Mike Hadlow
@mikehadlow.com
Lewes, UK. Software guy. blog: mikehadlow.com. TypeScript, C#. Author of guitardashboard.com and easynetq.com. Talk to me about: code / tech / guitar / science / history / progressive-rock
Enjoyed @simonwillison.net 's wrap up of the year in AI. His is probably my favourite developer-focussed AI blog. Definitely worth a regular read:
simonwillison.net/2025/Dec/31/...
simonwillison.net/2025/Dec/31/...
2025: The year in LLMs
This is the third in my annual series reviewing everything that happened in the LLM space over the past 12 months. For previous years see Stuff we figured out about …
simonwillison.net
January 1, 2026 at 11:16 AM
Enjoyed @simonwillison.net 's wrap up of the year in AI. His is probably my favourite developer-focussed AI blog. Definitely worth a regular read:
simonwillison.net/2025/Dec/31/...
simonwillison.net/2025/Dec/31/...
My faces-of-bluesky. Curtesy of bubbel.blue
January 1, 2026 at 9:13 AM
My faces-of-bluesky. Curtesy of bubbel.blue
Having worked as a contractor for over 20 years, none of this surprises me.
A thread 🧵 of _terrible_ design decisions for the internal APIs of the two Italian high speed train operators, Italo and Trenitalia.
Hardcoded passwords, terrible translations, spelling mistakes, xml in json (but utf8 encoded and transmitted as an array of numbers), it's all here. Enjoy!
Hardcoded passwords, terrible translations, spelling mistakes, xml in json (but utf8 encoded and transmitted as an array of numbers), it's all here. Enjoy!
December 31, 2025 at 11:29 AM
Having worked as a contractor for over 20 years, none of this surprises me.
My 2025 Year on Books
owlbadger.com/posts/2025-1...
owlbadger.com/posts/2025-1...
My 2025 Year in Books
My book consumption has experienced an uptick in seriousness and organisation
in ‘25. I’ve always enjoyed reading, typically getting through ten to twenty
books per year. Up to now the choice of readi...
owlbadger.com
December 31, 2025 at 11:17 AM
My 2025 Year on Books
owlbadger.com/posts/2025-1...
owlbadger.com/posts/2025-1...
OK, this legitimately blew my mind. I'm not too sure what I think it about yet, but it certainly aligns with my experience, and with the advent of AI coding tools it could possibly be the new paradigm.
December 31, 2025 at 9:21 AM
OK, this legitimately blew my mind. I'm not too sure what I think it about yet, but it certainly aligns with my experience, and with the advent of AI coding tools it could possibly be the new paradigm.
My where I'd live. Very typically Western European I expect.
December 30, 2025 at 12:16 PM
My where I'd live. Very typically Western European I expect.
So many levels of metaphor in one gif...
another robot highlight for 2025: man wearing humanoid mocap suit kicks himself in the balls
December 27, 2025 at 6:42 PM
So many levels of metaphor in one gif...
One of the core software development skills you have to master is being comfortable not keeping up with _all_ the latest software engineering practices 😀
No problem at all with not being on the early-adopter part of the curve, and a big risk with burning cycles on things that have yet to mature.
No problem at all with not being on the early-adopter part of the curve, and a big risk with burning cycles on things that have yet to mature.
Andrej Karpathy is worried about keeping up with software engineering practices
December 27, 2025 at 11:24 AM
One of the core software development skills you have to master is being comfortable not keeping up with _all_ the latest software engineering practices 😀
No problem at all with not being on the early-adopter part of the curve, and a big risk with burning cycles on things that have yet to mature.
No problem at all with not being on the early-adopter part of the curve, and a big risk with burning cycles on things that have yet to mature.
Now that's class.
December 26, 2025 at 7:31 PM
Now that's class.
I'm really enjoying Max Bennett's excellent A Brief History of Intelligence, but he keeps on referring to the dinosaur-killing KT-extinction event as the "Permian-Triassic extinction". But hey, what's 190 million years between friends?
www.amazon.co.uk/Brief-Histor...
www.amazon.co.uk/Brief-Histor...
