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Notes

Loose, unopinionated notes on things I don’t entirely understand yet.

Aesthetic Command Lines with Hyper, Spaceship, and Oh My Zsh

My fairly banal, basic, but beautiful command line setup

Noteabout 1 month ago

Leaving Elicit

Reflections on two years of working at Elicit and why it's time to leave

Note4 months ago

Home-Cooked Software and Barefoot Developers

The emerging golden age of home-cooked software, barefoot developers, and why the local-first community should help build it

Note4 months ago

Faking William Morris, Generative Forgery, and the Erosion of Art History

Buying fake William Morris prints on Etsy and other early signs of epistemological collapse

Note6 months ago

On Opening Essays, Conference Talks, and Jam Jars

How to open pieces of narrative non-fiction writing, conference talks, and sticky jars

Note7 months ago

The Finest Narrative Non-Fiction Essays

Narrative essays that I consider ideal models of the medium

Note7 months ago

Spinning Worlds, Seasickness, and Dealing with Vestibular Neuritis

Gaining a strange disease and losing my ability to see straight

Note8 months ago

A Collection of Design Engineers

Collecting people I know who work at the intersection of design and engineering, in an attempt to figure out what a design engineer is

Note8 months ago

Gathering Structures

How to gather people and create communities in ways that are low-stress and high-payoff

Note9 months ago

Speculative Calendar Events

Designing tentative calendar events to solve complex scheduling problems

Note10 months ago

Language Model Sketchbook, or Why I Hate Chatbots

Sketchy ideas for interfaces that play with the novel capabilities of language models

Noteover 1 year ago

Neologisms

A collection of interesting words that have recently been coined

Noteover 1 year ago

Teenage Skeuomorphic Desktop Designs

An archive of my high school desktop designs, circa 2009

Notealmost 2 years ago

Reverse Outlining with Language Models

Using language models to generate reverse outlines of writing drafts

Notealmost 2 years ago

Empty Pointers and Constellations of AI

On the fuzziness of calling things “artificial intelligence” and moving the goalposts

Notealmost 2 years ago

The Dark Forest and the Cozy Web

An illustrated diagram exposing the inner layers of the dark and cozy web

Notealmost 2 years ago

A Digital Anthropology Reading List

A few favourite books from the field of digital anthropology

Noteabout 2 years ago

Joining Ought

A new role at an AI research lab working on tools for open-ended reasoning

Noteover 2 years ago

Positioning Elements & Scrollytelling in CSS

Notes on how to use the position property in CSS to make scrollytelling stories

Noteover 2 years ago

Building a Second Brain: The Illustrated Notes

Illustrated notes on the Building A Second Brain course

Noteover 2 years ago

Interoperable Personal Libraries and Ad Hoc Reading Groups

Exploring ways to build social infrastructure around books and reading on the open web

Noteover 2 years ago

The Eponymous Laws of Programming

A collection of laws named for specific people in the field of programming

Notealmost 3 years ago

Frequently Asked Questions

Questions I am often asked to answer

Notealmost 3 years ago

Pink, Soft, Glittering Developers

A collection of observations on the rise of soft, sparkly, baby pink aesthetics among developers

Notealmost 3 years ago

The Best Illustration Books and Courses

My favourite resources for learning to draw and developing your visual thinking skills

Notealmost 3 years ago

Pattern Languages in Programming and Interface Design

Notes on pattern languages and Christopher Alexander's legacy on software programming

Noteabout 3 years ago

A Meta-Tour of This Site

A video tour through how I build the old version of this site

Noteabout 3 years ago

Tracking Humanity

The introduction to my thesis on the Quantified Self movement and the culture of self-tracking

Noteabout 3 years ago

A Metaphorical Reading Collection

A collection of my favourite books on conceptual metaphor theory

Noteabout 3 years ago

Illustrating Gatsby's Key Concepts

Illustrated notes on the key concepts of how Gatsby.js works

Noteabout 3 years ago

New Harvest & Illustrating the Cultivated Meat Podcast

Illustrations made for a set of episodes of the Cultivated Meat podcast

Noteabout 3 years ago

Making Programming Visual, Spatial, and Learnable

What's wrong with linear, static programming mediums and how might we improve them?

Noteabout 3 years ago

Plebeian Programming with Keyboard Maestro

How to write macros without touching the terminal

Noteabout 3 years ago

Natureculture, Moral Purity, and Cultural Boundaries

Why there is nothing natural about the idea of 'nature'

Noteover 3 years ago

Tending Evergreen Notes in Roam Research

A walkthrough of how I manage and tend Evergreen notes in Roam

Noteover 3 years ago

The Echo & Narcissus Writing Club

A Hyperlink Academy writing club where we mimic the work of others

Noteover 3 years ago

What App is That?

