LaTeX Escapism

Ryan Lopopolo

My résumé, written in LaTeX, is excessively over-engineered and 100% the way I want it. 🤪

Do the Simplest Thing That Could Possibly Work

Ryan Lopopolo

To build iteratively and shed complexity, do the simplest thing that could possibly work.

Scaling Myself by Letting My Team Fail

Ryan Lopopolo

As a Staff+ engineer, I've honed my focus by distinguishing projects where failure is acceptable, creating space for my teams to learn and grow, versus where it is not, requiring more direct involvement. Using this technique to delegate has further scaled my impact.

Feedback Windows

Ryan Lopopolo

It is not the case that all proposals are open to all feedback from all stakeholders at every point of their lifecycle.

I Wrote 4,000 Lines of Code with ChatGPT in a Weekend

Ryan Lopopolo

Pair programming with ChatGPT on Artichoke Ruby, writing a lot of Rust.

Debugging an mruby Heap Corruption in Artichoke with Pernosco

Ryan Lopopolo

Pernosco is a hosted omniscient debugger that makes debugging complicated bugs tractable.

Source-level Polymorphism in Rust

Ryan Lopopolo

Interface compatibility does not require implementing an interface or a trait. Use compile-time flags and source-compatible APIs to swap out implementations.

Communicating with the Synthesis Step

Ryan Lopopolo

Help your stakeholders by doing the hard work of distilling why the information you're sharing is important.

Cactus Harvesting: Cycle-Aware Reference Counting in Rust

Ryan Lopopolo

🌵 CactusRef lets you build cyclic data structures using strong references and knows how to deallocate unreachable cycles. You can use CactusRef to implement a doubly linked list. The CactusRef API is compatible with std::rc.

The Conjoined Villages: Baarle-Hertog and Baarle-Nassau

Ryan Lopopolo

The border between Baarle-Hertog 🇧🇪 and Baarle-Nassau 🇳🇱 is one of the most complicated international borders in the world.

Sprint Log, 2019-03-08

Ryan Lopopolo

What I did this sprint: Less raw code output, more broad impact.

Senior Engineers Build Consensus

Ryan Lopopolo

To be an effective senior engineer, you need to convince others to help you execute.

Reflections on Learning Rust By Building Punchtop

Ryan Lopopolo

To learn Rust, I implemented an audio game. There were some things I liked and some things I didn't. Some things were easy and some were hard. And there were plenty of libraries that were a joy to use.

Social Coding 2018 Recap

Ryan Lopopolo

I contributed to open source more than I ever have in 2018; but there is a lot I can do to improve.

Postmortem: 502s During Parameter Store Rollout

Ryan Lopopolo

Terraform misconfiguration of SSM PrivateLink endpoint completely brings down hyperbo.la.

Blue-Green Deployments With Autoscaling Groups and Terraform

Ryan Lopopolo

Moving blue-green deployments into terraform-managed autoscaling groups makes rolling out new AMIs easier.

AWS Is Your Org Chart

Ryan Lopopolo

Your AWS infrastructure is designed by your org chart. Alignment comes from increased communication and accountability.

Productive Engineering–Finance Partnership

Ryan Lopopolo

A successful partnership between Engineering and Finance creates better business outcomes.