Alan Mendelevich
@ailon.org
aka ailon
⚒️ Building marker.js, and more
🎹 Making music as Alan Jacobs
🪦 Previously: founder & CEO of AdDuplex, Microsoft MVP
⚒️ Building marker.js, and more
🎹 Making music as Alan Jacobs
🪦 Previously: founder & CEO of AdDuplex, Microsoft MVP
Weird thing about working in an English-first company with virtually no native speakers is that your fluency improves with time but your grammar is getting worse. Why bother if you can take shortcuts and there's no one to correct or shame you?
November 3, 2025 at 6:08 PM
Weird thing about working in an English-first company with virtually no native speakers is that your fluency improves with time but your grammar is getting worse. Why bother if you can take shortcuts and there's no one to correct or shame you?
git suddenly stopped working in VS Code on the Mac. And in the terminal as well. Turns out Xcode got updated and I didn't launch it and as a consequence didn't accept the updated license text. And that broke git throughout the system. WTF?
September 30, 2025 at 6:33 AM
git suddenly stopped working in VS Code on the Mac. And in the terminal as well. Turns out Xcode got updated and I didn't launch it and as a consequence didn't accept the updated license text. And that broke git throughout the system. WTF?
September 13, 2025 at 7:33 AM
BopOps Lyrics is live on ProductHunt today! Help me spread the word? www.producthunt.com/products/bop...
August 27, 2025 at 5:16 PM
BopOps Lyrics is live on ProductHunt today! Help me spread the word? www.producthunt.com/products/bop...
A brand-new tool from me - BopOps Lyrics. Write lyrics to a backing track, loop sections, align timings, and get help from a "passive" AI co-writer when you get stuck
lyrics.bopops.com
lyrics.bopops.com
August 26, 2025 at 11:23 AM
A brand-new tool from me - BopOps Lyrics. Write lyrics to a backing track, loop sections, align timings, and get help from a "passive" AI co-writer when you get stuck
lyrics.bopops.com
lyrics.bopops.com
Sometimes it's depressing how you seem to work and work for months and move almost nowhere. Other times it's amazing what you can build from scratch in just a week.
August 20, 2025 at 1:19 PM
Sometimes it's depressing how you seem to work and work for months and move almost nowhere. Other times it's amazing what you can build from scratch in just a week.
I wondered how come Booking's prices became worse than direct 9 times out of 10 (including all the Genius Level 3 stuff) over the last year or so. Now I have the answer www.theguardian.com/business/202...
Thousands of hotels in Europe to sue Booking.com over ‘abusive’ practices
Class action lawsuit argues the online travel platform distorted market with ‘best price’ clauses
www.theguardian.com
August 7, 2025 at 1:29 PM
I wondered how come Booking's prices became worse than direct 9 times out of 10 (including all the Genius Level 3 stuff) over the last year or so. Now I have the answer www.theguardian.com/business/202...
August 1, 2025 at 1:39 PM
Reposted by Alan Mendelevich
Introducing marker.js for React Native!
blog.ailon.org/introducing-...
blog.ailon.org/introducing-...
Introducing marker.js for React Native
Over the years one of the most frequently asked questions about marker.js was, “Does it work with React Native?”
blog.ailon.org
August 1, 2025 at 7:20 AM
Introducing marker.js for React Native!
blog.ailon.org/introducing-...
blog.ailon.org/introducing-...
Needed to look something up in my old Foursquare/Swarm checkins and discovered that quite a few of my "friends" there still check in regularly.
I wonder if it's just force of habit or sunk cost fallacy or it really still is the best place to "mark" POIs in time? After all that's why I went there.
I wonder if it's just force of habit or sunk cost fallacy or it really still is the best place to "mark" POIs in time? After all that's why I went there.
July 29, 2025 at 6:32 AM
Needed to look something up in my old Foursquare/Swarm checkins and discovered that quite a few of my "friends" there still check in regularly.
I wonder if it's just force of habit or sunk cost fallacy or it really still is the best place to "mark" POIs in time? After all that's why I went there.
I wonder if it's just force of habit or sunk cost fallacy or it really still is the best place to "mark" POIs in time? After all that's why I went there.
So good! www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8CE...
DON BROCO - CELLOPHANE (Official Music Video)
YouTube video by Don Broco
www.youtube.com
July 25, 2025 at 5:03 PM
So good! www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8CE...
I suspect some BS like "cultural differences" would be their excuse, but AirBnB not policing hosts marking studio apartments as "1 bedroom" is a total fail in UX.
It's been like that forever and doesn't get better no matter how fancy their design language got over that period.
It's been like that forever and doesn't get better no matter how fancy their design language got over that period.
July 23, 2025 at 4:26 PM
I suspect some BS like "cultural differences" would be their excuse, but AirBnB not policing hosts marking studio apartments as "1 bedroom" is a total fail in UX.
It's been like that forever and doesn't get better no matter how fancy their design language got over that period.
It's been like that forever and doesn't get better no matter how fancy their design language got over that period.
