Diomidis Spinellis
@coolsweng.bsky.social
Professor of software engineering at AUEB and software analytics at TU Delft, programmer, technology author. https://www.spinellis.gr/
(Tech tweets here. Follow @DSpinellis for Greek/Greece tweets.)
(Tech tweets here. Follow @DSpinellis for Greek/Greece tweets.)
I just received an AI-generated GitHub pull-request that incorrectly replaced 450 test code lines with a comment. Be VERY CAREFUL when reviewing out-of-the-blue PRs these days. AI-generated ones are likely to contain difficult-to-spot faults hidden as plausible fixes.
github.com/dspinellis/g...
github.com/dspinellis/g...
November 7, 2025 at 9:46 AM
I just received an AI-generated GitHub pull-request that incorrectly replaced 450 test code lines with a comment. Be VERY CAREFUL when reviewing out-of-the-blue PRs these days. AI-generated ones are likely to contain difficult-to-spot faults hidden as plausible fixes.
github.com/dspinellis/g...
github.com/dspinellis/g...
Στις 5 Νοεμβρίου λήγει η διορία της διαδικασίας έκδοσης του Προσωπικού Αριθμού.Με τη γεννήτρια γραμμάτων προσωπικού αριθμού μπορείτε να επιλέξετε εσείς έναν καλό συνδυασμό γραμμάτων για τον προσωπικό σας αριθμό. Θα τη βρείτε στο www.balab.aueb.gr/genpa/
November 1, 2025 at 8:17 PM
Στις 5 Νοεμβρίου λήγει η διορία της διαδικασίας έκδοσης του Προσωπικού Αριθμού.Με τη γεννήτρια γραμμάτων προσωπικού αριθμού μπορείτε να επιλέξετε εσείς έναν καλό συνδυασμό γραμμάτων για τον προσωπικό σας αριθμό. Θα τη βρείτε στο www.balab.aueb.gr/genpa/
I just added a note in the advice for writing LaTeX documents GitHub repository to avoid using the “itemize” environment, when you're describing elements. The “description” environment is better for this purpose.
github.com/dspinellis/l...
github.com/dspinellis/l...
October 27, 2025 at 11:58 AM
I just added a note in the advice for writing LaTeX documents GitHub repository to avoid using the “itemize” environment, when you're describing elements. The “description” environment is better for this purpose.
github.com/dspinellis/l...
github.com/dspinellis/l...
A feature in Nature journal published today takes us through the fascinating and frightening world of fake authors, reviewers, and articles. It mentions my recent work on fake articles attributed to known scholars.
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
How to spot fake scientists and stop them from publishing papers
Journals are considering doing identity checks to expose fake authors — but there are downsides.
www.nature.com
October 22, 2025 at 4:17 PM
A feature in Nature journal published today takes us through the fascinating and frightening world of fake authors, reviewers, and articles. It mentions my recent work on fake articles attributed to known scholars.
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Fun, fun, fun! I'm running a binary tournament merge to combine 64 SQLite databases (83 GB in total) into one. More details in doi.org/10.1109/MS.2...
October 18, 2025 at 11:27 AM
Fun, fun, fun! I'm running a binary tournament merge to combine 64 SQLite databases (83 GB in total) into one. More details in doi.org/10.1109/MS.2...
A big problem with reviewing GenAI-written text is that it is often (by design) very plausible but it can also be incorrect or superfluous, therefore requiring substantial concentrated effort to detect.
October 9, 2025 at 12:57 PM
A big problem with reviewing GenAI-written text is that it is often (by design) very plausible but it can also be incorrect or superfluous, therefore requiring substantial concentrated effort to detect.
Following the permanent loss of 858TB data due to a fire in a South Korea government datacenter, here's a reminder on the several technologies that are NOT backup solutions:
koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/2025-10...
koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/2025-10...
