--- type: "article" title: "2025W38" newsletter: "Jordi Villar" newsletter_handle: "jordivillarcom" newsletter_url: "https://usecommune.com/n/jordivillarcom" author: "Jordi Villar (@jordi)" published: "2025-09-29T12:51:59.117Z" canonical_url: "https://usecommune.com/n/jordivillarcom/a/2025w38" markdown_url: "https://usecommune.com/n/jordivillarcom/a/2025w38.md" chat_url: "https://usecommune.com/n/jordivillarcom/a/2025w38/chat" source_url: "https://jordivillar.com/reads/2025w38/" body_source: "imported" likes: 0 replies: 0 body_words: 687 --- # 2025W38 Read the full article in your browser [here](https://jordivillar.com/reads/2025w38/) # 2025W38 - [Surviving Long-Running Projects](https://ordep.dev/posts/long-running-projects) — A nice reality check on how grueling big projects can be. The author basically says: expect them to drag on, plan for “boring” maintenance, and set up routines to keep your motivation and mental health intact. It’s more about staying sane than about technical tricks. - [How we built it: Real-time analytics for Stripe Billing](https://stripe.com/blog/how-we-built-it-real-time-analytics-for-stripe-billing) — This is a cool peek under the hood. Stripe walks through how they built real-time analytics on top of billing, mixing Kafka, Flink, and their own in-house magic. It’s a story about scaling data pipelines to billions of events and still keeping dashboards snappy. - [9 Things Every Fresh Graduate Should Know About Software Performance](https://johnnysswlab.com/9-things-every-fresh-graduate-should-know-about-software-performance/) — Basically “performance isn’t magic.” It covers the usual suspects (memory allocation, cache, I/O, concurrency) but framed as a gentle guide for juniors. Solid reminders even for experienced devs. - [A brief history of threads and threading](https://eclecticlight.co/2025/09/20/a-brief-history-of-threads-and-threading/) — A fun historical tour of how we got to modern threading. From early OS days to today’s multicores, it’s an eye-opener on how messy and evolutionary concurrency really is. - [Hired Through GitHub: Part 1](https://zed.dev/blog/hired-through-github-part-1) — The author tells how showing work on GitHub led directly to job offers. It’s a feel-good story about the value of public contributions and writing about your code. - [In response to a developer asking about systems](https://notes.eatonphil.com/2025-09-15-what-is-systems-and-how-do-i-learn.html) — This is like a mini-manifesto on what “systems” really means. The takeaway is: stop chasing trendy tools and learn fundamentals — OS, networks, distributed systems. That’s how you actually “get” systems. - [From 19k to 4.2M events/sec: story of a SQLite query optimisation](https://mnt.io/articles/from-19k-to-4-2m-events-per-sec-story-of-a-sqlite-query-optimisation/) — Absolute banger. The author squeezes insane performance out of SQLite with indexing, batching, and clever SQL tweaks. Great reminder that small changes in schema/queries can be game-changing. - [UTF-8 is a Brilliant Design](https://iamvishnu.com/posts/utf8-is-brilliant-design) — A love letter to UTF-8. The author explains why it’s elegant, backwards-compatible, and just plain clever. Makes you appreciate how much thought went into something we all take for granted. - [Being good isn’t enough](https://joshs.bearblog.dev/being-good-isnt-enough/?utm_source=hackernewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=fav) — A short but punchy post: skill alone won’t get you ahead. Communication, visibility, and timing matter too. Basically: don’t hide behind code. - [Introducing Direct Compress: Up to 40x Faster, Leaner Data Ingestion for Developers (Tech Preview)](https://www.tigerdata.com/blog/introducing-direct-compress-up-to-40x-faster-leaner-data-ingestion-for-developers-tech-preview) — Marketing-y but interesting. A new ingestion tech promising 40x faster loads. The takeaway: data infra vendors are pushing more on-the-fly compression to cut storage and speed up analytics. - [When more threads make things worse](https://ordep.dev/posts/livelocks) — A cautionary tale of over-threading. Past a point, adding threads doesn’t help — it can create livelocks, context switching overhead, and general sadness. A good read if you’ve ever said “let’s just throw more threads at it.” - [You can try to like stuff](https://dynomight.net/liking/?utm_source=hackernewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=fav) — An odd but uplifting essay about cultivating taste. The author argues that liking things is a skill you can practice, not just something that happens. Kind of refreshing. - [Reflections on Tinybird](https://rbarbadillo.github.io/tinybird) — A personal reflection from someone using Tinybird. They talk about what impressed them, what didn’t, and lessons learned from building real-time APIs. Interesting outsider’s perspective. - [Do the simplest thing that could possibly work](https://www.seangoedecke.com/the-simplest-thing-that-could-possibly-work/) — Classic XP wisdom retold. The post champions simplicity over cleverness. Don’t over-engineer; just do the simple thing first and iterate. - [Developer’s block](https://underlap.org/developers-block/) — Like writer’s block, but for coders. Talks about burnout, procrastination, and ways to get unstuck. Feels relatable if you’ve ever stared at your editor unable to start. - [The First Time I Was Almost Fired From Apple](https://www.engineersneedart.com/blog/almostfired/almostfired.html) — Great storytime. An engineer recounts a near-disastrous mistake at Apple and what it taught them about responsibility and learning under pressure. - [Linear sent me down a local-first rabbit hole](https://bytemash.net/posts/i-went-down-the-linear-rabbit-hole/) — A cool piece about discovering local-first architectures (like CRDTs) after using Linear. Shows how design decisions in apps can spark curiosity about deeper tech. - [Local-first search](https://fika.bar/paoramen/local-first-search-01K1B0WM1X4P5SV5QAES0Z5N75) — Builds on that same local-first theme. Explains how search can work offline-first with sync happening in the background. Makes you rethink how “search” has to be architected. *** ## Discussion No replies yet.