South Software Content Suggestion #9
What I read and watch this week (Friday, September 20, 2024)
We’re back this week with new content to enjoy! Here I review content I consumed in the last week, so you can decide whether to go for it or not.
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Books
Bayesian Optimization in Action
Bayesian optimization is an effective technique for optimizing costly functions. This book explains a good amount of theory and shows many examples with state-of-the-art libraries to get to speed very fast.
Articles
A software engineer's guide to A/B testing
Practical suggestions about how to run A/B tests and don’t fall into common errors.
This article advocates the creation of a company CLI tool for increased productivity, and shows how to do it in practice.
State and Time are the same Thing
We know that one of the most common source of software bugs is mutable state. Functional programming is all about avoiding mutable state to achieve correct code. This article start from the idea that mutable state is a manifestation of advancement of time, and thus it cannot be totally avoided but embraced.
Your company needs Junior devs
A company with junior devs has a different culture from one where only experienced people are accepted. More teaching is needed, senior people need to share effectively their knowledge, and juniors can also bring a new vision to things. Hiring juniors may require effort, but it can be totally worth it.
Your use of AI is directly harming the environment I live in
An unusual take on LLMs from the point of view of a developer that lives in Iceland (where many data center reside) and is seeing the surrounding environment degrading year after year. Using renewable energy is definitely not enough to conserve our planet.
Podcasts
Valuable suggestions about how and when to use cloud computing to your advantage and not fall prey to aggressive marketing.
Call to Action
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