Thank you, Google, for popping a confusing Gemini dialog when my dad tried to check his email. You gave me an opportunity to visit my parents when I wasn't planning. #connectingpeople
July 21, 2025 at 5:11 PM
Thank you, Google, for popping a confusing Gemini dialog when my dad tried to check his email. You gave me an opportunity to visit my parents when I wasn't planning. #connectingpeople
Heads of State is a fun mindless movie. It's funny though, how a russian director made sure that all episodic characters speak perfect russian but couldn't care less that Belarus is not on the way from London to Warsaw and that there are literally zero mountains there.
July 20, 2025 at 9:16 AM
Heads of State is a fun mindless movie. It's funny though, how a russian director made sure that all episodic characters speak perfect russian but couldn't care less that Belarus is not on the way from London to Warsaw and that there are literally zero mountains there.
The "regular" BMTH works fine as the background work music for me. But if you need something more mellow, they have you covered now open.spotify.com/album/34pF0w...
Lo-files
Bring Me The Horizon · Album · 2025 · 23 songs
open.spotify.com
July 16, 2025 at 12:39 PM
The "regular" BMTH works fine as the background work music for me. But if you need something more mellow, they have you covered now open.spotify.com/album/34pF0w...
Random thought on Macs/macOS: every time it craps out and you want to complain, you realize that some part of your setup is not from Apple, and you don't have a right to whine, bitch! /s
July 16, 2025 at 11:25 AM
Random thought on Macs/macOS: every time it craps out and you want to complain, you realize that some part of your setup is not from Apple, and you don't have a right to whine, bitch! /s
Alan's list of random firsts:
...
134. Drive a Chinese car ✅
...
134. Drive a Chinese car ✅
July 14, 2025 at 7:17 AM
Alan's list of random firsts:
...
134. Drive a Chinese car ✅
...
134. Drive a Chinese car ✅
I understand that italians have dibs on "coffee fashion" but maybe at least for the hotel staff it wouldn't hurt to learn (or rather admit?) that when a stupid foreigner asks for latte they mean coffee and not just milk?
July 14, 2025 at 6:42 AM
I understand that italians have dibs on "coffee fashion" but maybe at least for the hotel staff it wouldn't hurt to learn (or rather admit?) that when a stupid foreigner asks for latte they mean coffee and not just milk?
Hotel manager showing us the premises of a posh Italian hotel: please keep in mind that there's a dress code for the restaurant - no shorts, flip-flops, etc.
Me: even for breakfast?
She: yes, please wear pants
Me: OK
Breakfast: 80% of men wearing shorts, including swim trunks 🤔
Me: even for breakfast?
She: yes, please wear pants
Me: OK
Breakfast: 80% of men wearing shorts, including swim trunks 🤔
July 12, 2025 at 9:05 AM
Hotel manager showing us the premises of a posh Italian hotel: please keep in mind that there's a dress code for the restaurant - no shorts, flip-flops, etc.
Me: even for breakfast?
She: yes, please wear pants
Me: OK
Breakfast: 80% of men wearing shorts, including swim trunks 🤔
Me: even for breakfast?
She: yes, please wear pants
Me: OK
Breakfast: 80% of men wearing shorts, including swim trunks 🤔
A weird thing for a Windows person on macOS is that apps don't close when you close their windows. OK, fine. A different paradigm. But... why the F does the built-in Weather app close when you close its window!?
July 4, 2025 at 1:06 PM
A weird thing for a Windows person on macOS is that apps don't close when you close their windows. OK, fine. A different paradigm. But... why the F does the built-in Weather app close when you close its window!?
These shoes are quite likely the most comfortable walking shoes I ever owned. Also the hardest to put on. Strained my wrist putting my shoes on yesterday 😅
July 3, 2025 at 7:11 AM
These shoes are quite likely the most comfortable walking shoes I ever owned. Also the hardest to put on. Strained my wrist putting my shoes on yesterday 😅
July 2nd - the first day I wear shorts this year.
Exhibit A in why "climate change" is a much better term than "global warming".
Exhibit A in why "climate change" is a much better term than "global warming".
July 2, 2025 at 5:35 AM
July 2nd - the first day I wear shorts this year.
Exhibit A in why "climate change" is a much better term than "global warming".
Exhibit A in why "climate change" is a much better term than "global warming".
My little rant on the "openness" of macOS from the app developer's perspective... blog.ailon.org/how-open-is-...
How open is macOS, really?
macOS is supposedly the most open part of the Apple’s ecosystem. How open is it, really?
blog.ailon.org
July 1, 2025 at 1:17 PM
My little rant on the "openness" of macOS from the app developer's perspective... blog.ailon.org/how-open-is-...
Introducing TinyGoodies Mail Merge — Send Personalized Emails from Your Mailbox blog.ailon.org/introducing-...
Introducing TinyGoodies Mail Merge — Send Personalized Emails from Your Mailbox
TL;DR: you can get TinyGoodies Mail Merge and send personalized emails from your own address here.
blog.ailon.org
June 30, 2025 at 12:02 PM
Introducing TinyGoodies Mail Merge — Send Personalized Emails from Your Mailbox blog.ailon.org/introducing-...