Focus
My name is Alex, and I am a former English Teacher turned perpetual student of all things computer science and software engineering. I enjoy learning about the minutia behind some of the world’s most used software. I’m particularly interested in data structure designs and memory allocation strategies as they relate to low level systems engineering.
The field of Operating Systems is a great combination of managing this implementation minutia and ensuring big picture usability concerns are addressed for the user. As a result, you will find much of the content on my site revolves around low-level languages that are well suited to systems development, especially kernel development. However, content may occasionally divert to explore higher level algorithms, neat abstractions, or coding practices I have found helpful in my posts and projects.
Preference
Given my own free time I would prefer to work on projects in the following languages, ranked by preference, with 1 being my favorite.
- C
- C++
- Rust
- Zig
- Python
As a result, you will find me giving inordinate amounts of free time to my projects like str_view and the C Container Collection, even if no one is watching. The latter project is the first stage in my preparation for building an educational Operating System in the style of PintOS or xv6. Stay tuned for posts about the process of building this system.
Miscellaneous
Occasionally, I enjoy learning things unrelated to typing words on a screen, kind of.
Table
I built a river table. See.
The gold streaks across the black are from the table epoxy ripping when the first black pour was too thick! The temperature got too high. Always ensure epoxy has proper ventilation and the pour is not too deep.
Keyboard
I said I enjoy learning things unrelated to typing words on a screen. Building a mechanical keyboard does not involve typing words on a screen. This counts by technicality.
This is the Discipline V2 a DIY mechanical keyboard that requires you solder all switches, resistors, chip, etc., onto the PCB yourself. I used it to learn how to solder. The switches are Zeal Tealio Linear Switches. I am still backlogged on some keyboard builds. I will perhaps post some updates if the builds turn out particularly nice.