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szastupov

154 karma · joined May 20, 2015

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szastupov··on An invisible desktop application that will help you pass technical interviews
> I believe live coding is a scourge and we should get rid of it altogether.

I would take an hour of live coding any time over a take-home task that is one hour only on paper and takes you three in reality.

Engineering is collaboration, and it's fair to expect candidates to talk, solve problems, and explain their solutions.

Where we could do better as an industry is the type of problems we give to people. I'm not a fan of LeetCode-style questions, especially when multiple ones are asked. Something closer to Earth would be better. But even if you have to ask something algorithmical, I'd prefer the style of "Advent of Code" exercises where the same problem has variations and multiple levels of complexity.

szastupov··on A pure WebAssembly / JavaScript port of FFmpeg
A few years ago I was using this port https://github.com/Kagami/ffmpeg.js

It was still asm.js but working just fine.

szastupov··on Vitamin D: the New Covid-19 Chloroquine?
Covid or not, you should test for vitamin deficiency and supplement if necessary. I do it every 3 month via Thriva (UK) and can see the progress.
szastupov··on Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (March 2020)
Location: London (on visa sponsorship)

Senior/Lead software engineer, full stack

Portfolio: https://stepan.xyz/projects

CV: https://stepan.xyz/cv

Email: stepan.zastupov@gmail.com

szastupov··on Ableton Connection Kit (2016)
Defiantly! As a guitar player you can also use it for live looping.
szastupov··on Ableton Connection Kit (2016)
Keep in mind that Lite version barely has any instruments so you'll have to either use 3rd-party plugins or rely on sampling.

A few month ago I decided to start fresh and removed all pirated DAWs, plugins, purchased Lite version and started learning it in and out. I was surprised how far you can go with just sampling. It was so much fun discovering new sample packs, chopping and remixing songs, trying to make tonal instruments out of weird noises. I've also realized how many popular songs use sampling (for example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eU5Dn-WaElI). So yeah, setting creative constraints is important ;)

I'm at the point when I'm super at home using Ableton and ready to spend more money on Suit, but holding hopes for black Friday discounts.

Also, shameless plug https://soundcloud.com/myprivateparadise

szastupov··on LastPass Extension slows Chrome's responsiveness by up to 50%
I honestly don’t understand why people use LastPass when everything about it screams poor quality. Is it the lack of taste or alternatives for non Apple platforms?
szastupov··on Netflix’s biggest competition isn’t sleep, it’s YouTube
I dunno, YouTube's catalog of originals is so tiny it can be watched during free trial. Even if Netflix catalog is smaller outside US it's still huge, originals are great and I'm willing to pay for it.
szastupov··on The faster you unlearn OOP, the better for you and your software
> Player.hits(Monster).with(Weapon)

The problem is that it's an artificial example, in reality you'll ave a lot of different monsters, weapons, and most importantly separate subsystems. I.e. physics processed in one pass, animation in another, same goes for custom logic and rendering.

Modern game engines use component systems that put data first for the same reasons author described in the post.

szastupov··on Ask HN: What tools have most helped your day-to-day productivity?
Also, stopping hating JavaScript and embracing it allowed me to do awesome things. I used to be a system/backend-only engineer, but once you get your head around UI, you get a lot more freedom.

And it's not just about getting MVPs out. For example, I had to make a few audio-processing algorithms, and in order to help myself understand and debug those, I build a simple web app to visualize each step of effects chain. Oh, and with hot module reloading, I can record a sample, then change the code and see updated results without losing the sample. Bret Victor level of productivity ;)

Oh, and after some bundling and transpiling (if necessary), I can run the same code in browsers, node.js and mobile (we're actually using jscore directly)!

szastupov··on Ask HN: What tools have most helped your day-to-day productivity?
It's totally fine to be a nerd about your tools, but sometimes, productivity comes when you stop being one.

I had major productivity boosts after switching from a nerdy tool, to a more mainstream one:

Linux -> Mac

Vim -> Emacs -> Sublime -> Vscode

Gdocs/OpenOffice/iWork -> MS Office

etc...

szastupov··on Blizzard's Battle.net Updater Installs Root Certificate
Well, they are very sloppy about security, look at the permissions they set for battle.net files https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DOvhmJ1WkAAFCSD.jpg (sorry for screenshot)
szastupov··on Don Jayamanne, creator of Python extension for VS Code, joins Microsoft
It uses Jedi under the hood, works ok for me. Sometimes it can't figure out the type, but that's when type annotations come handy.
szastupov··on Evolving the Dropbox Brand
Omg the site is so jerky in desktop Safari.
szastupov··on Trello Desktop for Mac and Windows: Get More Done Without Distractions
Slack used to use WebKit but they migrated to Electron for various reasons explained in their blog post https://slack.engineering/building-hybrid-applications-with-...
szastupov··on “We are working on getting Sublime Text 3.0 final ready to launch”
VSCode has out of the box debugger, git integration, higher quality of extensions, etc... Overall it feels more polished and professional.

