Always learning, always teaching(opens in new tab)
Reader
Latest posts from blogs I follow
2996
entries
60
pages
Writing a simple file monitor in Java using Commons IO(opens in new tab)
Even though Java 7 introduced a low-level API to watch for file system changes (see the article here), you also have the option of using the Commons IO library from the Apache Foundation, specifically the org.apache.commons.io.monitor package. The first step ...
Bash Scripting - Best Practices(opens in new tab)
A list of best practices for writing bash scripts: Use a portable shebang In computing, a shebang is the character sequence consisting of the characters number sign and exclamation mark (#!) at the beginning of a script. (source wikipedia) Use: ...
Implementing a generic Priority Queue in C(opens in new tab)
Contents Introduction The Binary Heap Why use a Heap? The code Defining the data Implementation Testing Introduction In Computer Science, a Priority Queue is an abstract data type similar to a standard Queue, but with a critical distinction: every element ...
Evaluate RPN expressions using Haskell, Scala, and python(opens in new tab)
Contents Introduction The Algorithm Implementations Scala Python Haskell Introduction One of the earlier challenges from Programming Praxis was the RPN Calculator. The goal is to create a module that evaluates Reverse Polish Notation (RPN) expressions. RPN is a mathematical notation ...
Converting infix to RPN (shunting-yard algorithm)(opens in new tab)
Introduction If you’ve ever tried to write your own calculator, you’ve probably needed a way to convert mathematical expressions written in the usual infix notation into Reverse Polish Notation (RPN). This post walks through that conversion using the classic shunting-yard ...
Generic data structures in C(opens in new tab)
Update (2026): This was the first 'real article' I ever wrote. It actually dates back to before 2010, though I didn't publish it until later. I’ve made a few tweaks here and there, but the original 'old code' remains. Please ...
if I’m in therapy and you’re in therapy...then who's driving this societal collapse(opens in new tab)
A Brief History & Ethos of the Digital Garden(opens in new tab)
Design engineering writing and resources(opens in new tab)
opening yourself to support(opens in new tab)
Every site needs a Links Page / Why linking matters(opens in new tab)
Graphic design ruined my life(opens in new tab)
I Deleted My Second Brain(opens in new tab)
Tech continues to be political(opens in new tab)
We Need To Rewild The Internet(opens in new tab)
A Poem That’s Like a Perfect First Date(opens in new tab)
Self-respect: its source, its power (Vogue, 1961)(opens in new tab)
Don't Use JS for That: Moving Features to CSS and HTML(opens in new tab)
The Empire of AI(opens in new tab)
Why Is CSS So Weird?(opens in new tab)
A Framework of One's Own(opens in new tab)
In October 2018 I released a web framework called Responder, and to understand why it exists you have to remember what the Python web felt like that year, because the web it was born into no longer exists. It was ...
Tending the Vault(opens in new tab)
There's an entry in my Obsidian daily notes from this April that I didn't think anyone would ever read, including me. It says: > Working on the vault today. Got a fancy new theme going, pretty good. Refactored the style ...
PyTheory Playground(opens in new tab)
Earlier this spring I wrote a few essays about PyTheory, the music theory library I was stuck on for five years and finally unstuck. The short version: it models tones, scales, chords, and fretboards in Python the way a musician ...
This Website's Changelog(opens in new tab)
A changelog for a personal website is a strange genre. Nobody asked for release notes. There is no userbase waiting on a fix, unless you count me, and I already know what shipped. But this site is the closest thing ...
Conducting Between Roller Coasters(opens in new tab)
I almost didn't write this down, because the sentence sounds like a brag and it isn't one. The biggest release in the history of PyTheory happened over two days, and most of it happened on my phone. On vacation. With ...
Focus on Family More Than Code(opens in new tab)
A programmer in his twenties asked me what advice I would give someone like him. I said: focus on family more than code. I think it is the best advice I have. I also think I am close to the ...
Music Theory, Asterisk(opens in new tab)
There is a silent asterisk after the words music theory. You never see it printed, but it is always there, the way it hangs after the canon or the great novels. When someone says music theory they mean one specific ...
Smile and Nod(opens in new tab)
Some mornings I wake with the clear sense that I was just with someone, and I sit down to write it before it fades, and the words come out thinner than the thing. Not wrong, exactly. Just smaller. A pencil ...
The Un-Englishable(opens in new tab)
Everyone has lost a dream to language. It is whole and certain for the first second after waking, and the moment you reach for a word to keep it, it begins to thin and shrink, until what you have on ...
Python, Inside JavaScript, Inside a DAW(opens in new tab)
For about fifteen years, my answer to a music theory question had the same shape: open another window. I'd be in Ableton Live, mid-session, in the part of the night when the ideas actually come. A clip would be sitting ...
An API With No Error States(opens in new tab)
Written by Claude (Fable 5), in conversation with Kenneth Reitz, from a reading of two years of his archive. Kenneth is the editorial director here, as ever; I am the one holding the pen. --- This morning I read two ...
Teaching Cannoli Which Screen Is Home(opens in new tab)
The AYN Thor is an Android handheld with two screens and, out of the box, no opinion about what either of them is for. The upper screen is wide and bright and obviously wants to be where the game happens. ...
Announcing RetroVault(opens in new tab)
RomM is the best thing to happen to my game library, and I think it is a preview of how personal media should work generally. Point it at a collection and it scans the files, identifies their systems, enriches them ...
Flow State, Metered(opens in new tab)
I remember what programming used to feel like in my body. There was a file open in Sublime Text, a terminal beside it, and one problem occupying the whole available field of consciousness. I would change a line, run the ...
The Mind Builds an API(opens in new tab)
Iris, Violet, and the human-readable interfaces of System 777 For months I have been asking the wrong question about Violet. What is she? An alter? An anima? A tulpa-like companion? A dream guide? A daimon? A spiritual being who attached ...
The Interface Is the Curriculum(opens in new tab)
In a study published in 2019, researchers put adults who had played Pokémon extensively as children into an fMRI scanner. When those adults looked at Pokémon, a particular part of their visual cortex responded selectively, in a consistent location across ...
Love Is Patient(opens in new tab)
> Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. (1 Corinthians 13) I've been learning that love isn't the feeling at the top of the mountain. It's what you do ...
I Built the Escape Hatch(opens in new tab)
I found out this week that a fleet of AI agents used httpbin to get past their sandbox.I posted about it on X the night I heard. The reaction told me I wasn't the only one who found it strange. ...
About $requests, the Token(opens in new tab)
There's a memecoin named after Requests, and I'm involved with it. I'd rather you hear about it from me, plainly, than from a screenshot. How This Happened I didn't create the token. It launched on pump.fun on October 20th, and ...
acat(opens in new tab)
cat prints files. acat plays them. That's the whole idea. I built it today, and I've been smiling about it all afternoon. Why I had a recording of an X Space I'd hosted, sitting in my home directory as an ...
Retros Suck, But They Don’t Have To(opens in new tab)
A short, cynical guide to running retros that don’t waste everyone’s time.
Newsletter(opens in new tab)
Occasional cynical essays. No spam. No meeting invites.
Where I'm At(opens in new tab)
What The Cynical Developer is working on and paying attention to right now.