37. You have no idea what that number is, do you? A number without context nor a label is a random value. It doesn’t tell us anything. Imagine walking by a billboard, […]
Stop waving the wand of magic numbers
How does a mutex work? What does it cost?
Concurrent programming requires synchronization. We can’t have more than one thread accessing data at the same time; otherwise, we end up with a data race. The most common solution is to wrap […]
How to fail a programming interview
“I’ve conducted many interviews. There are many reasons why I reject people, but there are recurring themes. I want to give a list of the most common problems. A few of these […]
Of course HTML is a programming language
Is HTML a programming language? I could express a bit of shock, even dismay, at the question, but instead, I’ll try a more polished approach. In some sense, it may be a […]
The User
Thinking that programming is about programmers is the worst mistake you can make. The single most important aspect of programming is the user. Keep this in mind through all the discussions we […]
Would you program a human?
With tales of Crispr babies in the news, I’ve been pondering the implications of programming human beings. This may or may not have been spurred by a crime novel I recently read, […]
We don’t need a ternary operator
A staple of compact code, the ternary operator ?: feels like it’s earned a place any programming language. I use it often; you should use it often. However, I don’t like the […]
ELI5: The filter, map, zip, and reduce operations
You’ve baked a fresh batch of gingerbread cookies. A bunch of little men, snowmen, stars, and bells are cooling on some trays. You clean up the table and lay out the colours […]
Sadly, I must say goodbye to Leaf (my programming language)
This is hard to write, or rather, it’s a hard decision to make. After investing many years on Leaf — a programming language, a major life project — I need to take […]
Creating a local screen overlay for streaming (OBS, Linux)
My new computer has a larger screen than the last one. It’s great, except it no longer matches the typical 1920×1080 streaming dimensions. I can’t adjust those dimensions without suffering scaling issues […]
ELI5: Algorithmic time complexity
Our favourite hobbies, like baking cookies or painting pictures, take time. Let’s ask a question though, does it take longer to bake one cookie or paint one picture? It’s hard to answer. […]
I don’t know how to create a website
The web has been part of my career since the beginning. I’ve created several sites, including apps and games, hell, I’ve even created web development tools, yet I have to admit I […]
Keeping tabs on shady internet authorities — What is Certificate Transparency?
Did you know somebody else could steal your domain name? Even if you’ve properly secured your site and gotten the right security certificates, it’s still possible some people get to the wrong […]
How I use `variant` in the Leaf compiler
Variants are data types that can store different types of values in them, as opposed to one fixed type. In contrast to a generic object or an untyped variable, there is a […]
