# Recently - October 2021


## WFH, Month 19

I was pretty heads-down on work this month. I'm working on a relatively
greenfield project that's had some fun opportunities to make architectural
decisions. It's very satisfying work, but it's the type of work that stays stuck
in your head, making it hard to switch out of "work mode" at the end of the day.

I feel really lucky to have a job that I enjoy, but after ~19 months of working
from home, the lack of clear boundaries between "work" and "not work" continues
to be a challenge. I'm a morning person, and it's tempting/easy to just "start
working" when I wake up, meaning that my days are frequently... longer than
"normal working hours" than I'd like to admit.

It seems like the January 2022 return-to-office date just might stick (fingers
crossed), and I've been going to work from an office a couple days a week.
Looking forward to seeing coworkers in person again, and starting to rebuild
routines that better timebox my working hours...

## New Monitor

I've been using a ~10 year old Apple Cinema display (24", 1080p) for the
duration of the COVID work-from-home. It was getting quite long-in-the-tooth, so
I decided to upgrade to something slightly larger. I ended up settling on a 27"
4K [Dell S2721QS](https://www.rtings.com/monitor/reviews/dell/s2721qs), and it's
been great so far.

I've come to terms with the fact that I don't do much (any) desktop gaming
anymore -- and so many of the "gaming monitor" features that get really heavily
pushed have little bearing on how I actually use a monitor. When I was
researching which monitor to get, I weighted text clarity highest.

Upgrading from 1080p to 4K was pretty noticeable, as was going from a 24" to a
27" display. I wish I'd upgraded earlier -- the comfort improvement alone was
well worth it.

## git-branchless

As part of the work project I mentioned, I've been working in Git again, after 2
years of using Google's
[internal SCM](https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2016/7/204032-why-google-stores-billions-of-lines-of-code-in-a-single-repository/fulltext).
(This also prompted this month's post on
[code review tools](/blog/2021/10/17/Features-of-Excellent-Code-Review-Tools/)).

I have a lot more to say about this, but vanilla Git is just... not great,
folks. As a
[Schelling point](<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Focal_point_(game_theory)>) for
a common standard for open source SCM, it's great. Git as a "force in the world"
has had a hugely positive influence. But, the day-to-day developer ergonomics
leave a lot to be desired.

I've been using [git-branchless](https://github.com/arxanas/git-branchless),
which recreates some of the [Mercurial](https://www.mercurial-scm.org/)-esque
workflow features that Google's (and Facebook's ("Meta's"?)) internal SCMs use.
Git-branchless is a step change in productivity above vanilla Git, in my
opinion. The big idea is moving from a branch-based workflow to an amend-heavy
stacked-commit workflow.

Over the past couple weeks, I started
[making some contributions](https://github.com/arxanas/git-branchless/commits?author=bcongdon)
to `git-branchless`. So far, I've added a couple interactive navigation commands
to make it easier to traverse stacked commits. But, I have some additional ideas
to smooth over some rough parts of my Git workflow that I'd like to see in
git-branchless. It's been a fun way to get some more exposure to Rust, and I've
been picking up some knowledge about Git internals that's been satisfying as
well. Source control management is one of those things that sounds simple in
theory, but when you actually working on the system's internals in, you stumble
upon a _metis_ of experiential knowledge that exposes the depth of complexity
inherent to the problem space.

There's a
[surprisingly](https://github.com/arxanas/git-branchless/wiki/Related-tools)
[large](https://github.com/epage/git-stack/blob/main/docs/comparison.md)
[ecosystem](https://github.com/martinvonz/jj) of adjacent Git tools based on a
similar philosophy, which I was excited to discover.

## Reading

**[Recursion](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42046112-recursion)** (5/5): A
sci-fi thriller with an unconventional take on time travel. Can't say much more
about the plot without spoilers, but I appreciated how thoroughly _Recusion_
explored its premise. Very entertaining.

**[Die with Zero: Getting All You Can from Your Money and Your Life](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52950915-die-with-zero)**
(4/5): Personal finance book. Explores the thesis that your goal should be to
"die with $0" -- e.g. spend down your lifetime earnings before you die. This is
one of those books, where the audience really matters -- it's clearly aimed at
well-off, but cautious/frugally-minded people. If you're in the target audience,
I think it has a pretty good message. Unfortunately, a lot of the advice boils
down to "spend more on experiences", which is a bit cliche now.

**[Fall of Koli](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/53321887-the-fall-of-koli)**
(5/5): I finished reading the "Ramparts Trilogy", and recommend it as good
apocalyptic sci-fi. I wrote a bit about the first book
[back in August](/blog/2021/08/31/Recently-August-2021/). The writing stayed
consistently good throughout the series and the plots of the first two books
paid off nicely in the third book.

## Watching

I haven't been watching much these days and, as one can tell, I mostly watch
zeitgeisty things. 🤷‍♂️

**[Dune](<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_(2021_film)>)**: Visually superb
but, wow, would you be lost if you hadn't read the book already. I was glad to
hear that the "part 2" was green-lit.

**[Squid Game](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squid_Game)**: Enjoyable, but
leaned too hard into "shock factor" violence, and was about 2 episodes too long.

## Assorted Links

-   [I Don't Know How To Count That Low](https://acesounderglass.com/2021/10/20/i-dont-know-how-to-count-that-low/) -
    On the failure mode of only attempting to address problems with large
    scale/scope. (Remember when everyone was continuously parroting "Web
    Scale"?)
-   [Do Chairs Exist?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXW-QjBsruE&ab_channel=Vsauce)
    (Video) - On the ontology of objects.
-   [Kerbal Space Program 2: Episode 4 - Celestial Architecting](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnQP5dhxlKU)
    (Video) - Development on KSP 2 seems to be chugging along. Looks pretty
    exciting!

Happy Halloween! 🎃🍫

_Cover: Ravenna Park, Seattle, WA_