New Frontiers: The Intersection of Humans and AI in Health

Measuring impact at Noom: How many engineers does it take to lose a pound of fat?

Changbal Member Invitation to visit Noom in NYC

Writing iOS Unit Tests

As a followup on my previous post about setting up development environment for unit tests on iOS, in this post, I want to briefly explore the mechanics of actually writing tests for iOS in Objective-C (not Swift).

Getting Started with iOS Unit Testing

One of the most frustrating things about mobile app development is finding a nasty problem in a just-released version and being forced to pull it off the market. It is this frustration that drove me to explore automated testing at Noom, and specifically unit testing for the Android and iOS platforms.

Decoding My Chronic Disease

Noom Product Designer, Logan Merriam, recently published a post for Prescribe Design's "D-Patient Series." Read his post on using UX to decode the symptoms of his chronic disease.

How to ace Noom’s engineering intern interview

Sweaty palms, awkward small talk, the prospect of being judged by a total stranger… Interviews can be tough, especially if you don't know what to expect.

The effect of UX on scalability

The leading in-person and telephonic coaching platforms allow health coaches to provide up to 50 participants with a high-touch, quality experience; or they can deliver simple, standardized interventions to as many as 175. There is significant evidence that coaching improves protocol adherence, but in the existing ecosystem, you can have high-touch coaching or scale, but not both.

What makes Noom’s coaches the best in the industry?

From social workers to personal trainers to nutritionists, in the world of healthcare, there are many different types of "coaches." While there are a myriad of professionals who consider themselves coaches of various sorts, it takes a special blend of talents to guide and motivate users through a lifestyle change as dramatic as those involved in chronic diseases like hypertension, diabetes, and obesity.

Cooking is Like Programming

Programming is my job, but cooking is my hobby. In my mind, cooking is very much like programming - just like a program obeys the laws of the hardware and OS environment it's running in, cooking obeys the laws the physics.

How I meet women who work in tech

At Noom, 20 percent of the developers are women -- 28 percent if you include current interns. As this spreadsheet (created by Tracy Chou from Pinterest) reveals, these numbers are somewhat unusual. I was the 6th employee at Noom over five years ago and the first female engineer. Having joined Noom early on, I've never experienced or witnessed any controversial or discriminatory events. I've always been treated as an equal and never had to justify my position. We have hired more female developers since then and recently our first VP of Engineering, Max Whitney.

Finding the Feature: One Swipe

Food logging has it all: interesting engineering problems involving database design and search, paradoxes about how to guide and motivate a user, and tricky UI design to boot. But what to focus on?

Adding a Little Joy to the App

At Noom, every day we’re working hard to make our product better, by adding new features to it, fixing bugs, improving performances, or even by providing better support to our users. No matter which team or department you’re on, improvement is always the biggest goal.

Android Local Unit Testing (Part 2)

In Part I, I discussed setting up the testing environment. In this post I will discuss how to actually write unit tests. As described in part I, we are specifically focused on local units tests and not on-device testing.

Android Local Unit Testing (Part 1)

One of the most frustrating things about mobile app development is finding a nasty problem in a just-released version and being forced to pull it off the market. It is this frustration that drove me to explore automated testing, and specifically unit testing for the Android platform.

Four House Rules for Hackathons

The word "Hackathon" might bring to mind developers huddled around laptops, eating Cheetos and staying up all night. You might imagine folks on other teams peering over cubicle walls, wishing they could get in on the fun. Well, at Noom, they're different.

Noom’s Workspace: Comfort is King

Tech startups understand that providing a comfortable and engaging environment for their teams goes a long way. A positive environment ensures that the team will be productive when it comes to building, marketing, and supporting great products.

How to Plan a Noom Offsite

Planning an offsite sounds simple. Find a house, get games, get alcohol. Well, not at Noom.

Teams Who Break Bread Together, Stay Together

Since I began working at Noom, I learned two things about Noomers: we are a social bunch, and we all love food. That is why lunchtime is easily the best part of our work day.

Bluetooth Data Exchange Between Android Phones Without Pairing

What if two Noomers in the same restaurant, concert, or bar could discover one another and connect over a shared interest, favorite food, or activity? What if even without an internet connection, they could chat and support one another relatively anonymously without sacrificing the security of their device.