Keeping it simple
Joined May 2017
- Tweets 314
- Following 268
- Followers 170
- Likes 260
78 Photos and videos
Surface risk: Getting left behind b/c you don't use ${AI_TOOL}.
Actual risk: Getting left behind b/c you prioritized novelty over craft.
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May 25
Main takeaway after reading Elon's biography:
Bottlenecks are fixed by subtraction, not addition.
Eliminate steps, parts, headcount, offers, complexity.
"Go ultra-hardcore on deletion and simplication."
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May 16
George R. R. Martin writes on a DOS box running WordStar 4.0 (abandoned 34 years ago).
You don't need a new IDE.
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May 4
There are two ways to be loved as a software engineer:
1. Solve the most complex problems so others don’t have to
2. Make complex problems simple enough for others to solve themselves
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Apr 17
Pieter Levels (tech minimalist GOAT) also travels light: levels.io/carry-on-world-tra…
Everyone who has overpacked eventually hits their breaking point and says, "Fck it, I don't need all that crap."
Same goes for devs and "heavy" codebases.
newsletter.fullstack.zip/p/c…
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Apr 6
A random marketing meeting on GitLab's side channel is 3X more popular than their main channel's top vid.
The reason? Ppl play the marketing meeting in the background to make it seem like they're busy lol
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Mar 31
Spent the last 3 months making the first four videos for the next generation of 10X engineers here.
Goal: give you something good to watch during your WFH Friday lunch.
If you go back to the keyboard excited, that’s a win.
We're on YouTube!
The channel: youtube.com/@fullstack-zip
The format: system design case studies.
Architecture -> feature breakdown -> takeaways
If @fireship_dev is espresso, this is pour-over.
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Mar 12
Ever wonder what happens after you `git push`?
This one's for you.
What powers the world's largest independent DevOps platform?
A Ruby on Rails monolith.
Yes, really.
Here's how it comes together. open.substack.com/pub/fullst…
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Feb 21
There’s a myth that the more complex the solution, the smarter the person.
I’ve found the opposite: the true experts obsess over simplifying.
Simple is smart.
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Feb 14
Fascinating how everything comes together. A mix of crude simplicity and juicy complexity.
Discord's Architecture:
- Foundation: Actor Model
- Real-time: Elixir WebSockets
- API: Python Rust Data Service
- DB: ScyllaDB
- Search: Elasticsearch
- Infra: GCP
- Voice: WebRTC Opus codec
- Client: React, RN, Electron
Full breakdown:
newsletter.fullstack.zip/p/d…
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Jan 28
Inspired by true events
The 5 stages of an integration:
Denial — "The docs say it's just a few calls"
Anger — "Why didn't they mention this?!"
Bargaining — "There's gotta be an npm pckg"
Depression — "Guess I'm not going to brunch"
Acceptance — eats two boiled eggs
open.substack.com/pub/fullst…
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Jan 21
Which of these matters most for an unemployed junior dev?
1. Waking up at 5 am and building his portfolio for 5 hours
2. Submitting 20 jobs applications/week
3. Getting hired within 3 months
Answer: 3
1 & 2 are inputs.
3 is an outcome.
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Jan 11
Get strong: gym
Get ripped: gym kitchen
Get revenue: sell
Get profit: sell not buying everyone YETI tumblers
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Jan 7
No one will ever say, “Your app would solve my problem perfectly, but I don’t think you can invert a binary tree from memory, so I’m going to pass.”
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31 Dec 2025
TL;DR the UX is better
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24 Dec 2025
Google Calendar doesn't get enough credit
- No fluff API
- Simple frontend (just JS CSS)
- Offline support
It's not the fastest or flashiest.
But it's reliable & secure.
That's enough.
Oh, and every scheduling app since 2006 desperately depends on it
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Tyler Dane retweeted
6 Nov 2025
We built a grid that shows your life in weeks.
Each square = 1 week.
The filled ones are what you’ve lived.
The rest are (hopefully) what’s left.
Try it → compasscalendar.com/life
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1 Nov 2025
Building @CompassCalendar on YouTube Live for the next 60 days.
Come through.
youtube.com/@tylerdane-com/s…
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