The latest blog posts to take off on Hacker News. 259 posts.
I’ve taken agency in the treatment of my bone cancer (osteosarcoma in the T5 vertebrae of the upper spine). After I ran out of standard-of-care treatment options and there were no trials available for…
There are a lot of challenges in the way QA and engineering work together. Many eng leaders think you shouldn't have QA. I dig in.
I started a reading group in 2021, a few months after joining Microsoft as a new grad on the Azure Databases team. The group was initially focused on database internals, which was my favorite subject at UW. Databases touch so many areas of CS: compiler construction in the query engine, memory management with the…
On automation, identity, and why warmth and presence — not technical skill — are the parts of a person that can never be replaced by a model.
I called a large company the other day. Did I know the information I wanted could be found on their website? And was I aware that I could manage my account online? And would I like to receive a link to chat with their AI assistant via WhatsApp? Naturally, call volumes were higher than expected. I can only assume that…
On friction, patience, and planting trees.
Hello Windows Insiders, I want to speak to you directly, as an engineer who has spent his career building technology that people depend on every day. Windows touches more people's lives than almost any technology on Earth. Every day, we hear from th
GambleAI I’ve been coding a lot with AI since November, when we all noticed it got really good. And it is quite good for instantly generating something th...
AI coding tools are optimising the wrong thing and nobody wants to hear it. Writing code was already fast. The bottleneck is everything else: unclear requirements, review queues, terrified deploy…
We’ve all heard of those network effect laws: the value of a network goes up with the square of the number of members. Or the cost of commun...
[2026-03-16 Mon 03:09] Since this might be prone to misinterpretation as an excuse to treat people rudely, a clarification is warranted. Being direct is not rude, and this style of communication assumes an established …
An opinionated perspective on how to do important research that makes a difference (and sometimes win awards).
Looking foolish is underrated.
In 2021, being a good software engineer felt great. The world was full of software, with more companies arriving every year who needed to employ engineers to…
Employees who are impressed by vague corporate-speak like “synergistic leadership,” or “growth-hacking paradigms” may struggle with practical decision-making, a new Cornell study into “corporate BS” reveals.
The models are good now. But most people still miss the point.
This week has been… eventful. And when I say eventful, I can say this has been the funniest pentest I have ever been on in my life. Let me tell you about it!
We reward complexity and ignore simplicity. In interviews, design reviews, and promotions. Here’s how to fix it.
I shared this internally at Meta in response to a deluge of clout-chasing posts celebrating PMs landing prod diffs. The response was positive and the message generalizes, so here we are on the open www. PMs shouldn’t waste time landing … Continue reading →
Working on an international tech team comes with communication challenges that go beyond just language. Here’s some practical advice I’ve gathered in my ten years of working in Japan.
Should you become an engineering manager?
Writing code is easier than ever. Being a software engineer is harder than ever. The paradox nobody talks about, and what engineers and leaders should do.
A systems analysis of how AI-assisted development creates a gap between output speed and understanding, and why organizations cannot see it happening.
In May of 2023, Google introduced “AI overviews” into their search engine.^1] This followed years of decisions leading to worse search quality and the consum...
Nominations are now open for this year’s appointments to the F-Droid Board of Directors! We are looking to select up to four volunteer directors to serve for...