A Brief History of Intelligence: Why the Evolution of the Brain Holds the Key to the Future of AI
A Brief History of Intelligence: Why the Evolution of the Brain Holds the Key to the Future of AI : Bennett, Max: Amazon.co.uk: Books
www.amazon.co.uk
December 23, 2025 at 11:33 PM
I'm really enjoying Max Bennett's excellent A Brief History of Intelligence, but he keeps on referring to the dinosaur-killing KT-extinction event as the "Permian-Triassic extinction". But hey, what's 190 million years between friends?
www.amazon.co.uk/Brief-Histor...
www.amazon.co.uk/Brief-Histor...
My Tsundoku is totally out of control. I currently have in excess of a 100 unread books in the house. I have a reading list planned for the next 5 years, yet I still buy more! I think it must be a kind of mental illness.
December 20, 2025 at 9:57 AM
My Tsundoku is totally out of control. I currently have in excess of a 100 unread books in the house. I have a reading list planned for the next 5 years, yet I still buy more! I think it must be a kind of mental illness.
If you've used an AI coding assistant like Claude Code, you'll notice something very odd; a lack of joined-up-ness that's really surprising: The coding assistant doesn't communicate with the language server or the compiler. Instead it works like a software engineer from the 90's ...
1/3
1/3
December 15, 2025 at 11:27 AM
If you've used an AI coding assistant like Claude Code, you'll notice something very odd; a lack of joined-up-ness that's really surprising: The coding assistant doesn't communicate with the language server or the compiler. Instead it works like a software engineer from the 90's ...
1/3
1/3
I really enjoyed the recent Dwarkesh Patel interview with Ilya Sutskever. The contrast Sutskever drew between human and AI cognition was fascinating, and possibly gives a good roadmap for human/AI interaction for software engineering.
www.dwarkesh.com/p/ilya-sutsk...
www.dwarkesh.com/p/ilya-sutsk...
Ilya Sutskever – We're moving from the age of scaling to the age of research
“These models somehow just generalize dramatically worse than people. It's a very fundamental thing.”
www.dwarkesh.com
December 8, 2025 at 11:13 PM
I really enjoyed the recent Dwarkesh Patel interview with Ilya Sutskever. The contrast Sutskever drew between human and AI cognition was fascinating, and possibly gives a good roadmap for human/AI interaction for software engineering.
www.dwarkesh.com/p/ilya-sutsk...
www.dwarkesh.com/p/ilya-sutsk...
I've been attempting to learn low-latency, zero-allocation, C#. It's a whole new world.
Would you care for a ring-buffer sir?
Sounds a bit rude!
Would you care for a ring-buffer sir?
Sounds a bit rude!
December 7, 2025 at 10:28 AM
I've been attempting to learn low-latency, zero-allocation, C#. It's a whole new world.
Would you care for a ring-buffer sir?
Sounds a bit rude!
Would you care for a ring-buffer sir?
Sounds a bit rude!
Not a bad drawing despite the engine being completely wrong, but the labelling is a joke.
November 21, 2025 at 8:16 AM
Not a bad drawing despite the engine being completely wrong, but the labelling is a joke.
I'm thinking longer for a better answer.
October 22, 2025 at 9:29 AM
I'm thinking longer for a better answer.
AWS has the Monday morning blues. Half the world is struggling to operate because their SaaS is down. At least I'm back to running a local dev environment now. In my Lambda days I'd be twiddling my thumbs.
October 20, 2025 at 9:32 AM
AWS has the Monday morning blues. Half the world is struggling to operate because their SaaS is down. At least I'm back to running a local dev environment now. In my Lambda days I'd be twiddling my thumbs.