A guide to the apps and tools I use to create illustrations

Noteover 3 years ago

The Linear Oppression of Note-taking Apps

What we lose when our digital notes remove the freedom to move

Noteover 3 years ago

Douglas, Dirt, and Matter Out of Place

Mary Douglas defined dirt as matter out of place – the crossing of boundaries

Noteover 3 years ago

Problematic Proteins

How to offend everyone with boundary-crossing steak and nuggets

Noteover 3 years ago

Fetishism & Mechanical Keyboards

Developer self-expression through coloured switches, keystroke actuation, and LED light displays

Noteover 3 years ago

Painting Roam Research with Custom CSS

How to customise Roam Research with your own CSS themes

Noteover 3 years ago

Are Data Unions the Future of Data?

Illustrated notes on how data unions work and what problems they might solve

Notealmost 4 years ago

A History of Cyborgs

Notes on the history of cyborgs and why the idea still holds historical weight in Western narratives

Notealmost 4 years ago

GreenSock Animations with React Hooks

How to use the Greensock animation library inside React using React hooks

Noteabout 4 years ago

The Bare Essentials of Greensock

Notes on the basics of the Greensock animation llibrary

Noteabout 4 years ago

The Gift Economy

Illustrated notes on the idea of Gift Economies and cultural historys of economic exchange

Noteover 4 years ago

Synecdoche: Drawing the Part for the Whole

Notes on the metaphorical varieties of synecdoche and metonymy

Noteover 4 years ago

Growing the Evergreens

Illustrated notes on the concept of 'Evergreen notes' and how to write them

Noteover 4 years ago

The Knowledge Hydrant

Illustrated notes on the Knowledge Hydrant guide to collaborative learning

Noteover 4 years ago

A Naive Exploration of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning

Notes on the academic field of CSCL and major papers in the discipline

Noteover 4 years ago

Silent Synchronous Reading Sessions

Notes on how to run silent meetings and reading sessions

Noteover 4 years ago

What the Fork is React Suspense?

Illustrated notes on how React suspense works

Noteover 4 years ago

Visually Workshopping the AWS Cloud

Some insights into how I collaborative with experts to create illustrated notes on technical topics

Noteover 4 years ago

Fixing Common Git Mistakes

Illustrated notes on common mistakes people make in Git, and how to fix them

Noteover 4 years ago

A Chat with Henry Zhu on OSS & Gift Economies

Notes from my podcast episode Open Source and Gift Economies on Maintainers Anonymous

Noteover 4 years ago

Defend Your Cookies with Essential Web Security Tactics

Illustrated notes on the essentials of web security

Notealmost 5 years ago

What the Fork is xState?

Illustrated notes on how to build state machines with the xState library

Notealmost 5 years ago

A Journey into Vue-Router

Illustrated notes on how routing works in Vue.js

Notealmost 5 years ago

What the Fork is Rust?

Illustrated notes on the core concepts in Rust

Notealmost 5 years ago

The Art and Craft of Gatsby Themes

Illustrated notes on building Gatsby themes

Notealmost 5 years ago

JavaScript Bits You Skipped the First Time Around

Illustrated notes on advanced but fundamental topics in JavaScript

Notealmost 5 years ago

Building Custom React Hooks

Illustrated notes on building custom React hooks

Noteabout 5 years ago

Immutable Data with Immer and Personal Assistant Bots

Illustrated notes on how work with immutable data in the Immer state library

Noteover 5 years ago

Speaking the GraphQL Query Language

Illustrated notes on the basics of the GraphQL query language

Noteover 5 years ago

A Fresh Serving of JavaScript ES2019

Illustrated notes on the new language changes in JavaScript ES2019

Noteover 5 years ago

The JAMStack, Gatsby & Contentful

Illustrated notes on the JAMstack, Gatsby & Contentful

Noteover 5 years ago

Instachatting with Vue & Socket.io

Illustrated notes on how to implement web sockets with Vue.js and Socket.io

Noteover 5 years ago

Building VR Apps with React360

Illustrated notes on building VR web apps with React360

Noteover 5 years ago

Testing Apps with Cypress

Illustrated notes on how to test web apps with Cypress

Noteover 5 years ago

How Are Compilers & Transpilers Different?

Illustrated notes on how compilers and transpilers are different

Noteover 5 years ago

A Fruitful Guide to JavaScript's Comparison Operators

Illustrated notes on how JavaScript's comparison operators work

Noteover 5 years ago

What the Fork is Babel?

Illustrated notes on how Babel works

Notealmost 6 years ago

JSX is a Lovechild

Illustrated notes on how JSX in React works

Notealmost 6 years ago

What the Fork is the React Virtual DOM

Illustrated notes on how the React virtual DOM works

Notealmost 6 years ago

JavaScript's ...spread Operator

Illustrated notes on how JavaScript's spread operator works

Notealmost 6 years ago