But the most important thing is alive ecosystem - a lot of Sublime plugins are either dead or in maintenance mode, developers lost interest and moved to open source alternatives like Atom and VSCode.

P.S. Even though I moved to VSCode, I still love and respect Sublime.

szastupov··on Debian GNU/Hurd 2017 released
Obligatory XKCD link https://xkcd.com/1508/
szastupov··on Switching to the Mutt Email Client
I'm trying to say, that at that period of time, MacOS 9 was stuck in the past, even compared to Windows. This was in reference to Emacs limitations as a platform.
szastupov··on Switching to the Mutt Email Client
> But, just as it is a mistake to blindly cling to the old and comfortable, neophilia is a trap in itself.

Agree, there is always must bee a meedle path.

To answer your question about MacOS 9 comparisons, I meant technical limitations, like single threading issues, ui capabilities, you know. I may be wrong, though, I haven't paid attention to Emacs intervals for a while. Modern web-based platforms are far from perfect, but they are reacher.

szastupov··on Switching to the Mutt Email Client
Sorry, I didn't mean it to be hostile. But you're right, I'm expressing my frustration, perhaps a bit sarcastically. Of course everyone's needs and preference are different, I'm not trying to say I am the source of wisdom, just sharing my thoughts, you know ;)
szastupov··on Switching to the Mutt Email Client
I get the point about Emacs being a OS, but don't you think it's kind of a dated clunky OS? Like "Mac OS 9" was, lacking memory protection and pre-emptive multitasking. Why would anyone want to be limited by technology when the rest of the world is moving forward?
szastupov··on Switching to the Mutt Email Client
But you can extend IDEs just as well as you extend your vim/emacs. Not to mention, that for some users it's more convenient to hack extensions in Python (Sublime), Javascript/Coffee (Atom) or Typescript (vscode), rather than in weird dialect of lisp (lisp is cool, I encourage everyone to go and read SICP, but not elisp) or even worse, vim script.
szastupov··on Switching to the Mutt Email Client
I spent quiet some time setting up mutt or trying to make a real IDE out of vim or Emacs, but in the end it's just cargo cult and waste of time. There a modern email clients, IDEs, polished operating systems, etc., all built in this century. There is absolutely no need in wasting time scoring nerd points.
szastupov··on Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (May 2017)
Fullstack developer, a little over 10 years of experience, looking for work or a gig at (preferably) product company.

Location: Saint-Petersburg, Russia

Remote: Yes!

Willing to relocate: Yes

Technologies: Python, Javascript, Node, React, PostgreSQL, C/C++, Unix

CV: http://stackoverflow.com/story/szastupov

GitHub: https://github.com/szastupov

Email: stepan.zastupov at gmail

szastupov··on Sublime Text 3 dev build 3128 released
You are correct, I use 3126 too and it's more stable than Atom ever been :)
szastupov··on Sublime Text 3 dev build 3128 released
It doesn't break fonts completely but uses new default fonts instead of whatever spacegray specifies.
szastupov··on Sublime Text 3 dev build 3128 released
Excited to hear news from Sublime team!

I tried the new beta: it kinda breaks fonts in old themes (I use spacegray) but the new Adaptive theme looks pretty (I wish I could reduce tab bar height, though).

Also enjoyed switching UI and syntax themes via palette.

Overall looks great but for now I'll stick to ST3 stable release.

My #1 feature request is Sidebar API, you know, for version control integration.

szastupov··on Voice Calls: Secure, Crystal-Clear, AI-Powered
Judging from recent updates it's still alive. The version in AppStore might be stale (not sure) but if you install the version from site (https://macos.telegram.org) you'll get frequent update.e

But I must admit that amount of clients is confusing.

szastupov··on Roadmap to becoming a web developer in 2017
It totally depends on task at hand. If you have a db/forms heavy project than Rails/Django gives you advantage, if your project is more driven by interactions and subtle UX then SPA lets you focus on that.

Like, imagine how hard it would be to make Shopify as SPA (https://engineering.shopify.com/17489056-rebuilding-the-shop...). On the other hand, Trello would never feel so fluid if it was driven by server rendering (notice how weird Github projects comparing to Trello).

Personally, I've been doing SPA for years and think it's the right way for reach UI. But recently I had to build a form-heavy app and decided to go with classical server-side setup + some jQuery on client. Old school but very productive.

EDIT: added link to shopify blog.

szastupov··on Roadmap to becoming a web developer in 2017
Modern SPA tools require heavy tooling, which is fine but too overwhelming for a beginner. Even if the tools are easy to set up (create-react-app, next.js) they are thick layers, and when you start you better be closer to basics. jQuery is more basic.

Besides, not every project requires single page application interface. Sometimes, you'd be more productive with server-side rendering in classic framework like Rails and Django and and a bit of JS inside $(document).ready().

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