - precisely the areas in which we at makandra have extensive expertise.

As a long-standing player in the Ruby on Rails community and an official member of the Rails Foundation, we are actively committed to strengthening the ecosystem around this technology. With makandra cards, we make a targeted contribution to expanding and sharing knowledge about Ruby on Rails. 

Instead of solving problems over and over again, employees can document their knowledge in form of “cards”, which are then accessible to everyone. These cards act as a collective memory and can contain text, code, links and attachments. At the beginning of each week, newly created cards are discussed, refined and elaborated together. We also go through our “repeating cards” in regular intervals to remind ourselves of collectively gathered information, solutions and approaches. This leads to greater efficiency and reduces potential sources of error. 

By the way,you can search for our elaborated, precisely refined repeating cards with the help of “repeats:yes”. The search function makes it very easy to find information within the platform in general. For example, quotation marks can be used to search for a specific phrase (f.e.“git rebase production") or words can be excluded from the search with a minus sign (-word or - “a phrase”). While some users search specifically for our cards to find needed information, most often users discover our content through search engines like Google when looking for solutions to their problems. This combination of targeted and intuitive use makes makandra cards an extremely flexible knowledge base.

The cards are organized in so-called “decks”. We gain most of our experience in our daily work, and since web development is our biggest team and we write all our applications in Ruby on Rails, makandra dev is accordingly the deck with the most cards. makandra operations is the deck of our DevOps department. It contains a lot of information about how software and system infrastructures are set up, operated and monitored. We are experts in Linux and AWS environments, as well as self-hosted server infrastructures.