The hardest part of software engineering has always been writing good clear requirements in a natural language. Using current AI requires we do more of the hard bit to automate the easier bit of writing code.

I’ve met many tech executives frustrated that their software teams were failing to deliver. In each case they’ve been advised by their software engineers that the answer was to rewrite all their software with some awesome new approach, technology, language, library, platform or architecture. 🧵👇

Is anyone using Zig in production? If so, what and why did you pick it?

31 things I’ve learned writing 91 coding challenges over the last 27 months: 1. You can build some amazing software in less than 8 hours of focused time. 2. Breaking projects down into steps is a skill that many software engineers don’t have. 3. And one that many want to learn. 🧵👇

Software Engineers - need a project for the weekend? How about building your own Monkeytype? open.substack.com/pub/codingch... Or one of the 90+ other real-world projects you can build to level up your coding skills: codingchallenges.fyi/challenges/i...

Networking tip: lead with curiosity, not your job title. Curious leaders ask better questions, build stronger relationships, and spot opportunities others miss. That’s where the good stuff starts. If you’re a senior engineering leader, I’m building a community — DM me if you’re curious.

Software Engineers - need a project for the weekend? How about building your own ELIZA chatbot? codingchallenges.substack.com/p/coding-cha... Or one of the 80+ other real-world projects you can use to level up your coding skills: [https://codingchallenges.fyi/challenges/intro](t.co/jZPvdDtBt1)

Networking tip: just talk to the other awkward person at the event.

If you say you can’t prioritise a bug fix over a feature because “features generate revenue,” what you’re really saying is: you lack the judgment, experience, or data to prioritise effectively. Here’s how you do it:

Q: How do you find open source projects to contribute to? A: Use Google to find a site that covers issues marked "good first issue" then look through those to find a project that interests you.

Who do you turn to when you're the most senior engineering leader in the room? When your team looks to you for clarity, vision, and direction, but you aren’t sure what to do. It can feel like there's no one you can turn to. That’s why I’m building a peer community of engineering leaders.

What are the leading communities for software engineering leaders?

Why is 13+ years of experience in engineering all of a sudden in every job ad?

Yesterday’s coding challenge was to build your own strace. Even if you don't build it, do please read the challenge and learn about and use strace. You'll learn a useful tool and skill gain an insight into the system calls and levels of abstraction in something as simple as a Hello World program.

9 tips for building high-performing software development teams. 1. Create a shared vision for the team to believe in and be inspired by. 2. Present the vision in terms of a concrete roadmap. 3. Promote communication – software is a team sport!

If you’re looking for work as a software engineer in a tech company and struggling to find one then consider applying for related roles. Use them to get your foot in the door. It worked for me, though not quite in the way I expected.

Old school programming this evening! I implemented quicksort and mergesort for the first time in years! No I’m not prepping for a DSA interview, it’s some new material for Coding Challenges!

“It is hard to describe how much you learn by actually doing — by carefully considering all factors, making a decision, and then taking responsibility for the outcome. Unlocks wisdom that cannot be arrived at any other way.” Greg Brockman What happens if we stop doing and start blindly trusting AI?

Who else is enjoying listening to Sleep Token’s new song Emergence as they go about their weekend?

There are so many engineering fails in this post.

Too few software engineers understand this simple fact. We are not paid to write code. We are paid to solve problems. We often solve with code, but not always. Those who fail to recognise this, neglect the skills needed to be software engineers. They are the ‘coders’ who will be replaced by AI.

Software Engineers - need a project for the weekend? How about building your own Time Zone Converter? codingchallenges.substack.com/p/coding-cha... Or one of the 80+ other real-world projects you can build to level up your coding skills: codingchallenges.fyi/challenges/i...

It's been a pleasure being on Coding Chats podcast with @johncrickett.bsky.social We talked about a LOT of interesting topics, especially how to grow beyond Senior Engineer and thrive in a lead role (Team Lead, Tech Lead (Staff), Engineering Manager).

I saw another post saying AI is getting better and it really does understand what we ask for. So I asked for a picture of a left handed guitarist to see if it was better than last time I tried. Spoiler, nope it's not.

