Blogs

Let’s go for my web review for the week 2024-34.


Unbundling Profile: MIT Libraries - SPARC

Tags: research, copyright, open-access

It’s good to see major institutions like this get out of contracts with scientific publishing companies. Those unfortunately became mostly parasitic. Open access should be the norm for research.

https://sparcopen.org/our-work/big-deal-knowledge-base/unbundling-profiles/mit-libraries/


Make Firefox Private Again

Tags: tech, mozilla, privacy

Since they unfortunately turned on private attribution by default (why? Mozilla, why?). Here is an easy automated way to turn it off.

https://make-firefox-private-again.com/


Being on The Semantic Web is easy, and, frankly, well worth the bother

Tags: tech, web, semantic

With all those bots and scripts crawling the Web, some of the semantic web vision got silently implemented.

https://csvbase.com/blog/13


Markov chains are funnier than LLMs

Tags: tech, ai, machine-learning, gpt, markov-chains, funny

Interesting musing. The predictability in tone doesn’t make for very funny content indeed. Also as a side-effect this might help people remember that Markov chain are a thing and much less expensive.

https://emnudge.dev/blog/markov-chains-are-funny/


ugh. I picked up a shitty NUC from ewaste…

Tags: tech, security

Scary thread… developers should know better than do this and ship it on devices around the world. Their data is now anyone for the taking and users’ privacy can’t be ensured.

https://digipres.club/@foone/112990331505043510


NetAlert X

Tags: tech, networking, security, tools

Looks like a nice tool to monitor your network.

https://netalertx.com/


Free, OpenSource IPv6 Textbook

Tags: tech, book, ip, networking

Looks like an interesting resource to learn about IPv6.

https://ipv6textbook.com/


Andries Brouwer on the OOM killer

Tags: tech, linux, kernel, memory

Funny musing about the OOM killer. With nice pointers if you want to dive further into the topic.

https://quuxplusone.github.io/blog/2024/08/22/overcommit/


The Closed-Loop Benchmark Trap

Tags: tech, benchmarking

Be sure to pick the right behavior model when you make a benchmark. Otherwise you might just measure the wrong thing.

https://buttondown.com/jaffray/archive/the-closed-loop-benchmark-trap/


What is std::ref?

Tags: tech, c++

A little refresher about std::ref and std::cref. They come in handy sometimes, but also if you don’t realize you need them you’ll generate more copies than necessary.

https://www.sandordargo.com/blog/2024/08/21/std-ref


SIMD Matters :: Box2D

Tags: tech, cpu, simd, performance, physics, simulation

SIMD is hard to use, not all problems can apply to it. But when they can, the performance gain can be great.

https://box2d.org/posts/2024/08/simd-matters/


uv: Unified Python packaging

Tags: tech, python, tools

Looks like there’s another contender for package management for Python. This is sooo fragmented now… this one is compelling though.

https://astral.sh/blog/uv-unified-python-packaging


Common Causes of Memory Leaks in JavaScript

Tags: tech, javascript, memory, leak

There are many ways to create a memory leak in Javascript. Here is a good list of the things to pay attention to.

https://www.trevorlasn.com/blog/common-causes-of-memory-leaks-in-javascript


Toasts are Bad UX – Max Schmitt

Tags: tech, web, frontend, ux

It’s better than no feedback. It’s a bit lazy and far from perfect though.

https://maxschmitt.me/posts/toasts-bad-ux


Reckoning

Tags: tech, web, frontend, ux, criticism

Interesting series about the rise of the javascript frontend framework, the bad practices which came with them and the very real impacts on the users. There are indeed better ways.

https://infrequently.org/series/reckoning/


Don’t Repeat Yourself and the Strong Law of Small Numbers - iRi

Tags: tech, design, programming

This is a good point. The DRY principle has value but the trick is finding the right time to apply it.

https://jerf.org/iri/post/2024/dry_strong/


Code review antipatterns

Tags: tech, codereview

Starts like a satire, but there’s a serious conclusion in the end. Indeed, mind the power dynamics in code reviews. Be nice, steer away from those antipatterns, especially since you might be on the receiving end the next time.

https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/quasiblog/code-review-antipatterns/


Interview with Ron Jeffries

Tags: tech, agile, history, criticism

Very nice interview. This is an interesting reflection on the past 20+ years of Agile Software Development.

https://ronjeffries.com/articles/-x024/-v04/8/


Decision Logs

Tags: tech, product-management

Nice way to keep in check how and why behavior changes as the requests from various stakeholders come in.

https://buttondown.com/j2kun/archive/decision-logs/


Bug squash: An underrated interview question

Tags: tech, hr, interviews, debugging

This is indeed a nice way to approach technical interviews. Unfortunately it requires quite some effort to setup and maintain. You also have to find the right bugs to put in the interview and this is a rarity.

https://blog.jez.io/bugsquash/



Bye for now!