I'm sorry, but you still have to think

I'm sorry, but you still have to think
8 minutes by Piotr Sarnacki

Piotr argues that AI-generated code is not automatically reliable. Comparing Rust and Elixir rewrites of a chat application reveals important differences in performance, message delivery, and resource usage. He highlights the limits of benchmarks and shows how design choices affect real-world behavior. Developers still need to understand their systems, evaluate trade-offs, and test carefully to build reliable software, even when AI does most of the coding.

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Let's build a compressor from scratch
5 minutes by Adolfo Ochagavía

Compression shrinks files by rewriting data more efficiently without losing any information. A common method called Huffman coding works by giving shorter codes to bytes that appear often and longer codes to rare ones. Building a basic compressor with this approach takes only a few hundred lines of code and can cut a book's file size nearly in half.

Good interfaces make good neighbors
2 minutes by Andrew Bosworth

Andrew points out that clashing teams often have an interface problem, not a relationship problem. Good collaboration needs three things: clear ownership so anyone can find who is accountable, an honest priority list that includes what was left out, and a defined process for handling new requests. With those in place, disagreements stay manageable and escalation becomes rare.

The lightbulb computer
7 minutes by Guillaume Ardaud

Projecting information onto surfaces around your home could be a better future for computing than smart glasses or small screens. A lightbulb-shaped device combining a projector with computer vision could let you view recipes, maps, and photos on any surface, control smart home devices by pointing, and get answers to questions hands-free. Unlike eyewear, it works socially, requires no face-mounted hardware, and blends naturally into everyday spaces.

I love software rendering
4 minutes by James Mackenzie

Software rendering in old DOS games means the CPU draws every pixel, with no graphics card involved. This produces sharp, gritty visuals that many prefer over the smoothed look of early 3D card acceleration. Running these games on fast modern hardware lets you push resolutions that were impossible in the 1990s, and doing it on real hardware rather than emulation keeps performance solid.

And the most popular article from the last issue was:

• How to effectively debug when you no longer understand the code