Making things out of other things.
Previously: Made some apps. Worked at Apple on UIKit for a while.
He/him.
Asheville, North Carolina.
| About Me | https://www.blog.montgomerie.net/about/ |
| Blog | https://www.blog.montgomerie.net/ |
| Twitter-That-Was | https://twitter.com/th_in_gs |
Sort-of-but-not-really connected to my last post, if you’re looking for a newsletter that’s finely balanced between almost-but-not-quite-extremely-online and xennial snark and angst - and honestly a lot better than I’ve made it sound - you could do a lot worse than Today in Tabs.
It’s slowly become one of my favorite publications, and today’s issue(?) is a great example:
Good article: https://blog.katanaquant.com/p/your-llm-doesnt-write-correct-code
I was struck by this:
> METR’s randomized controlled trial (July 2025; updated February 24, 2026) with 16 experienced open-source developers found that participants using AI were 19% slower, not faster. Developers expected AI to speed them up, and after the measured slowdown had already occurred, they still believed AI had sped them up by 20%. These were not junior developers but experienced open-source maintainers. If even THEY could not tell in this setup, subjective impressions alone are probably not a reliable performance measure.
…and how it matches my own ‘traffic’ behavior/emotions. I’m much happier driving a longer distance - and taking longer - if it means not sitting stopped in traffic, because then I’m always moving and making progress. I know this is unreasonable and inefficient, so I try not to give in to it - to my emotional detriment.
Great sprint! I’m loving the new regulations so far. Don’t really understand the viewpoint that it’s ’not racing’. *Maybe* see the complaints about ‘overtake mode’ - although it’s no more ‘artificial’ than DRS was. The rules are the same for all the racers though, and the new energy systems are just another level of complexity the drivers and teams have to manage. Fascinating (and often exciting!) to see them learning the intricacies in real time.
Bit of a #coldtake, I know, but I’m abstractly considering moving to another server (feels kind of disingenuous to still be on sfba.social when I’m in WNC), and choosing one is still confounding. Feels like I’m ignoring the advantages of federation by just heading to mastodon.social (I’d rather just stay here). But choosing most any other feels like I’m making a political statement, or shouting that I’m _really into_ some hobby.
I don’t want a political statement to be the first part of my identity people see online, and I’m not into anything enough that I want it to be the primary part of my identity.
I know, I’m overthinking this…
Could I interest you in a blog post?
If you’re on the fence, I _did_ get an 40-year-old microcontroller to blink an LED.
In this series of posts, I’m rescuing vintage microcontrollers from their decades-long purgatory in a drawer in my local makerspace. To this end, I’m attempting to use them to drive a LED sign made of WS2812 strips So far in this series, I found some decades-old Signetics SCN8031AH and OKI MSM83C154 microcontrollers in a drawer, and worked out that they’re 8051 and 8052 derivatives (members of the MCS-51 family) from the 1980s, and calculated that it should be possible to make them control modern WS2812 LED strips. In this installment, I get one of the microcontrollers set up on breadboards and get it to, at last, fulfill its purpose and BLINK AN LED!
In a bold display of consistency that experts are already describing as “technically impressive in its audacity,” the man who built his political brand on “no more foreign wars” has officially star…
Ha! I got one of the mass of ‘80s 8052 derivative microcontrollers that were in the makerspace electronics supply drawers to blink an LED!
Finally it gets to fulfill its purpose!
I’m 80% of the way to doing anything!
NewsThump
Jeff Jarvis
Betsy Langowski