Interesting finds from this week #4

They say that January is the most depressing month, but I think February is worse. The leftover Christmas food is a distant memory and the weather is freezing cold and wet (at least in the UK). It is also flu season and a lot of my team have been off over the last few weeks.

It seems this week is my turn to feel rubbish. No flu luckily, but my body is definitely telling me I need to rest so it is just a short issue this week.

I mentioned last week that I want to start making free courses and asked everyone what course I should make first.

Thank you for everyone who voted, the results are in:

It seems Design Patterns took the top spot, followed by Software Architecture and Web Development.

If you want to get notified when the first video is out then I have a signup form on my courses page you can use.

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❤️ Picks of the Week #

🛠️ Tool — Hotline for modern Apple systems — I got my first Apple computer long after Hotline was removed. This looks like an interesting way to host a small community.

📝 Article — Do-nothing scripting: the key to gradual automation (2019) — This is a great idea to slowly build out automation for things. It is leaves less room for error compared to just writing a README.md file.

📝 Article — Obscure islands I find interesting — I hadn't heard of most of these. It always amazes me that people can live in these really remote locations.

📝 Article — We are destroying software — I agree with some of these. Working out how to build something yourself rather than pull in a dependency that you have to maintain is an important skill. I miss coding without all the bloat.

🎨 Art — Jacksonpollock.org (2003) — This is genius!!

📝 Article — Don't use NOT IN in PostgreSQL — I didn't know about the issues with using null in a NOT IN list. Something to keep in mind.

📝 Article — Is NixOS truly reproducible? — I like the idea of NixOS especially for servers. I have jumped ship yet, but I am sure the next time I need to build a home server I will give it a try.

📝 Article — tech i'd like to see more of — Tech should be used to improve our lives. Hopefully AI will help with this rather than make things worse. Time will tell.

📝 Article — Building a personal, private AI computer on a budget — I think the future of AI is going to be in personally run AI models. This is pretty powerful for €1695.15 and the energy usage is pretty decent too. I am hoping models will become efficient enough so that we can have ChatGPT like performance with sitting on a self-contained sub £500 system.

📝 Article — Musk-led group makes $97B bid for control of OpenAI — I would prefer for OpenAI to stay a non-profit entity, but I am not sure Musk having control of it is a good idea either!

📝 Article — Jeep Introduces Pop-Up Ads That Appear Every Time You Stop — Maybe it is time we had an open source car!

🛠️ Tool — A0.dev: React Native App Generator — This is really cool. I have been meaning to create a simple app to help with my guitar practice. With one prompt it created something usable which is pretty cool.

📝 Article — The subtle art of designing physical controls for cars — I just thought these smart knobs look really good.

📝 Article — Smuggling arbitrary data through an emoji — This i󠅉󠅟󠅥󠄐󠅖󠅟󠅥󠅞󠅔󠄐󠅤󠅘󠅙󠅣󠄐󠅟󠅞󠅕󠄐󠅑󠅣󠄐󠅧󠅕󠅜󠅜󠄞󠄐󠅄󠅘󠅕󠅢󠅕󠄐󠅙󠅣󠄐󠅝󠅕󠄐󠅤󠅘󠅙󠅞󠅛󠅙󠅞󠅗󠄐󠅤󠅘󠅑󠅤󠄐󠅠󠅕󠅟󠅠󠅜󠅕󠄐󠅧󠅟󠅥󠅜󠅔󠄐󠅟󠅞󠅜󠅩󠄐󠅗󠅕󠅤󠄐󠅤󠅘󠅕󠄐󠅟󠅞󠅕󠄐󠅘󠅙󠅔󠅔󠅕󠅞󠄐󠅙󠅞󠄐󠅤󠅘󠅕󠄐󠅕󠅝󠅟󠅚󠅙󠄑s really cool that it works with normal text as well 🤔󠄹󠄐󠅧󠅟󠅞󠅔󠅕󠅢󠅕󠅔󠄐󠅙󠅖󠄐󠅑󠅞󠅩󠅟󠅞󠅕󠄐󠅧󠅟󠅥󠅜󠅔󠄐󠅤󠅢󠅩󠄐󠅑󠅞󠅔󠄐󠅔󠅕󠅓󠅟󠅔󠅕󠄐󠅝󠅩󠄐󠅝󠅕󠅣󠅣󠅑󠅗󠅕󠄑󠄐󠄹󠅖󠄐󠅩󠅟󠅥󠄐󠅔󠅙󠅔󠄐󠅩󠅟󠅥󠄐󠅑󠅢󠅕󠄐󠅝󠅩󠄐󠅛󠅙󠅞󠅔󠄐󠅟󠅖󠄐󠅠󠅕󠅟󠅠󠅜󠅕󠄞󠄐󠅄󠅘󠅑󠅞󠅛󠅣󠄐󠅖󠅟󠅢󠄐󠅢󠅕󠅑󠅔󠅙󠅞󠅗󠄐󠅝󠅩󠄐󠅞󠅕󠅧󠅣󠅜󠅕󠅤󠅤󠅕󠅢󠄞󠄐󠄹󠄐󠅘󠅟󠅠󠅕󠄐󠅩󠅟󠅥󠄐󠅕󠅞󠅚󠅟󠅩󠄐󠅤󠅘󠅕󠄐󠅢󠅕󠅣󠅤󠄐󠅟󠅖󠄐󠅩󠅟󠅥󠅢󠄐󠅔󠅑󠅩󠄞

📝 Article — Leaking the email of any YouTube user — I love reading how people find these exploits.

🛠️ Tool — PgAssistant: OSS tool to help devs understand and optimize PG performance — I am going to have to give this a try with my own Postgres database.

🎬 Videos — Most-Watched Software Engineering Talks of 2024 — There are a lot of interesting talks on this list. This is going to keep me busy for a while!

📝 Article — Why young parents should focus on building trust with their kids — The one value that I live my life by is honesty. I am honest to a fault sometimes, but I think it is incredibly important in all relationships.

👾 Learning Game — SQL Noir: Learn SQL by solving crimes — This is a really cool way to learn SQL or just a fun game if you already know it.

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💬 Quote of the Week #

Many people dislike some parts of their jobs. But they stay in their jobs because their suffering is familiar. To change would be to trade the known for the unknown and change brings discomfort in hard to predict forms. So people avoid change and develop coping strategies. They learn to sidestep the manipulative manager, or like me, change jobs every couple of years, plan vacations, stay busy, and get drunk during the weekend. Play this game long enough without becoming too burned out, and you might end up getting promoted.

From The Pathless Path by Paul Millerd.