I finally wrote the book I kept threatening to write for a few years on and off: Why Developers Code In Dark. It is out now on Leanpub. You can grab it here: https://leanpub.com/whydeveloperscodeinthedark
This book looks at a thing many of us quietly do, shipping code late at night, and asks a simple question: why does working in the dark work for so many developers? The answer is not just “no meetings”. There is psychology, physiology, and culture in the mix, plus trade offs that deserve an honest look.
I like good tools as much as anyone, but the last couple of weeks around Anthropic’s Claude 4 family have been a reminder that you can’t build your working life on shifting sand. Models change, limits move, and entire features wobble without much notice. Useful? Absolutely. Dependable enough to be your only plan? Not even close.
What changed If you’ve been anywhere near Claude lately you’ve probably felt the turbulence. Some days are fine; other days you’re staring at elevated errors, partial outages, or features that feel half-broken.
For a long time this site hasn’t had comments. When I moved from WordPress to a static site generator, the old commenting system didn’t come along for the ride. The result was simple pages, fast builds, and a very quiet comment box that no longer existed.
I’ve gone back and forth on whether to bring comments back. Most days I enjoy the focus of writing and publishing without worrying about moderation. Other days I miss the conversations that used to happen underneath posts. I’ve had emails and DMs that would have been even more useful as public threads, where other readers could add context or correct me when I get something wrong.
I write software for a living, often as a freelancer/consultant. My faith doesn’t make me louder; it makes me clearer. It’s the thing that nudges me toward honesty, courage, and high‑quality work when nobody is watching.
I built a small app called Regex Battle. It lives at https://regexbattle.com and it turns regular expressions into a head to head game. You get a prompt, a timer starts, and your goal is to write a regex that meets the challenge before the clock hits zero. You can play against another person or against a bot if you want to practice solo.
Regex Battle is a PvP regular expression battle game with a bot and PvP mode. Each round gives you an objective and a set of example strings. Your job is to write a pattern that matches what it should and rejects what it should not. When you submit, the app checks your regex against the round tests and shows the result. Fast and correct beats slow and almost. Simple as that.
I learned early that a day job will keep you busy, but it will not always stretch you. If you want to move forward, you have to put in reps outside the clock. Not forever, not at the cost of your life, but long enough and often enough to build range.
I started in an agency. Fast pace, many clients, constant context switching. I worked late nights and some weekends because I wanted to get better. That is not a long term lifestyle and I do not recommend burning yourself out, but those seasons taught me how to ship, how to debug under pressure, and how to own the result. They also taught me to set better boundaries later. You can hold both truths: growth often requires extra effort, and health requires rest.
I have been cooking with the Meater Pro XL for a while now after coming from the original Meater Block. I loved the hands‑off promise back then, but the first‑gen hardware could be flaky for me. The Pro XL got my attention because the probes were redesigned and the block was updated. After dozens of cooks, I am happy to say this is the Meater setup I wanted in the first place. It is not perfect, but it is close enough that I reach for it every weekend.
Almost two years ago I deactivated my LinkedIn. Not paused. Not lurking. Gone. I have not missed it for a single day.
I have never received a real opportunity through LinkedIn. The good work in my career has come through people who know me: former clients, colleagues, friends of friends. Conversations, coffee, shipping things together. In Australia especially, our circles are smaller than you think. Reputation travels faster than an algorithmic feed ever will.
I love Nintendo hardware and I was excited for the Switch 2. The form factor is better, the Joy‑Con 2 controllers feel sturdier, and the bigger 7.9‑inch 1080p screen is a real upgrade. Docked 4K output and the revised internals make older games feel fresher too. On paper, this is exactly what I wanted. In practice, the software side still feels thin for a brand‑new console.
What’s good Hardware. Nintendo kept the magic of the original and tightened almost everything: a nicer screen with HDR/VRR, revised Joy‑Cons with new tricks like mouse‑style input, and a sturdier build. Even enhanced ports like Cyberpunk 2077 are surprisingly playable here, with a proper physical 64 GB cartridge option on day one. That last bit matters to me.
For the past ten years, every good opportunity in my career has come through people. Former clients who referred me. Colleagues who remembered a job I did well. Friends of friends who needed help and trusted the recommendation. In Australia especially, the circles in tech are smaller than you think and the degree of separation is tiny.
If you build real connections, you can often sidestep the mess that is interviewing and get hired for the work you actually do, not for how fast you can solve an algorithm on a whiteboard. I am genuinely grateful for that.