November 29, 2022

I run a few re-usable APIs for the various side projects I tinker on; in this post, I wanted to share a little about them. Working on side projects is one of my favorite things to do in the pretty limited spare time I have (between family, work, friends, church, etc.). Working with software is unique in that it allows an individual to build systems, products, and prototypes that would normally be impossible for an individual.

November 15, 2021

It’s been far too long since I’ve blogged. In this post, I want to reflect on some things I’ve learned as a senior engineer and try to synthesize them into a personal engineering philosophy. table of contents impact over productivity “It depends” Cleverness kills “Business knows best” Ignore best practices (sometimes) Code is the easy part “No Mysteries” Abstract & optimize later You Aren’t Going To Need It (Probably) impact over productivity If you have to optimize for something as an engineer, it should be impact.

June 28, 2020

I wanted to write a little post to announce a side project/fledgling app to the world: isBusy. With all that’s been going on in the world these last few months, a lot has changed. Very little of our lives seems to have been left untouched by the Covid-19 pandemic. One area that has been changed dramatically for many people is their work life and situation. Tragically, many people have lost their jobs or face the challenge of a radically different work environment, remote or otherwise.

June 19, 2020

There are stages to every engineer’s relationship with a database. They might go like this: shock: “what is this new thing? This is bad! I’m not used to this!” euphoria: “I CAN DO ALL THE THINGS” self-doubt: “but I thought I could do all the things?” the hero emerges: “I just need to tune this and that and use the right tool for the right use-case” Working with MongoDB isn’t an exception.

June 18, 2020

I originally wrote this post to appear on the FloQast Engineering Blog. I know how frustrating slow apps are. I also really care about my users’ time. One of the best ways to respect peoples’ time when using your applications is by ensuring your database is humming smoothly. I’ve learned how to work with MongoDB over the years in order to make sure my users’ time isn’t wasted and wanted to share some of those lessons here.

January 12, 2019

tl;dr: ads are everywhere and aren’t so fun everyone is trying to track you (for better or worse) Pi Hole is awesome; it’s a network-level adblocker and runs on a Raspberry Pi streisand gives you a quick way to set up a censorship-resistant and secure server running a number of VPNs/proxies (OpenVPN, Shadowsocks, Wireguard, and more!) you can combine them to get a secure & resilient connection with network-level ad-blocking everywhere you go (iOS/android, linux, mac OS, windows, etc.

December 5, 2018

Hello again! It’s been a while since I’ve written on this blog and I am resolving (pre New Year’s!) to write more. I’m starting easier by writing about a backup setup that I put in place while I’ve been on paternity leave. A few highlights of my current setup: encrypted at rest + nice threat model incremental snapshots deduplication of data fast! written in Golang (++ style points) support for tons of backends ⛅️ multi-cloud ⛅️ Backups 🤷 Let’s just get it out of the way: if you’re not backing your files etc.

July 4, 2018

tl;dr: I’ve written a book about React, React in Action for Manning Publications! I’m thankful to have been able to work on it and fulfill a life-goal of mine. If you’re reading this post, you probably either made your way here from somewhere on the internet or you’re reading React in Action and were directed here from the book. One of my goals for the book is to give the reader a sense of React that isn’t bogged down in jargon and is instead rooted in solid concepts and practical examples.

August 14, 2017

It’s been a while since I’ve revisited the design of my site (pssstt. you’re here!). I was pretty happy with the second version of it, but felt like it needed a change. It’s overall design is still utilizing the Tufte-CSS project, which based on the work of Edward Tufte (a renowned statistician noted for his expertise and work around the presentation of data). I have a copy of The Visual Display of Quantitative Information and really enjoy the technical precision of his work as well as the overall aesthetic.

November 3, 2016

You might have seen my post from the other week about my upcoming book on React. Today, React in Action is part of Manning’s Deal of the Day. You can get 50% off your order here (make sure to use code dotd110316au!). What’s in the book? React in Action is broken into several major parts. In the first section, you’ll meet React. We’ll dive into some of the fundamental ideas in React and work with components.