Home

prq: A tool for recycling worktrees

Tue, 12 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

prq is a PR queue with warm worktrees and tmux notifications

Time to Close the Windows

Tue, 12 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

A vibe-coded script reminding me to close the windows as it gets warm is still useful after a year

Libby Web Downloader

Fri, 20 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Download audiobooks from Libby to listen offline

Stacked MRs with git branchless

Fri, 13 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Managing stacked Merge Requests with git branchless

Mark Generated Files with gitattributes

Tue, 14 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Mark files as generated for easier review in Github and Gitlab

AI Position Statement

Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT

My feelings about AI are complicated

Claude techniques I like

Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT

A couple of simple techniques for getting better results from Claude Code

Check that two types are the same in TypeScript

Wed, 06 Aug 2025 00:00:00 GMT

A TypeScript pattern for ensuring that two types are the same.

Commit Changeset

Tue, 24 Jun 2025 00:00:00 GMT

A git alias to use changeset descriptions as commit messages

Inferred Config for Nx Monorepos

Wed, 04 Jun 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Nx supports inferring tasks by looking at config files, but that's backwards. Better to infer the configs themselves.

Privacy-preserving Analytics with Counterscale

Sat, 08 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Using self-hosted Counterscale to track page views on my blog

Constraint Solving in Spreadsheets

Tue, 11 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Can we create a tool that allows users to specify constraints in a spreadsheet and then solve them?

The best Result type for TypeScript

Fri, 07 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Make Result types in TypeScript as ergonomic as Rust's ? operator

Sync and Swim App

Mon, 13 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT

An app to load music and audiobooks onto Shokz OpenSwim headphones

sync-and-swim

Mon, 13 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Scheduling Conference Talks with Linear Programming

Thu, 07 Nov 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Schedule talks for a multi-track conference with an eye to avoiding conflicts

Baby advice

Sun, 03 Nov 2024 00:00:00 GMT

What I wish I'd known before having a baby

Cross-platform dotfile Management with dotbot

Mon, 05 Aug 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Use dotbot to link your dotfiles to the right spots on macOS, Linux and Windows

Neovim smart-splits on macOS

Wed, 17 Jul 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Setting up neovim smart-splits with kitty on macOS

Fix line breaks in comments with VS Code Rewrap

Thu, 13 Jun 2024 00:00:00 GMT

VS Code Rewrap is a handy extension for wrapping long comments in your code.

Using Alpine.js with Astro View Transitions

Fri, 03 May 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Astro View Transitions can break Alpine.js components. Here's how to fix it.

JavaScript Package Development

Mon, 29 Apr 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Setting up a JavaScript package repo with multiple packages, TypeScript, testing, codegen, and automatic releases

Solving the New York Times Letter Boxed Puzzle with Regular Expressions

Sat, 20 Apr 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Can we solve the Letter Boxed puzzle with a regex?

vitest-unsettled

Sat, 20 Apr 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Custom matcher for checking if a Promise is settled (either resolved or rejected).

Behind the Scenes: How We Fixed Leftover Underlines in the Grammarly Text Editor Plugin

Wed, 03 Jan 2024 00:00:00 GMT

A look at the challenges faced by the Grammarly for Developers team when fixing a bug in the Grammarly Text Editor Plugin.

Recover a Lost Commit Message

Tue, 19 Dec 2023 00:00:00 GMT

How to recover a lost git commit message

Swimming with Audiobooks

Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 GMT

I've been swimming a lot recently. I find swimming to be pretty boring, so I've been listening to music with swim headphones to occupy my mind. A few weeks ago, my cheapo headphones were stolen from the side of the pool. To replace them, I bought some Shokz OpenSwim headphones. Wow, these are so much better.

Changesets vs Semantic Release

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 00:00:00 GMT

A comparison of two tools for managing version numbers and changelogs in a monorepo

Contentful migration strategy

Thu, 24 Mar 2022 00:00:00 GMT

Contentful's migration strategy is lacking. Here's how I've worked around it.

Raw SQL Array parameters in Rails

Wed, 23 Feb 2022 00:00:00 GMT

How to pass an array as a parameter to a raw SQL query in Rails

cpp-subprocess

Wed, 17 Nov 2021 00:00:00 GMT

A C++ library for safely invoking external commands and pipelines.

Alpine.js vs Stimulus

Fri, 05 Nov 2021 00:00:00 GMT

A comparison of Alpine.js and Stimulus.js for adding interactivity to server-rendered pages (Alpine.js wins IMO).

Avoiding CORS with a proxy

Fri, 01 Oct 2021 00:00:00 GMT

How to avoid CORS restrictions by setting up a proxy with AWS Cloudfront

Clipbox for S3

Sun, 29 Aug 2021 00:00:00 GMT

Clipbox is a little utility that I've been using in some form or another for years. It is a utility that provides a keyboard shortcut to select a region of the screen, upload the screenshot to a server, and put a link to the image on your clipboard.

Aurora Serverless DB Export

Thu, 08 Jul 2021 00:00:00 GMT

Save a snapshot of an Aurora Serverless database to an S3 bucket

DB Export for Datalake

Thu, 08 Jul 2021 00:00:00 GMT

Solving a difficult problem with Aurora Serverless

Readable Bash Scripts

Thu, 07 Jan 2021 00:00:00 GMT

A technique for breaking bash pipelines into smaller, more easily debuggable pieces.

Vue Browser Extensions with Parcel

Tue, 17 Nov 2020 00:00:00 GMT

Use parcel to build a browser extension with Vue

backsplash

Fri, 08 May 2020 00:00:00 GMT

Convert between lat-lng, web mercator tiles, and pixel coordinates.