Define your musical taste in eight artists
Yes
Pink Floyd
The Beatles
King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard
Sly And The Family Stone
Cardiacs
The Zombies
Geese
Yes
Pink Floyd
The Beatles
King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard
Sly And The Family Stone
Cardiacs
The Zombies
Geese
Define your musical taste in eight artists
Beck
Sonic Youth
Elliott Smith
The Beatles
Bob hund
P.J Harvey
Ed Harcourt
Damien Jurado
Beck
Sonic Youth
Elliott Smith
The Beatles
Bob hund
P.J Harvey
Ed Harcourt
Damien Jurado
Define your musical taste in eight artists
Led Zeppelin
Shostakovich
Bjork
Sandy Denny
Hildegard of Bingen
Tangerine Dream
Funkadelic
Syd Barrett
Near misses: Love, Kate Bush, Blondie, Davy Graham
Led Zeppelin
Shostakovich
Bjork
Sandy Denny
Hildegard of Bingen
Tangerine Dream
Funkadelic
Syd Barrett
Near misses: Love, Kate Bush, Blondie, Davy Graham
October 19, 2025 at 8:29 AM
Define your musical taste in eight artists
Yes
Pink Floyd
The Beatles
King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard
Sly And The Family Stone
Cardiacs
The Zombies
Geese
Yes
Pink Floyd
The Beatles
King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard
Sly And The Family Stone
Cardiacs
The Zombies
Geese
I've these collections of interesting nuggets. The ones on how AI is pretty much all of US growth at present is particularly notable. The crash, when it happens, is going to be very painful!
www.derekthompson.org/p/the-25-mos...
www.derekthompson.org/p/the-25-mos...
The 25 Most Interesting Ideas I've Found in 2025 (So Far)
Charts and history lessons—across culture, politics, AI, economics, health, science, and the long story of progress
www.derekthompson.org
October 4, 2025 at 8:04 AM
I've these collections of interesting nuggets. The ones on how AI is pretty much all of US growth at present is particularly notable. The crash, when it happens, is going to be very painful!
www.derekthompson.org/p/the-25-mos...
www.derekthompson.org/p/the-25-mos...
Today's discovery is tmux alternative Zellij zellij.dev
Pretty much better in every way. Written in Rust (of course).
Pretty much better in every way. Written in Rust (of course).
Zellij
A terminal workspace with batteries included
zellij.dev
October 3, 2025 at 10:04 PM
Today's discovery is tmux alternative Zellij zellij.dev
Pretty much better in every way. Written in Rust (of course).
Pretty much better in every way. Written in Rust (of course).
Do I know any IBM MQ experts I can ask some questions about how to write high performance clients? Event better if you've used the IBMMQDotnetClient library.
September 30, 2025 at 12:52 PM
Do I know any IBM MQ experts I can ask some questions about how to write high performance clients? Event better if you've used the IBMMQDotnetClient library.
Is this my dream job? If only I could write!
Are you a science and technology aficionado? We are looking for someone to report on anything from astronomy to archaeology, particle physics to synthetic biology.
Apply by September 28th:
Apply by September 28th:
The Economist is hiring a science and technology correspondent
We’re looking for a writer to join us in London for 12 months
econ.st
September 19, 2025 at 12:37 PM
Is this my dream job? If only I could write!
So after a two and a half year stint as a full time Node engineer, I'm back coding in C#, but now on Linux with Rider as the IDE. It feels like a warm old familiar place. Rider is a pretty good experience so far. JetBrains certainly know how to build an IDE.
September 17, 2025 at 6:35 PM
So after a two and a half year stint as a full time Node engineer, I'm back coding in C#, but now on Linux with Rider as the IDE. It feels like a warm old familiar place. Rider is a pretty good experience so far. JetBrains certainly know how to build an IDE.
Several years into using z-shell I discover that ctrl-XE opens the current command in nvim (or whatever you've got set as your default editor). I wish I'd known this before.
September 16, 2025 at 7:51 AM
Several years into using z-shell I discover that ctrl-XE opens the current command in nvim (or whatever you've got set as your default editor). I wish I'd known this before.
My Grandfather (highlighted) with his class, training to be a lieutenant in the Royal Navy at HMS King Alfred (yes that's now the swimming pool) in Hove during WWII.
CC @eaterofsun.bsky.social
CC @eaterofsun.bsky.social
September 3, 2025 at 9:56 PM
My Grandfather (highlighted) with his class, training to be a lieutenant in the Royal Navy at HMS King Alfred (yes that's now the swimming pool) in Hove during WWII.
CC @eaterofsun.bsky.social
CC @eaterofsun.bsky.social