MODULO LOTUS

👋 Hi!
I'm Matthew Davidson
Senior software engineer, entrepreneur, and former Buddhist monk for a couple weeks
This is my blog, where I mostly talk about tech, but occasionally other random odds and ends.

Recent blog posts

Why do Thai people use the "w" sound as a "v" substitute?

They're not close in production.

I declared nix bankruptcy

I gave up on nix-darwin, and reverted back to Homebrew.

Using IPA to improve my Thai

An exploration of using the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) to enhance Thai language learning, focusing on improved vowel pronunciation.

You should test less - skip irrelevant tests with impact analysis

Test-impact analysis (TIA) optimizes CI pipelines by running only relevant tests based on code changes, reducing test execution time and resource consumption.

Adding HTTP/2 client support to Aleph

A technical overview of implementing HTTP/2 client support in Aleph, detailing challenges with stream handling, protocol negotiation, and real-world implementation differences from the HTTP/2 specification.

Undertale in EXAPUNKS
Fun!

My mashup demo recreating Undertale inside the Zachtronics' game EXAPUNKS.

Test-induced design damage in Clojure

An exploration of test-induced design damage (TIDD) in Clojure, examining how code modifications made solely for testing can lead to unnecessary complexity, with comparisons of various approaches including with-redefs, binding, protocols, and the dynamic-redef library.

Arrhythmic Beats - IDM

A curated list of influential IDM artists and essential albums from the 90s, featuring Aphex Twin, Autechre, Boards of Canada, and more.

A case study in refactoring Clojure trie code for performance

A detailed exploration of optimizing Clojure trie implementation for performance, showing the progression from idiomatic but slow code to highly optimized JVM-specific implementations with significant speed improvements through algorithmic changes and JVM optimizations.

Using Clojure for the Cryptopals cryptography challenges

Insights and challenges from solving the Cryptopals cryptography exercises using Clojure, highlighting specific implementation issues, JVM limitations for byte manipulation, and offering tips for specific challenges.
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