Vlad Haltakov
@haltakov.net
Building products in the age of AI. Automating everything. Ex-VP Eng (cybersecurity), ex-BMW (self-driving).
Found the best tester for simple.photo! Gave it to my 7 years old who just started school and let him create a gallery with his Pokemon images.
He is doing quite well, but I found few things to improve in the UX!
He is doing quite well, but I found few things to improve in the UX!
November 12, 2025 at 5:53 PM
Found the best tester for simple.photo! Gave it to my 7 years old who just started school and let him create a gallery with his Pokemon images.
He is doing quite well, but I found few things to improve in the UX!
He is doing quite well, but I found few things to improve in the UX!
We had a quick planning session with my friend with whom I'm working on Simple Photo Gallery to outline what we need to do before launch of the web app.
We used the best planning tool - a text file 😅
Are we gonna make it by the end of this week?
We used the best planning tool - a text file 😅
Are we gonna make it by the end of this week?
October 28, 2025 at 8:51 PM
We had a quick planning session with my friend with whom I'm working on Simple Photo Gallery to outline what we need to do before launch of the web app.
We used the best planning tool - a text file 😅
Are we gonna make it by the end of this week?
We used the best planning tool - a text file 😅
Are we gonna make it by the end of this week?
Cheetah knows Breaking Bad
October 24, 2025 at 8:05 AM
Cheetah knows Breaking Bad
For comparison, these are my results, so I'm officially more creative than the SotA LLMs 😅
That being said, there are much more creative people than me, like for example @waitbutwhy.
https://x.com/waitbutwhy/status/1426570321109336069
That being said, there are much more creative people than me, like for example @waitbutwhy.
https://x.com/waitbutwhy/status/1426570321109336069
October 23, 2025 at 8:56 PM
For comparison, these are my results, so I'm officially more creative than the SotA LLMs 😅
That being said, there are much more creative people than me, like for example @waitbutwhy.
https://x.com/waitbutwhy/status/1426570321109336069
That being said, there are much more creative people than me, like for example @waitbutwhy.
https://x.com/waitbutwhy/status/1426570321109336069
Recently @karpathy talked about how unvaried LLM responses are because of distribution collapse.
So, I wondered how creative LLMs will be on the Divergent Association Task - come up with 10 words that are as different as possible from each other.
Spoiler alert - they suck 👇
So, I wondered how creative LLMs will be on the Divergent Association Task - come up with 10 words that are as different as possible from each other.
Spoiler alert - they suck 👇
October 23, 2025 at 8:56 PM
Recently @karpathy talked about how unvaried LLM responses are because of distribution collapse.
So, I wondered how creative LLMs will be on the Divergent Association Task - come up with 10 words that are as different as possible from each other.
Spoiler alert - they suck 👇
So, I wondered how creative LLMs will be on the Divergent Association Task - come up with 10 words that are as different as possible from each other.
Spoiler alert - they suck 👇
ChatGPT thinks I'm suicidal...
October 23, 2025 at 8:20 PM
ChatGPT thinks I'm suicidal...
Browser agents are lazy bastards
Ask them to do some repetitive work and they just hallucinate the answer. Gemini does it and OpenAI Atlas does it. They were supposed to save us time, not "simulate" the work!
@sama @OfficialLoganK make these GPUs go brrrr please!
Ask them to do some repetitive work and they just hallucinate the answer. Gemini does it and OpenAI Atlas does it. They were supposed to save us time, not "simulate" the work!
@sama @OfficialLoganK make these GPUs go brrrr please!
October 21, 2025 at 8:28 PM
Browser agents are lazy bastards
Ask them to do some repetitive work and they just hallucinate the answer. Gemini does it and OpenAI Atlas does it. They were supposed to save us time, not "simulate" the work!
@sama @OfficialLoganK make these GPUs go brrrr please!
Ask them to do some repetitive work and they just hallucinate the answer. Gemini does it and OpenAI Atlas does it. They were supposed to save us time, not "simulate" the work!
@sama @OfficialLoganK make these GPUs go brrrr please!
OpenAI Atlas cannot download images...
October 21, 2025 at 8:19 PM
OpenAI Atlas cannot download images...
How can I misspell my own name twice in a simple repo 🤦♂️
October 21, 2025 at 7:25 PM
How can I misspell my own name twice in a simple repo 🤦♂️
Cancelled my Adobe "monthly" subscription, 4 days before the end of the yearly period
October 21, 2025 at 12:20 PM
Cancelled my Adobe "monthly" subscription, 4 days before the end of the yearly period
Gemini 2.5 Pro Computer Use straight up refusing to do what I ask it to do, because it is not the original task, lol.
