Jan-Lukas Else

Thoughts of an IT expert

๐Ÿ”— Links: 2020-03

This is a collection of links I stumbled across and found worth sharing. Also see the blogroll for links to blogs I regularly read.


Annoying Technology

Published on in ๐Ÿ”— Links

Annoying Technology is a site by Manuel Grabowski and Philipp Defner, where they share typical annoyances with technology. Situations that probably everyone knows: annoying software download pages, dark UI patterns while shopping at Amazon or design flaws.

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The Great Empty

Published on in ๐Ÿ”— Links

The New York Times published a photo story (open the link in a private tab to avoid the login-wall) with photos of public places around the world in times of COVID-19. The emptiness in these pictures is on the one hand magical, but also somehow frightening. A virus has actually managed to stop the world.

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How to read RSS in 2020

Published on in ๐Ÿ”— Links

I often talk about โ€œRSS feedsโ€ and that itโ€™s my favorite way to follow content sources (news, blogs, YouTube channels) on the internet. Laura Kalbag wrote about how to read RSS in 2020 in which she explains the basics and benefits about RSS.

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The Coronavirus Explained

Published on in ๐Ÿ”— Links

โ€œKurzgesagt - In a Nutshellโ€ is a YouTube channel that explains different topics in short videos in a clear and easy to understand way. The videos are also visually works of art:

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Pure CSS paintings

Published on in ๐Ÿ”— Links

Ben Evans created amazing pieces of art. He โ€œdrawโ€ a sunset, a still life and a portrait. But instead of images, he created CSS style sheets. All those images are made with just CSS. It is very impressive!

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Writing a SQL database from scratch in Go

Published on in ๐Ÿ”— Links

Phil Eaton wrote a really cool article. He documented how he used Go to write a rudimentary SQL database including a CLI. It is very interesting to read how commands are parsed and analyzed. The whole thing probably has no practical use (there are already countless mature database systems), but itโ€™s still exciting. I remembered some of the math lectures in the first semester about formal languages.

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Quizlet

Published on in ๐Ÿ”— Links

This semester, as already mentioned, I take a Spanish course. Of course, learning languages also includes learning vocabulary. I looked for suitable apps and found Quizlet. I like the app even more than I thought. For example, I can create โ€œlearning setsโ€ on the computer and learn from anywhere on my mobile phone. And various learning functions also ensure that I not only create virtual flashcards, but also learn the vocabulary.

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Why 543 KB keep me up at night

Published on in ๐Ÿ”— Links

The problem is not this specific website or how fast it loads, but that shipping seems to be so much more important than performance, usability, accessibility, or user experience.

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Jan-Lukas Else