NIRS fire destroys government's cloud storage system, no backups available
A fire at the National Information Resources Service (NIRS) Daejeon headquarters destroyed the government’s G-Drive cloud storage system, erasing work files saved individually by some 750,000 civil se...
koreajoongangdaily.joins.com
October 7, 2025 at 6:33 AM
Following the permanent loss of 858TB data due to a fire in a South Korea government datacenter, here's a reminder on the several technologies that are NOT backup solutions:
koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/2025-10...
koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/2025-10...
Saw the following hidden deep inside the Linux kernel arm compilation commands. I don't think that the arguments were arbitrarily ordered 😃
ar mPiT init/main.o vmlinux.a arch/arm/kernel/head.o
ar mPiT init/main.o vmlinux.a arch/arm/kernel/head.o
October 3, 2025 at 7:43 AM
Saw the following hidden deep inside the Linux kernel arm compilation commands. I don't think that the arguments were arbitrarily ordered 😃
ar mPiT init/main.o vmlinux.a arch/arm/kernel/head.o
ar mPiT init/main.o vmlinux.a arch/arm/kernel/head.o
Why I Choose Email Over Messaging
My colleagues and friends know that I prefer to communicate with them via email rather than chat messaging. There are many benefits in such a choice. You may want to consider them and adopt the same stance.
www.spinellis.gr/blog/2025092...
My colleagues and friends know that I prefer to communicate with them via email rather than chat messaging. There are many benefits in such a choice. You may want to consider them and adopt the same stance.
www.spinellis.gr/blog/2025092...
September 26, 2025 at 5:21 PM
Why I Choose Email Over Messaging
My colleagues and friends know that I prefer to communicate with them via email rather than chat messaging. There are many benefits in such a choice. You may want to consider them and adopt the same stance.
www.spinellis.gr/blog/2025092...
My colleagues and friends know that I prefer to communicate with them via email rather than chat messaging. There are many benefits in such a choice. You may want to consider them and adopt the same stance.
www.spinellis.gr/blog/2025092...
With all the GenAI buzz we tend to forget the value of 100% correct deterministic tools. Thank you Rust clippy!
![Checking uu_sed v0.0.1 (/xfs/dds/sed/src/uu/sed)
error: manual implementation of `.is_multiple_of()`
--> src/uu/sed/src/fast_io.rs:869:8
|
869 | if (out_off + head_align) % block_size != 0 {
| ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ help: replace with: `!(out_off + head_align).is_multiple_of(block_size)`
|
= help: for further information visit https://rust-lang.github.io/rust-clippy/master/index.html#manual_is_multiple_of
= note: `-D clippy::manual-is-multiple-of` implied by `-D warnings`
= help: to override `-D warnings` add `#[allow(clippy::manual_is_multiple_of)]`](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:34na47mry5rtwq3l7xm6w3hc/bafkreibuma6qblwlmb7ixiez6bzz5nuegyf3mlmsihat44ebtzefk5dwa4@jpeg)
September 19, 2025 at 5:35 PM
With all the GenAI buzz we tend to forget the value of 100% correct deterministic tools. Thank you Rust clippy!
TIL that setting Turnitin checks to *include* bibliographic references (a check typically disabled, as it generates false positive matches) can help identifying hallucinated generative AI references (as these are less likely to appear elsewhere).
September 5, 2025 at 11:09 PM
TIL that setting Turnitin checks to *include* bibliographic references (a check typically disabled, as it generates false positive matches) can help identifying hallucinated generative AI references (as these are less likely to appear elsewhere).
A special place in Hell is reserved who those who create in their programs custom editing areas where the operating system's keyboard editing bindings, copy, paste, and our macros stop working.
August 30, 2025 at 7:35 PM
A special place in Hell is reserved who those who create in their programs custom editing areas where the operating system's keyboard editing bindings, copy, paste, and our macros stop working.
Reposted by Diomidis Spinellis
Since search is dead, how soon do you think Google Scholar is headed for the Google Graveyard? I'm betting it's soon, and academia is NOT prepared
Google Scholar Is Doomed
Academia built entire careers on a free Google service with zero guarantees. What could go wrong?
hannahshelley.neocities.org
August 13, 2025 at 1:28 AM
Since search is dead, how soon do you think Google Scholar is headed for the Google Graveyard? I'm betting it's soon, and academia is NOT prepared
That's a first! As I write a program's error message, I catch myself thinking whether GenAI will be able to understand it and produce a useful suggestion. (It does.)
 and sign in (or register).
