AI has democratised writing code. Pretty much anyone can pull up ChatGPT or Claude and build basic apps and websites. What people fail to realise is that writing code is just a small part of being a developer. Indeed, in most software engineer roles, writing code is one of the things you spend the least time on! While AI now means anyone can write code, there is fundamental software development knowledge still missing, and you don’t know what you don’t know. ...
Some of my favourite moments from this year are directly because of ‘The Alchemist’ by Paulo Coelho. Not only did I find the novel thoughtful and inspiring, but it truly gave me better perspective on the world around me, what I want from my life, and the person I want to be. Although the text itself on the surface is straightforward, for me, it triggered emotions that I hope to capture in my writing. ...
The skeleton of my VPS setup is Nginx. It takes a collection of websites and applications, each with its own way of deployment and brings them under a single umbrella. This is useful if you have multiple projects you wish to host, but do not want the headache of remembering where each one is hosted and managing them individually. Not only does using Nginx save a lot of time and energy, but it’s also a very safe solution. Let me walk you through how and why I set this up. ...
It is often told that every serious developer should have their own space on the web. A space to express themselves, share their learning and host all their personal projects. I felt that I was lacking a digital form of expression, so I decided to embark on a journey. I built Aether. This is a framework for hosting my personal website, this blog, an email service and my own API. In order to have maximum control, I decided to build this infrastructure myself. I learned a lot along the way, and this post details the philosophy and high-level implementation details. ...
After leaving my corporate job to re-centre and decide in which direction to take my life, I travelled around for a few months. I had picked up a freelancing gig, and while I was in the Caribbean, working on the balcony of my villa, surrounded by sun, trees and sea, I thought: Why can't I do this all the time? My office for a few weeks I remembered a dream I had while backpacking across India in 2023. To travel and work at the same time. At first, the idea seemed ludicrous, but as I met more people doing the same, and saw that most of my work as a software engineer didn’t require in-person interactions, the idea became more feasible. ...
Although the availability of LLMs has made our lives easier, they are still very limited. They only have the ability to take some input text and spit out something that resembles human intelligence. They live in a void and have no power outside of the current and immediate interaction you have with them. But this is changing. AI agents are the next step forward. An agent can be thought of as more alive than a mere LLM. They can remember, create and follow better plans, and act on the world around them. ...