I was Promised Pizza

Wed, 01 Jan 2020 00:00:00 GMT

A coworker had a question about combining the values from multiple javascript Promises. I've tried to cull the interesting Promise construction out of the original problem, and came up with an example about pizza.

Writing an Implementation Plan

Mon, 30 Dec 2019 00:00:00 GMT

A technique for getting work done in the face of overwhelming challenges.

A Tale of Two Sorted Lists: Comparing Inheritance and Composition

Fri, 03 May 2019 00:00:00 GMT

We'll explore two different approaches to solving the same problem: Inheritance and Composition. At first glance, the Inheritance example looks more correct and is a bit shorter. I want to convince you that the Composition approach is more correct.

superdelegate

Thu, 02 May 2019 00:00:00 GMT

alfred-clipbox

Sun, 03 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMT

inspect.macro

Sun, 03 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMT

Scheduling a Medical Residency using Python

Sat, 26 Jan 2019 00:00:00 GMT

Using linear programming to schedule a medical residency program

Migrating an ASP Web App to .NET Core

Wed, 12 Dec 2018 00:00:00 GMT

Migrating a small ASP.NET web api from .NET Framework 4.6 to .NET Core.

Vanquishing CORS with CloudFront and Lambda@Edge

Mon, 03 Dec 2018 00:00:00 GMT

Using CloudFront to host a single-page web app and avoid CORS issues

vue-await

Tue, 27 Nov 2018 00:00:00 GMT

Programming on MacOS in 2018

Sat, 03 Nov 2018 00:00:00 GMT

A list of software I find useful for programming on MacOS, circa 2018.

A Cloudfront Mystery

Wed, 24 Oct 2018 00:00:00 GMT

A detective story of debugging a Cloudfront 502 error

citrus

Sat, 02 Jun 2018 00:00:00 GMT

floorspace.js

Sat, 10 Feb 2018 00:00:00 GMT

Mongo Schemas with Pokemon

Wed, 03 Jan 2018 00:00:00 GMT

Using JSON Schema to validate pokemon documents in MongoDB.

Copy on Read with ES6 Proxy

Thu, 07 Dec 2017 00:00:00 GMT

Using a Proxy object to enforce making a deep copy of default values on read.

d3 Event Issues

Thu, 28 Sep 2017 00:00:00 GMT

A detective story tracking down why d3.event was null in a throttled function.

Inline SVG styles

Tue, 26 Sep 2017 00:00:00 GMT

A quick script to inline styles in SVGs

Python-style Context Managers in JavaScript

Wed, 20 Sep 2017 00:00:00 GMT

Python's context managers are a great feature. Here's how to approximate them in JavaScript.

winnow

Sat, 20 May 2017 00:00:00 GMT

Migrating a Primary Key to Bigint

Thu, 23 Mar 2017 00:00:00 GMT

High volume tables can run out of ids. Here's how to convert a Django model's primary key to a bigint.

Django Migrations Tribulations

Wed, 22 Mar 2017 00:00:00 GMT

Ensuring merge migrations are unique in Django

Setting up GNU pass with Alfred

Wed, 31 Aug 2016 00:00:00 GMT

How to set up pass, the open source password manager, with Alfred on OSX

Meddlesome Decorators

Thu, 31 Mar 2016 00:00:00 GMT

When your decorators want to meddle with the function's arguments, things can get tricky. Here's a pattern for writing decorators that need to access the function's arguments.

Facebook Messages Auto-reply

Tue, 15 Mar 2016 00:00:00 GMT

Use selenium to check for unread Facebook messages and send a reply

postgres-kernel

Wed, 15 Jul 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Postgres Advisory Locks

Thu, 02 Jul 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Acquire and release postgres advisory locks from python with a decorator

Decorators without the Magic

Sun, 01 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Decorators look like magic when you first see them, but they don’t feel like something mere mortals could write. We’ll go through some examples of exactly how they work (without the scary @ syntax), and why they are a nice pattern for writing elegant, easy to understand code.

Pair Programming with wemux and ngrok

Fri, 18 Jul 2014 00:00:00 GMT

Share your terminal with friends!

Where's the Facebook app?

Fri, 07 Mar 2014 00:00:00 GMT

Disappointed by the lack of an official Facebook app for your Mac? Make your own! (download provided for the lazy)

Event Triggered Averages Tutorial

Fri, 28 Feb 2014 00:00:00 GMT

Event-triggered averages, also known as Peristimulus Time Histograms (PETHs) are a method of analysis commonly used in neuroscience, but also in the finance industry and others.

pthreads and PRNGs, oh my!

Thu, 12 Dec 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Professors teaching Concurrency classes are fond of saying that when there is a race condition in your code, anything can happen. But can it?

Grading on a Curve

Sun, 10 Nov 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Everyone's happy to hear that a test will be curved, but what does that even mean?

latex-therefore

Wed, 09 Oct 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Putnam Boxes and Balls

Thu, 19 Sep 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Every December, undergrads across the country take the Putnam Exam, regarded as one of the toughest math competitions around. This is a walkthrough of a problem from the 2010 test.

Muggles and Base Two

Sat, 31 Aug 2013 00:00:00 GMT

You can be half muggle, quarter muggle, or even 13/16 muggle. But can you be 1/3 muggle?

LaTeX Therefore package

Fri, 21 Jun 2013 00:00:00 GMT

This LaTeX package alleviates the constant struggle in mathematical writing of finding synonyms for 'therefore'.

Minishell

Fri, 01 Jun 2012 00:00:00 GMT

As part of the UNIX Systems class at WWU, each student makes a basic shell program, msh.

LaTeX Class

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 00:00:00 GMT

LaTeX is a markup language that's particularly useful for typesetting mathematics. When I was at WWU, I taught a 1.5 hour class covering the basics.