Back to work after holidays

I returned to work after 2 weeks of Summer holidays. I feel refreshed, but the use of AI also seems to be in my face more fiercely.

A colleague seems to have taken the use of AI to the next level doing some kind of genetic algorithm-y programming by generating multiple exploratory solutions for a problem using agents and then trying to produce a next generation of solutions by selecting the best features of this one. This is super cool and something that wasn’t possible before the current era of agentic programming, but it also raises questions about how theory building, collaboration, code reviews, knowledge sharing, etc should evolve.

In this context, I found this post on why the author insists on writing commit messages by hand even for AI generated code insightful.

Another article that I found thought provoking is about how developing with LLMs can make you feel more burned out than if you built the comprehension as you wrote the code. It also comes with a nice UI with sliders to change different parameters and see how it impacts the developer’s burnout factor.

Meeting inter-generational friends in Bengaluru

We were able to meet a bunch of friends (and missed out on meeting some more) over the course of the week. We met a handful of kids of our friends ranging from the age of a month to 7 or 8 years old.

It was fun to see Niya skate for the first time in a competition with a “proper” rink. It was overwhelming for her to see so many kids and parents and the rink and all the excitement there. But, luckily she had enough time to talk to some other kids and let her parents distract her and give her some words of encouragement. She ended up doing great and winning a gold medal in her category that she was so thrilled to win!

I read the “Tiger who came to Tea” along with Aarush, while he was having lunch. My first surprise was him filling in the author’s (Judith Kerr) name when I started reading from the cover page. And then he continue to verbatim complete lines as I continued to read. It was also amazing to see him ask his mom for a flight tracker showing where his dad currently was. His mom and grand-mom weren’t sure where he learned about it’s existence (they hadn’t used it before, themselves). He probably extrapolated from cab rides or food delivery, but it was heart-warming to see such a tech-native/intuitive idea from a ~4 year old! And when it was time for me to leave, he wouldn’t let me. He had a good time too, I guess.

Addu caught me up on his football coaching and him having to miss a tournament for a family vacation during the Independence Day weekend. It sounded like he enjoyed the trek in Anantagiri, but would’ve preferred playing in the tournament over it. Also, briefly got to see how much work it is for their parents to keep Vismaya and Sharanya alive.

With time, I hope they don’t just remain kids of our friends, but we actually become inter-generational friends. :)

Physical Activity

This week was great workout wise. I was able to get to the gym on 4 days of the week! It was mostly me struggling with my cleans and jerks under Kavya’s supervision. It’s a great help with the learning curve to have physical supervision which I don’t get back home. It’s fun, but I’ve a long way to go before I feel confident about them.

I was also able to get join a Frisbee pick-up for a short while and played some doubles Badminton with Prats and friends.

Bond Touch - Long-Distance Bracelet

I learnt about this long-distance bracelet called Bond Touch from a friend, this week. It connects to your phone via bluetooth and lets you send a missing you “touch” to your loved one by simply touching your own band. It seems like a cool idea, given how difficult long-distance relationships can be. I wonder if people who wear fitness bands care to also wear another band like this!

Plain Text Accounting with Ledger Workshop

I’ve tinkered with ledger and beancount a little bit, and even gave Actual Budget a spin, but haven’t really been able to stick with using them consistently. I came across this tutorial on how to use and set things up with ledger which makes me want to give this all another try!

Divine Feminine by Prashasti Singh

Prashasti’s Divine Feminine was hilarious and thought-provoking at the same time. She touches on a varied topics around women, gender and marriage, etc especially in the Indian society.