Notes
What the work
actually cost.
Each note is one piece of engineering from a product we built and ran, with the bill attached. If you only read one, take the database we defended in writing and got wrong.
- We picked the wrong database.We modelled concurrency and got the right answer to the wrong question. D1 held a write lock for two to five seconds every two minutes, and signups failed inside that window.Read the note
- 29 languages, none translated.Local, not translated: a terminology table per language, the informal register wherever the language has one, and a locale order picked from a revenue model rather than a gut feeling.Read the note
- An agent gets no special path.There is no API tier, so row-level security is the authorisation boundary for a phone and for an agent alike. That made the agent interface cheap to add. The token handling is where the days went.Read the note
- Most crash reports are noise.Fingerprints from stack frames, a rate limiter for launch-day floods, and months of reclassifying platform noise as non-fatal. One fix closed 185 reports at once.Read the note
One mail. No form.
Tell us what is in the way.
Say what you're building and where it stopped.
Copy it into your mail client if that is easier.
The draft opens with
- What you are building
- What is in the way
- The stack
- When you want to start
The contact page says who answers, and what the reply contains.