What’s stopping you writing code like this: ``` ++++++++++[>+>+++>+++++++>++++++++++<<<<-]>>>++.>+.+++++++..+++.<<+++. ``` If you’re having trouble following the code I’ll give you a clue, it’s written in the Brainf*ck programming language.

18 computer science books - that you can get for 5% of the cover price right now! I’m excited by Nora Sandler’s Writing a C Compiler and Code Craft by Pete Goodliffe! 👉 Writing A C Compiler 👉 Data Structures The Fun Way 👉 Computer Architecture 👉 Dive Into Systems 👉 Effective C 👉 Code Craft

If you have a behavioural interview coming up do yourself a favour and watch this week's Coding Chats. Austen McDonald explains on how to prepare for behavioural interviews and why they are so important in the hiring process.

For those who write C regularly and do TDD, what unit testing framework do you recommend? I haven't written C for over 20 years but last night after the session on my current Coding Challenges live course I decided to build a demo of a parser for Redis serialisation protocol in C.

7 tips to improve how you interview software engineers: 1. Put as much time into preparing for them as you expect candidates to. 2. Have a clear definition of what a good candidate looks like. 3. Don't base technical tests on your ego.

Elon Musk’s email to US federal employees caused quite a stir over the weekend. And rightly so, it is a terrible way to manage people. But writing down and sharing your accomplishments is something everyone should do for themselves. 🧵⬇️

I just received an email asking me to complete an exit interview, for a role I left a year ago:

Only people who don't know how to do something, think it can't be done. Next time think something can’t be done, pause and ask yourself: “How could it be done?” That’s how you grow. As a software engineer. As an manager/leader. As a person.

Today's Coding Challenge is now available: codingchallenges.substack.com/p/coding-cha...

So present (the go presentation tool) looks useful. But it looks horrible. Is there a set of nicer themes anywhere? I've looked without much success.

Beware: LLMs have enabled the rapid creation of technical debt at scale. Remember: code is always a liability, only sometimes is it an asset.

Who apart from Grammarly is using Lisp in production these days? And what for?

"fatal error: stack overflow" Wow been a long time since I've seen that! Better get debugging.

I am not surprised: www.theregister.com/2025/01/23/a...

Who should I invite to talk tech with me on the Coding Challenges YouTube channel? I’ve really enjoyed doing the Coding Chats podcast so now I’d like to start a new series for Coding Challenges. 🧵

Software Engineers - need a project for the weekend? How about building your own markdown to PDF editor? codingchallenges.fyi/challenges/c... Or one of the 80+ other real-world projects you can build to level up your coding skills: codingchallenges.fyi/challenges/i...

Test-Driven Development is a *personal* development workflow. That workflow is: 👉 Capturing requirements. 👉 Designing a solution. 👉 Implementing the solution. 👉 Writing some tests for the solution. Done in a specific way. That way is described by @kentbeck.com in his post "Canon TDD".

Software Engineers - need a project for the weekend? How about building your own Brainf*ck Interpreter?? codingchallenges.fyi/challenges/c... Or one of the 70+ other real-world projects you can build to level up your coding skills: codingchallenges.fyi/challenges/i...

In today's Coding Chats episode is now available! I talk to Shalini Goyal about diversity in tech, software engineering, mentoring and interviews. Check it out on all the top podcast platforms!

5 great reasons to learn Python: 1. Simplicity: Python’s simplicity makes it easy to learn and write readable code.

TIL there is an open-source book: Introduction to Zig. What's even cooler is, like Coding Challenges, it's project based! You can find it here: pedropark99.github.io/zig-book/

TIL that zig has ziglings: codeberg.org/ziglings/exe...

If you enjoy Coding Challenges, don't forget we have a Discord server! You can come hang out, chat and share your thoughts, suggestions for other challenges or solutions to the existing challenges. You'll find it here: discord.gg/3kRwa9DA

The New Year is a fresh opportunity to start from scratch. Starting from scratch and building real-world software applications is a great way to become a better software engineer. Not sure what to build? Coding Challenges and I are here to help!

"Code should run as fast as necessary, but no faster; something important is always traded away to increase speed." -- Richard E. Pattis Something to keep in mind before rewriting in a "faster" language.

Every time you encounter a best practice, try asking yourself: "Is it best practice for MY context or theirs?"