hyperbo.la :: blog

LaTeX Escapism

Ryan Lopopolo | August 26, 2023
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 | August 25, 2023
To build iteratively and shed complexity, do the simplest thing that could possibly work.

Scaling Myself by Letting My Team Fail

Ryan Lopopolo | July 27, 2023
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 | June 14, 2023
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 | June 13, 2023
Pair programming with ChatGPT on Artichoke Ruby, writing a lot of Rust.

Debugging an mruby Heap Corruption in Artichoke with Pernosco

Ryan Lopopolo | September 19, 2021
Pernosco is a hosted omniscient debugger that makes debugging complicated bugs tractable.

Source-level Polymorphism in Rust

Ryan Lopopolo | December 24, 2020
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 | August 20, 2019
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 | July 15, 2019
🌵 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 | June 29, 2019
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 | March 9, 2019
What I did this sprint: Less raw code output, more broad impact.

Senior Engineers Build Consensus

Ryan Lopopolo | March 3, 2019
To be an effective senior engineer, you need to convince others to help you execute.

Reflections on Learning Rust By Building Punchtop

Ryan Lopopolo | January 27, 2019
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 | December 28, 2018
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 | November 16, 2018
Terraform misconfiguration of SSM PrivateLink endpoint completely brings down hyperbo.la.

Blue-Green Deployments With Autoscaling Groups and Terraform

Ryan Lopopolo | November 5, 2018
Moving blue-green deployments into terraform-managed autoscaling groups makes rolling out new AMIs easier.

AWS Is Your Org Chart

Ryan Lopopolo | October 27, 2018
Your AWS infrastructure is designed by your org chart. Alignment comes from increased communication and accountability.

Productive Engineering–Finance Partnership

Ryan Lopopolo | October 27, 2018
A successful partnership between Engineering and Finance creates better business outcomes.