Former General Electric CEO Jack Welch once nearly died of a heart attack. Years later he was asked what went through his mind while he was being rushed to the hospital in what could have been his las
In 2017, we wrote a blog post on how we store billions of messages. We shared our journey of how we started out using MongoDB but migrated our data to Cassandra because we were looking for a database
A principal engineer usually means one of the most experienced individual contributors in the organisation. It’s an ultimate step in the engineer career ladder that gives great recognition for folks i
I've worked on many projects throughout my career as a software engineer. However, Helix - Uber's Rider app rewrite in 2016 introducing Swift and RIBs - stands as the craziest project by a margin. Thi
My name is Julien Nahum ( @jhumanj on Twitter). I’m the founder of NotionForms , a form builder for Notion, a productivity tool. I have been bootstrapping this SaaS solo for the past year. It very rec
Our son was born March 12th, 2009 . He's a little over two and a half years old. Now, I am the wussiest wuss to ever wuss up the joint, so take everything I'm about to say with a grain of salt – but c
We live in a contracting world, with diminishing options to travel far from your home and meet people of unfamiliar backgrounds- if you’re a child. With increasingly regimented time, homework starting
W hen Jenica Anderson and Stephan DuVal clicked on one another’s online profile on Modamily.com – tagline “A new way to family” – neither was looking for romance. They were both in their late 30s, and
Your parents’ good intentions might have undermined your confidence – but you can do something about it. Y You’ve probably noticed how some of your colleagues take to leadership roles like a duck to w
Obviously, pregnancy for partners won’t be the same as it will be for moms-to-be, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be a joint venture. You may not be experiencing morning-noon-and-night sickness, but yo
Sup nerds, you're reading Cyber Patterns. If you want to join 700+ patternists learning about emerging patterns in tech every week, subscribe below. Subscribe I’ve been losing on the internet for 10+
In 2014, I began my search for a software engineering job in Tokyo. But I didn't want just any old job. I wanted one that was — for lack of a better term — actually good . Because I'd heard some scary
Note: This post hit the front page of Hacker News and generated some good discussion. Check it out here . Tell me if you’ve heard this story before: “software engineering manager leaves cushy high pay
Children introduce unique challenges to travel planning , but luckily Japan is a destination that is easy and safe to explore with kids. The following are some things to consider that can make your fa
I’m a Taurus. Here’s my horoscope for today: Things should improve for you as the day progresses, Taurus. You shouldn’t depend on something that may not pan out the way you want. As you can see, it’s
Stage 1: Meeting people who you’re likely to be friends with Most friends during your childhood are going to be circumstantial. You didn’t really choose where you went to school K-8 because you didn’t
Good morning! This week I’m answering three reader prompts, collected from a few weeks ago, that each hit on something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. The first, on chores, prompted today’s ess
+ Table of Contents Xerox scanners/photocopiers randomly alter numbers in scanned documents Please see the “condensed time line” section (the next one) for a time line of how the Xerox saga unfolded.
Some years ago, I was explaining to my manager that I was feeling a bit bored, and theytold me to learn how to read a Profit & Loss (P&L) statement .At the time, that sounded suspiciously like, “Stop
No matter how hard you work, it still takes a little bit of luck for something to hit. That can be discouraging, since luck feels like a force outside our control. But the good news is that we can inc
Hacks for engineering estimates Engineers often have to ask each other for “estimates”– rough projections for how long projects will take. While some teams do rigorous estimation rituals to varying de
Jack Black, in the DVD extras for School of Rock , had this to say in an interview: I had to learn how to play electric guitar a little bit because all I play is acoustic guitar. And I'm still not ver
I n the very first instalment of my column for the Guardian’s Weekend magazine, a dizzying number of years ago now, I wrote that it would continue until I had discovered the secret of human happiness,
Art for The Intrinsic Perspective is created by Alexander Naughton There’s a dreaded term: the “writer’s writer.” Someone often beloved by authors but seldom read by the public. A common example is Wi
Art for The Intrinsic Perspective is by Alexander Naughton At the age of 24, and worried about being driven out of graduate school due to a contentious relationship with my PhD advisor over our resear
The Life of a Backpacker in Asia in the 1970s Story and photos by Kevin Kelly In an adapted excerpt from an interview on the Deviate podcast with Rolf Potts, a writer and speaker best known as a futur
Shuvomoy Das Gupta April 13, 2020 Last update: May 2, 2022 Recently, I came across a few old and new interviews of Donald Knuth , where he sheds light on his work habits, how he approaches problems, a
The Pit, the Cabin, and the Dance Floor Okay, Jamie, you’re in the pit again. It’s far from your first stay here, but let’s not get too comfortable. There’s a distinct lack of roses here to stop and s
Jack Welch, GE CEO popularized segmenting workers into letter groups:A players (top 20%), B players (70%) and C players (bottom 10%). SteveJobs is popularly quoted, A players hire A players; Bplayers
One of the most common pieces of advice you'll get as a startup is this: Only hire the best. The quality of the people that work at your company will be one of the biggest factors in your success – or
Imagine… Last night, lightning struck our house and burned it down. I escaped wearing only my nightclothes. In an instant, everything was vaporised. Laptop? Cinders. Phone? Ashes. Home server? A smoul
When hiring developers, there are many things we are looking for, but over the years I have found that raw coding ability is easily the most important quality to look for. I can quickly train a person
Not too long ago, Daniel Pink , the bestselling social psychology author, made an observation that seemed to speak to our national mindset: There are more than 50 books in the U.S. Library of Congress
There are approximately 330 million Reddit users.Users that are famous for hating marketers.A community that you cannot bullshit. Are there people who had luck marketing on Reddit?If so, how did they
Q: I’m an experienced professional ready for a change from my current position. What are great methods to discover opportunities that can be a step up for me? While the tech job market for people with
In about six years, I have sold over 40,000 books and earned over $160,000 (income) from selling non-fiction books on Amazon, all these while writing from the side. I have a full-time job, am a father
eTour.com w/ Peter Askew X’ed out : ) The email landed in my inbox around 10:05/am, alerting us of an all-hands meeting in 15 minutes. “Guess we got acquired” , we all thought. 16 minutes later, we we
This isn't about the time I inadvertently shut down one of Britain's nuclear power stations, an entirely true story for which the world is nevertheless not yet prepared. Nor is it about the poor junio
Recent changes News Know How About Help What links here Related changes Recent changes Random page Special pages STAY ON THE BUS The Helsinki Bus Station Theory: Finding Your Own Vision in photography
Elevator pitch: Bring enough light to simulate daylight into your home and office. This idea has been shared in Less Wrong circles for a couple years. Yudkowsky wrote Inadequate Equilibria in 2017 whe