The Accidental Podcast
I automated audio versions of my essays, looked away for four months, and found a 22-episode back catalog. Meet Never the Stack, the podcast I never meant to start.
★tag · 12 essays
#side-projects
All essays tagged side-projects.
The Instrument and the Ledger
In June I itemized the AI subsidy by hand. This month I built the instrument that does it for me. It took an afternoon, and it was built by the very thing it measures.
★Barometer: I Chased a New Primitive. I Was Standing on It.
I built a serverless internet health monitor because I wanted an excuse to learn Lambda MicroVMs. The better lesson was that Barometer did not need the newest primitive. It needed the boring, correct fit between the tool and the job.
★Still in the Code
I lead engineering at a Fortune 100 company, and I still ship my own software. Not because leaders need to prove they can code, but because AI is changing the work faster than secondhand models can keep up.
★AI Did Not Configure My Network. It Helped Me Understand It.
A weekend home-networking project became a practical lesson in AI-assisted reasoning, documentation, guardrails, and engineering judgment.
Eleven Years, One Week, and an AI Co-Pilot: Rebuilding TravelTimes for iOS 26.4
A decade-old side project, six major features, one week. How spec-driven AI-assisted development compressed months of work into a focused sprint on a real codebase with real constraints — and where the AI got it wrong.
Meet Roci: My Always-On Personal AI Agent, One Month In
Back in January I wrote about OpenClaw as a concept. That post was the theory. This one is the implementation. One month running a dedicated EC2 instance, a name, and an agent I genuinely rely on.
How I Built a Production Notification System for TravelTimes in One Day with Claude Code
From 'users want commute alerts' to 1,800 lines of shipped, App Store-ready code in a single coding session. A deep dive into architecture, edge cases, and what AI-assisted iOS development actually looks like.
OpenClaw and the Rise of the 'Real' AI Assistant
An honest look at OpenClaw, the open-source AI personal assistant generating real excitement. What it does, what I learned running it, and why it matters for the future of enterprise AI.
Building My Own Productivity Tools: A Procrastinator's Journey
After testing every productivity app under the sun, I did what any reasonable engineer would do—I built my own. Two open-source, privacy-first task managers to help procrastinators like me get things done.
10 Years Later: A Journey of Continuous Learning Through Side Projects
Reflecting on a decade of staying hands-on in tech, fueled by curiosity, side projects, and a desire to never stop learning.
Back to Blogging: Two Decades in the Making
After two decades, I’m returning to blogging — back to sharing ideas, experiments, and the joy of connecting with curious minds.