I need Asimov's 3rd law implemented in Gemini @OfficialLoganK please!
I need Asimov's 3rd law implemented in Gemini @OfficialLoganK please!
October 16, 2025 at 3:00 PM
Gemini 2.5 Pro Computer Use straight up refusing to do what I ask it to do, because it is not the original task, lol.
I need Asimov's 3rd law implemented in Gemini @OfficialLoganK please!
I need Asimov's 3rd law implemented in Gemini @OfficialLoganK please!
Launched on Product Hunt and 2 times on Hacke News - got couple of views.
Commented in a HN thread on Sunday - 300+ views and counting...
Commented in a HN thread on Sunday - 300+ views and counting...
October 13, 2025 at 8:31 PM
Launched on Product Hunt and 2 times on Hacke News - got couple of views.
Commented in a HN thread on Sunday - 300+ views and counting...
Commented in a HN thread on Sunday - 300+ views and counting...
Changing “loading” to “thinking” is such a perfect flex for any AI startup.
It’s a small tweak but instantly makes your product feel more agentic.
Love how Klaas nailed it.
It’s a small tweak but instantly makes your product feel more agentic.
Love how Klaas nailed it.
October 6, 2025 at 6:31 PM
Changing “loading” to “thinking” is such a perfect flex for any AI startup.
It’s a small tweak but instantly makes your product feel more agentic.
Love how Klaas nailed it.
It’s a small tweak but instantly makes your product feel more agentic.
Love how Klaas nailed it.
The unfortunate thing about Product Hunt is that most people only look at the featured products. So if you are beyond position 7 it is difficult.
Next time, I need to put more effort at the beginning of the launch to bump it to a higher position.
👇
Next time, I need to put more effort at the beginning of the launch to bump it to a higher position.
👇
October 6, 2025 at 3:01 PM
The unfortunate thing about Product Hunt is that most people only look at the featured products. So if you are beyond position 7 it is difficult.
Next time, I need to put more effort at the beginning of the launch to bump it to a higher position.
👇
Next time, I need to put more effort at the beginning of the launch to bump it to a higher position.
👇
We got 100 visitors, mostly from Product Hunt.
This is not actually that bad give that the tool is quite niche - a CLI tool for creating photo galleries.
We are at 10 GitHub ⭐️ now, up from 4, which is good.
👇
This is not actually that bad give that the tool is quite niche - a CLI tool for creating photo galleries.
We are at 10 GitHub ⭐️ now, up from 4, which is good.
👇
October 6, 2025 at 3:01 PM
We got 100 visitors, mostly from Product Hunt.
This is not actually that bad give that the tool is quite niche - a CLI tool for creating photo galleries.
We are at 10 GitHub ⭐️ now, up from 4, which is good.
👇
This is not actually that bad give that the tool is quite niche - a CLI tool for creating photo galleries.
We are at 10 GitHub ⭐️ now, up from 4, which is good.
👇
Prisma blocked a DB reset by Cursor Agent, very interesting!
In this case I told the agent to reset the DEV DB, so it was fine. However, it is interesting that tool providers like Prisma are now integrating protection agains agents!
In this case I told the agent to reset the DEV DB, so it was fine. However, it is interesting that tool providers like Prisma are now integrating protection agains agents!
October 5, 2025 at 10:03 PM
Prisma blocked a DB reset by Cursor Agent, very interesting!
In this case I told the agent to reset the DEV DB, so it was fine. However, it is interesting that tool providers like Prisma are now integrating protection agains agents!
In this case I told the agent to reset the DEV DB, so it was fine. However, it is interesting that tool providers like Prisma are now integrating protection agains agents!
Mobile is almost perfect... The key was creating a vertical version of the hero image to not load the big portions on the side.
Resources 👇
Resources 👇
October 1, 2025 at 4:15 PM
Mobile is almost perfect... The key was creating a vertical version of the hero image to not load the big portions on the side.
Resources 👇
Resources 👇
Next step in the SEO journey - technical SEO improvements for Simple Photo Gallery:
- Converted images to AVIF and reduced dimensions giving >80% size reduction 🤯
- Fixed an SEO error in robots.txt
- Fixed small accessibility issues
Got all metrics to 100 on desktop 👇
x.com/haltakov/st...
- Converted images to AVIF and reduced dimensions giving >80% size reduction 🤯
- Fixed an SEO error in robots.txt
- Fixed small accessibility issues
Got all metrics to 100 on desktop 👇
x.com/haltakov/st...
