Location: SF or Portland
Remote: Yes (or Hybrid)
Willing to relocate: Yes
Technologies: Python (FastAPI), Typescript/Javascript (Angular, React), Postgres, Redis, AWS, Docker, Terraform, LLM, Data Pipeline/ETL
Résumé/CV: https://ndeast.com/resume.pdf
Email: hn [at] ndeast [dot] com
Hi, I am a backend-focused engineer with 5+ years building python microservices and full stack web applications at JPMorgan Chase and startups. Open to product engineering, infrastructure, and LLM integration roles. I like vintage mechanical keyboards, punk music, and natural bodybuilding.
i am surprised (am i really?) that apple never implemented a toggle to E2EE your icloud backup, just like you can backing up locally through itunes. thankfully you can just completely disable iCloud Backup.
I went through the entire process of learning Colemak-DH last year, and made sure to maintain my ability to type QWERTY. I would bring my reprogrammed HHKB to work every day, and switching between layouts at home to keep the skill. Eventually I realized that all the new layout did was add an extra layer of cognitive friction when it came to keyboard shortcuts. Now a year later I am back to just using QWERTY.
Glad I tried it, now I know I could do it all over with only a little bit of discomfort, but I never saw any of the oft lauded benefits of switching keyboard layouts. Maybe at 60-70WPM I am just not fast enough to notice improved efficiency, or my youthful joints have yet to decay enough to have pain from typing. Who knows.
Last year during a couple month break I had between jobs I decided I would learn a new keyboard layout as it was something I always wanted to do, but never wanted to commit to the learning process while I still needed to be proficient at typing.
I chose to learn Colemak-DH [0]. Before learning I was around a 75-80 WPM Qwerty touch typist. I went all in and did a lot of heavy practice. It took me around a week to be able to touch type colemak-dh (slowly) and then a further few months to touch type at speed.
I didn't want to lose my ability to use Qwerty so after getting up to a moderate speed of ~45 WPM I exclusively brought my colemak flashed happy hacking keyboard to work, and left qwerty at home. I have now equalized at about 60 WPM on both layouts after 8 months, and can pretty easily swap between them.
Now I don't really know what to do, nor have I noticed really any perceived benefit of switching layouts. The biggest difficulty has been vim keybinds. I really don't want to have to remap all of my vim keybinds (as like the OP article states, I think of my vim commands based on their name and qwerty representation) so I have been relying on multiple keyboard layers to handle movement keys and the like. Having to use modifiers, remember the different locations between layouts, and stealing away previous CTRL+<key> modifiers from vim to accommodate this kind of sucks.
I notice no difference in wrist (dis)comfort, it's just become more mental overhead to typing, and I am kind of stuck. I guess I am waiting to have some time to think about what I want to do, but balancing two layouts doesn't seem practical, or reasonable, or efficient.
Alan Thrall (owner of Untamed Strength in Sacramento) has discussed this a few times (most recently in this video[0]), but basically independent gyms don't really see this effect. In fact January can still be a pretty slow month for independent gyms as members over spend during the holidays (and cancel memberships) or don't want to go out in the cold weather.
Personally as a member of an independent gym for a few years now, I have also not seen an increase in activity at the beginning of the year. Most of the members tend to be pretty consistent and I've been now 5 days this new year at different peak times and seen only one new face. Good independent gyms are very expensive to run.
I enjoy that there is now so many options to share a beer with someone without the alcohol, but I am one and done. It’s calorically like drinking full sugar soda and most bars I’ve been to that sell cans tend to charge as much or more than a regular beer. Rather just drink water or seltzer at that point.
Hi, I am a backend-focused engineer with 5+ years building python microservices and full stack web applications at JPMorgan Chase and startups. Open to product engineering, infrastructure, and LLM integration roles. I like vintage mechanical keyboards, punk music, and natural bodybuilding.