The latest blog posts to take off on Hacker News. 6,086 posts.
Why are popularizing educational newsletter-frequency writers of important fields like Matt Levine for finance so rare? Because most fields are too slow or ambiguous, and writers of the right combination of expertise, obsession, and persistence are also rare.
The term “psychological safety” is often misleading. When managers hear safety, many dismiss it as a soft style that implies complacency. Meanwhile, psychology implies too much mumbo jumbo. High-profile figures like Elon Musk advocating for a “hardcore” style perpetuate this misconception. But this is a fundamental…
I set out to find a simple definition that would help managers frame the fundamental things they expect from software engineers.
Learning is a consequence of doing
Leaning in without falling over.
I met a social worker whose job was to look after four orphaned children. She’d alternate with her coworkers spending 24 hours at a time living with the kids, effectively acting as their parent. The children, unsurprisingly, had a lot of trauma and so her job was certainly not an easy one, but she found it deeply…
Three weeks ago I wrote the following draft of a blog post entitled “Is It Better to Fail Spectacularly?”. I am having a lot of doubts. I’ve been training for the Chicago Marathon in earnest since June, but in reality the preparations began a year ago when I was accepted based on my qualifying time from the 2023…
Examining the Devaluation of Software Engineer Titles and Its Impact on Tech Industry Integrity
Curious about living in Japan? Learn from Christian, one of the first digital nomad visa holders, as he shares his experience and tips for obtaining the visa.
Successful software is buggy software.
Discover how Greptile, an AI-powered code review startup, implements the Fortress Method to balance event-driven and long-running engineering tasks, maximizing productivity in a small team.
I had a plumber over the other day. I was worried that my water service line might be leaking. There was a wet patch in the yard and I noticed that one of my sink’s water pressure seemed to be lowe…
We have decades of experience trying to automate processes. My biggest lesson is that automation is not about the easy and known flow, but about exception handling.
Warm Handoffs are a procedure I’ve implemented with several teams and organizations to improve communication and collaboration in Slack. As organizations grow and ownership shifts and splits as teams are formed and re-formed, Slack channels proliferate, and it gets harder for folks across an org to know the…
One year ago, I switched from charging project fees to day rates. It’s been transformative on lots of fronts. > Everything below comes with the following preface/caveat: > 1. There’s no univers…
My insight into corporate legal disputes is as meaningful as my opinion on Quantum Mechanics. What I do know is that, when given the chance this week to leave my job with half a year’s salary paid in advance, I chose to stay at Automattic.
I haven’t been blogging much lately, and it turns out there is a very good reason.My last technical blog post was October 1st of last year. After I hit publish on that one I went to get ready for b…
This post is not about research or developing software for robots. Instead it is some tips on how to go about building robots for mass deployment and how to leverage those deployed robots for improving your product.
Hi there. I’m Bill “LtRandolph” Clark, and I’m the engineering manager for the Champions team on LoL . I’ve worked on several different teams on League over the past years, but one focus has been consistent: I’m obsessed with tech debt. I…
When everyone builds in public, no one builds in public.
Organizations tend to drift towards danger and normalize deviations from procedure.
Two years ago I was elected to the board of directors for the Python Software Foundation—the PSF. I recently returned from the annual PSF board retreat (this one was in …
A discussion of why I don’t intend to turn Gwern.net into a book, and how trying to write a book can harm writers.
Wartime can be extremely demanding for Engineering Managers. But by ruthlessly focusing on delivery, building a resilient team, investing in individuals, and maintaining their own strength, an EM can lead their people to not just survive but thrive under pressure.
