Undeterministic flaky builds are one of the most annoying things in software engineering 💢. It also sounded like a fun name for a engineering blog 👨💻. This website contains thoughts and struggles in the path to create meaningful engineering processes, useful products and websites 💡.
This is software engineering blog from Onni Hakala, a seasoned product minded software engineer with a decade of experience about writing code and few years on leading teams of engineers.
You can learn more about me here.
Latest from the Blog
Helping Claude Code to find undocumented APIs from the code
Claude Code kept saying my DuckDB extension was impossible to create. GitHits MCP saved the day—it searches real code instead of docs, finally helping Claude find the undocumented C++ APIs I needed.
Storing only the changed rows with Ducklake
Tips for using ANTI JOIN and EXCEPT in DuckDB to write only changed data in Ducklake.
Tagging useful information in OpenStreetMap
OpenStreetMap contains plenty of useful data, which can be used freely by anyone. Here's a short introduction and a few useful examples to help you find family-, laptop-, or dog-friendly places. Hopefully, this motivates you to start contributing too! 🗺️
Debug like a champion
This guest post by Juhis discusses five key tips for effective software debugging.
Using MacOS Screen Time data to create work hour reports
Using MacOS Screentime, Duckdb and SQL to keep track of working hours
Data engineering to find domains pointing to certain CNAMEs
Using Merklemap DNS database and duckdb to reverse lookup popular CNAME values. Parquet is very powerful format on storing large quantities of data. We learn importance of ordering and compression as well.
Multiple options of storing SSH keys in hardware
Tutorial on using hardware backed SSH keys from multiple physical devices on MacOS. Learn how to use secure ways to store your keys and how to have backups of them too.
My mobile internet setup and physical eSIM cards
My mobile internet setup using GLX-3000 router, Peplink 42G antenna and EIOTClub eSIM card adapter to use cheap eSIM providers on the go.
Creating wrappers for Windows exe files using Homebrew and Wine
Tutorial for creating MacOS Homebrew Casks for software originally intended for Windows only. This example will show how I created a MacOS wrapper for car diagnostics software FORScan. You will learn how to automate the process of running Windows apps on macOS with Wine integration and USB device handling.
How to watch TikTok videos without TikTok account with Proxitok & Finicky
Learn how to watch TikTok videos without an account on MacOS by using Proxitok proxies and automatically rewriting TikTok links with Finicky.
How to add 3 million real companies to your empty Cloudflare D1 database?
These are the steps how I added 3 million real companies to my empty database. CrunchBase has amazing free dataset which I converted to SQL using duckdb & sqlite3 and uploaded to Cloudflare D1 database with wrangler.
How to avoid sending duplicate emails to customers
Read about my embarrassing incident where due to a coding error, customers received the same email 32 times. You can avoid this issue by using idempotent emails.
Backup your MacOS keyboard shortcuts from command line
MacOS keyboard shortcuts can be backed up and imported using the defaults command line interface. This can be done for all shortcuts or for individual ones. The defaults command can also be used to find other keyboard shortcuts. However, the documentation for defaults is lacking, making it difficult to use.
Guide for purchasing custom domains
Detailed guide on finding, purchasing, transfering and using Custom domains for cheap. We explore free alternatives as well and talk about automating things with domains too. I will share why NameCheap and Cloudflare are my top choices for a domain registrars.
Stop scheduling meetings manually
Scheduling tools like Calendly or Cal.com can streamline manual meeting coordination. Cal.com is amazing for its open-source nature and generous free tier. The author shares their positive experience with Cal.com, underscoring its ability to save time and improve productivity.
Built-in workaround for applications hiding under the MacBook Pro notch
Annoyed by the notch on the new MacBook Pro models? There's a built-in workaround! Adjust menu bar spacing with simple Terminal commands, no extra software needed. Say goodbye to hidden menu items behind the notch!
How to get a logo for your website without design skills?
To get a logo for your website without design skills, you can use paid options like LogoAI, Fiverr Logo Maker, or hire cheap designers directly from Fiverr. Free alternatives include using royalty-free logos from Freepik.com and converting them to SVG.
Creating a tech blog which I actually enjoy writing
The author shares his ten-year journey of developing tech blogs, starting with WordPress, exploring Static Site Generators (SSGs) such as Jekyll and Hugo, and eventually ending using Notion as a Content Management System (CMS).
Using Chrome through SSH tunnel and SOCKS5 proxy in MacOS
Instructions on how to proxy Chrome requests through an SSH tunnel using a SOCKS5 proxy on MacOS, allowing access to remote web services and changing the visible IP address.
How to manage remote server users with Ansible
This post shows an powerful example of how to do user access management for admin/developer user accounts for medium to big sized web agencies. Managing users efficiently and securely in big company usually includes a clunky process like LDAP. Today I will show you how to use git and ansible instead.