* Generate an API key.
2. **Set the environment variable** before running the script:
```bash
export MYODP_KEY="your_api_key_here"
./fetch-uspto.sh
```
Or prepend it inline:
```bash
MYODP_KEY="your_api_key_here" ./fetch-uspto.sh
```
3. If you want it to persist across sessions, add the line to your shell config (e.g., `~/.bashrc`, `~/.zshrc`):
```bash
export MYODP_KEY="your_api_key_here"
```
---
Do you want me to show you how to modify `fetch-uspto.sh` so that it gives clearer instructions (like printing how to set the variable), instead of just failing?](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:34na47mry5rtwq3l7xm6w3hc/bafkreih2us42pwl7r4cxvmfwlij56yjxo2oclsvx7oqcteudgkd4rueecq@jpeg)
August 24, 2025 at 3:56 PM
That's a first! As I write a program's error message, I catch myself thinking whether GenAI will be able to understand it and produce a useful suggestion. (It does.)
![— In UML create a comment note.
— In UML diagrams, a **comment** (or “note”) is shown as a rectangle with a dog-eared corner.
Graphviz can mimic this by using `shape=note`.
Example in DOT:
```dot
digraph UML_Comment {
rankdir=LR;
node [fontname="Arial", fontsize=12];
// Regular UML component
A [label="«component»\nOrder Service", shape=component];
// UML comment
Cmt [label="Processes orders\nand handles payments", shape=note, style=filled, fillcolor="#ffffcc"];
// Dashed association from comment to element
Cmt -> A [style=dashed, arrowhead=none];
}
```
**Key points:**
* `shape=note` → dog-eared corner rectangle.
* `fillcolor` → makes the note background match UML style (light yellow is common).
* `style=dashed, arrowhead=none` → matches UML’s “annotates” relationship from a comment to a model element.
---
If you want, I can insert UML comment nodes into your **O1/O2 Graphviz diagram** to annotate entire clusters or specific tasks, so they look like sticky notes connected to the relevant part. Would you like me to do that?](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:34na47mry5rtwq3l7xm6w3hc/bafkreiaifxbhfdl5pkwcpva4ao6dt4yc5xaqnbt4b7jiesm3jme7p75oma@jpeg)
Reposted by Diomidis Spinellis
This kind of thing looks like an opportunity for a new generation of developers to make their mark in open source
What are the challenges and gains when porting legacy systems software written in C into #Rust? Here's my own experience porting the BSD Unix / macOS stream editor sed into Rust as part of #uutils.
IEEE Software article: doi.org/10.1109/MS.2...
Source code: github.com/uutils/sed/
IEEE Software article: doi.org/10.1109/MS.2...
Source code: github.com/uutils/sed/
GitHub - uutils/sed: Rewrite of sed in Rust
Rewrite of sed in Rust. Contribute to uutils/sed development by creating an account on GitHub.
github.com
August 9, 2025 at 5:51 AM
This kind of thing looks like an opportunity for a new generation of developers to make their mark in open source
What are the challenges and gains when porting legacy systems software written in C into #Rust? Here's my own experience porting the BSD Unix / macOS stream editor sed into Rust as part of #uutils.
IEEE Software article: doi.org/10.1109/MS.2...
Source code: github.com/uutils/sed/
IEEE Software article: doi.org/10.1109/MS.2...
Source code: github.com/uutils/sed/
GitHub - uutils/sed: Rewrite of sed in Rust
Rewrite of sed in Rust. Contribute to uutils/sed development by creating an account on GitHub.
github.com
August 8, 2025 at 1:13 PM
What are the challenges and gains when porting legacy systems software written in C into #Rust? Here's my own experience porting the BSD Unix / macOS stream editor sed into Rust as part of #uutils.
IEEE Software article: doi.org/10.1109/MS.2...