October 1, 2025 at 4:15 PM
Next step in the SEO journey - technical SEO improvements for Simple Photo Gallery:
- Converted images to AVIF and reduced dimensions giving >80% size reduction 🤯
- Fixed an SEO error in robots.txt
- Fixed small accessibility issues
Got all metrics to 100 on desktop 👇
x.com/haltakov/st...
- Converted images to AVIF and reduced dimensions giving >80% size reduction 🤯
- Fixed an SEO error in robots.txt
- Fixed small accessibility issues
Got all metrics to 100 on desktop 👇
x.com/haltakov/st...
Useful feature if you want to test your website on slow Internet connections (and you don't live in Germany, lol).
Open Chrome Dev Tools, go to the Network tab and enable throttling. Choose the desired speed and refresh the page. Same in Firefox.
Open Chrome Dev Tools, go to the Network tab and enable throttling. Choose the desired speed and refresh the page. Same in Firefox.
September 30, 2025 at 6:00 PM
Useful feature if you want to test your website on slow Internet connections (and you don't live in Germany, lol).
Open Chrome Dev Tools, go to the Network tab and enable throttling. Choose the desired speed and refresh the page. Same in Firefox.
Open Chrome Dev Tools, go to the Network tab and enable throttling. Choose the desired speed and refresh the page. Same in Firefox.
Here is without BlurHash. Note that even progressive JPEGs look terrible. The difference is incredible!
Now ont he progressive JPEGs... 👇
Now ont he progressive JPEGs... 👇
September 30, 2025 at 3:30 PM
Here is without BlurHash. Note that even progressive JPEGs look terrible. The difference is incredible!
Now ont he progressive JPEGs... 👇
Now ont he progressive JPEGs... 👇
The idea is to process all image offline, compute their BlurHashes and embed them in your HTML code in image placeholders. This is particularly useful for image heavy sites like photo galleries.
See how a large gallery works with BlurHash in the video
Without it is much worse👇
See how a large gallery works with BlurHash in the video
Without it is much worse👇
September 30, 2025 at 3:30 PM
The idea is to process all image offline, compute their BlurHashes and embed them in your HTML code in image placeholders. This is particularly useful for image heavy sites like photo galleries.
See how a large gallery works with BlurHash in the video
Without it is much worse👇
See how a large gallery works with BlurHash in the video
Without it is much worse👇
The BlurHash is a super low resolution version of the image that is blurred when upscaled.
For example, this image thumbnail is 5KB, while the BlurHash is 28B, which is just 0.5% of the size. In fact here is the exact hash:
LMIi2,jDR-t8%in$V@af~qR+sRjF
Who created it? 👇
For example, this image thumbnail is 5KB, while the BlurHash is 28B, which is just 0.5% of the size. In fact here is the exact hash:
LMIi2,jDR-t8%in$V@af~qR+sRjF
Who created it? 👇
September 30, 2025 at 3:30 PM
The BlurHash is a super low resolution version of the image that is blurred when upscaled.
For example, this image thumbnail is 5KB, while the BlurHash is 28B, which is just 0.5% of the size. In fact here is the exact hash:
LMIi2,jDR-t8%in$V@af~qR+sRjF
Who created it? 👇
For example, this image thumbnail is 5KB, while the BlurHash is 28B, which is just 0.5% of the size. In fact here is the exact hash:
LMIi2,jDR-t8%in$V@af~qR+sRjF
Who created it? 👇
BlurHash saves you from slow Internet connections
Sites with many images look ugly and broken when the connection is slow. You can improve the experience a lot using BlurHash.
It adds a super efficient blurred placeholder of the image.
Here is how it works 👇
Sites with many images look ugly and broken when the connection is slow. You can improve the experience a lot using BlurHash.
It adds a super efficient blurred placeholder of the image.
Here is how it works 👇
September 30, 2025 at 3:30 PM
BlurHash saves you from slow Internet connections
Sites with many images look ugly and broken when the connection is slow. You can improve the experience a lot using BlurHash.
It adds a super efficient blurred placeholder of the image.
Here is how it works 👇
Sites with many images look ugly and broken when the connection is slow. You can improve the experience a lot using BlurHash.
It adds a super efficient blurred placeholder of the image.
Here is how it works 👇
Creating both horizontal and vertical variants is important, because if you display a horizontal image on mobile, you need a lot of Y resolution, but only 35% of the image is actually visible.
👇
👇
September 29, 2025 at 3:30 PM
Creating both horizontal and vertical variants is important, because if you display a horizontal image on mobile, you need a lot of Y resolution, but only 35% of the image is actually visible.
👇
👇