Source code: github.com/uutils/sed/
IEEE Software article: doi.org/10.1109/MS.2...
Source code: github.com/uutils/sed/
I'm sure psychologists have a diagnostic name for this disorder.
August 7, 2025 at 11:32 AM
I'm sure psychologists have a diagnostic name for this disorder.
Ever wondered why car ergonomics have gone down the drain as touch screens replaced buttons to drive down costs? This reader comment on an @financialtimes.com article on the topic says it all.
July 9, 2025 at 11:02 AM
Ever wondered why car ergonomics have gone down the drain as touch screens replaced buttons to drive down costs? This reader comment on an @financialtimes.com article on the topic says it all.
My LLM coding interactions taught me that their benchmark results vastly overstate their capabilities. The paper by M. Mancoridis et al. “Potemkin Understanding in LLMs” explains and formalizes my feeling. Benchmarks derived from human tests are unsuitable for LLM assessment. doi.org/10.48550/arX...
June 27, 2025 at 6:12 PM
My LLM coding interactions taught me that their benchmark results vastly overstate their capabilities. The paper by M. Mancoridis et al. “Potemkin Understanding in LLMs” explains and formalizes my feeling. Benchmarks derived from human tests are unsuitable for LLM assessment. doi.org/10.48550/arX...
This week two US courts ruled in favor of AI's use of copyrighted works to train LLMs. How is such a use legal? Should it be legal? Two questions with very different answers. More (and an explanation of the audio cassette's relevance) at www.spinellis.gr/blog/20250626/
June 26, 2025 at 11:50 AM
This week two US courts ruled in favor of AI's use of copyrighted works to train LLMs. How is such a use legal? Should it be legal? Two questions with very different answers. More (and an explanation of the audio cassette's relevance) at www.spinellis.gr/blog/20250626/
Reposted by Diomidis Spinellis
Predatory journals should not mess with Diomidis Spinellis (@coolsweng.bsky.social)
doi.org/10.1186/s410...
N.B.this journal, full of AI-generated crap has DOIs and is listed in Crossref, but not DOAJ.
doi.org/10.1186/s410...
N.B.this journal, full of AI-generated crap has DOIs and is listed in Crossref, but not DOAJ.
False authorship: an explorative case study around an AI-generated article published under my name - Research Integrity and Peer Review
Background The proliferation of generative artificial intelligence (AI) has facilitated the creation and publication of fraudulent scientific articles, often in predatory journals. This study investig...
doi.org
June 19, 2025 at 12:17 PM
Predatory journals should not mess with Diomidis Spinellis (@coolsweng.bsky.social)
doi.org/10.1186/s410...
N.B.this journal, full of AI-generated crap has DOIs and is listed in Crossref, but not DOAJ.
doi.org/10.1186/s410...
N.B.this journal, full of AI-generated crap has DOIs and is listed in Crossref, but not DOAJ.
The fascinating story of how Microsoft Office developers moved from a proprietary version control system to Git. danielsada.tech/blog/carreer...
Part 7: Office Migration from Source Depot to Git, or how I learned to love DevEx. | Daniel Sada Caraveo | Developer Productivity & Culture
Part 7 of my software journey, getting to know developer experience.
danielsada.tech
June 13, 2025 at 7:01 AM
The fascinating story of how Microsoft Office developers moved from a proprietary version control system to Git. danielsada.tech/blog/carreer...
Here's how machine learning can be applied to detect risky software changes and thereby increase the reliability of a large bank's IT systems. medium.com/ing-blog/lev...
Leveraging AIOps for Enhanced Change Reliability at ING
From an Idea to Moving to Production
medium.com
June 11, 2025 at 3:31 PM
Here's how machine learning can be applied to detect risky software changes and thereby increase the reliability of a large bank's IT systems. medium.com/ing-blog/lev...
Wow! The Rust compiler correctly guessed the correct method I should be calling. Helpful and very impressive error handling!
May 29, 2025 at 5:57 PM
Wow! The Rust compiler correctly guessed the correct method I should be calling. Helpful and very impressive error handling!