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✨ Jean Yang ✨ Profile
✨ Jean Yang ✨

@jeanqasaur

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New Product @getpostman . Founded @akitasoftware . Programming, APIs, and developer experience. Former programming languages professor @CSDatCMU .

Bay Area
Joined March 2011
Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
In the last few years, I've talked with hundreds, if not thousands, of software developers. What I've learned: there's a HUGE gap between what developer-influencers are writing about, versus the daily reality of most developers. BUT PEOPLE DON'T TALK ABOUT THE OTHER STUFF. 1/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
Two important lessons I learned in my twenties: - If you think everyone hates you, you probably need to sleep. - If you think you hate everyone, you probably need to eat.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
Ok I couldn't resist. Taylor Swift as classic programming textbooks, a thread.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Problems people on Twitter think women in tech face, vs the problems women in tech actually face
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
Taylor Swift as iconic computers, a thread
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
Software developers looking at logs
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
6 years
Today I discovered an unfortunate consequence of GDPR: once someone hacks into your account, they can request--and potentially access--all of your data. Whoever hacked into my @spotify account got all of my streaming, song, etc. history simply by requesting it. 😱
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
9 months
In software engineering, there's what people think of as "docs" and then there's "the information I needed to debug that thing that took to days of my life." The second thing is different and should be called something other than "documentation." But what should we call it?
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
To start shedding unattainable software standards, let's: 🛑 Stop thinking of software as homogeneously represented by a small number of unrepresentative companies 🗯 Start being more honest about "real software process" 🛠 Demand more solutions to the real problems!! end/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
8 months
Today, I made a curious discovery: Javascript, Typescript, Python, and Java all follow the same cyclical pattern on Google Trends. Rust, on the other hand, does not. My theory: weekends. You know a dev tool is primarily used at work when you start seeing the Weekend Drop.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
9 months
Programming Programming in a dynamically in a statically typed language typed language
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
6 years
The TAs for the class I'm teaching, Principles of Imperative Computation, got me a "Functions are Pointers" jacket. (These jackets are in opposition to the "Functions are Values" jackets from the functional programming TAs.) I now wear it to point at functions.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
When I was and undergrad and junior grad student, I regularly burned myself out on deadlines. I actually work WAY harder now. And I'm able to do it because I learned to manage my energy better. Here are some lessons I learned. Thread. 👇
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
But the solutions that engineers at a Netflix or LinkedIn or Facebook come up with aren't for the vast majority of software shops: they're often best for big companies that can afford to set a high engineering bar, that can afford large infrastructure teams and ops teams. 3/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Being vaccinated doesn't mean you can turn off static type-checking.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
From a friend: "I think you've been memed." (by @redgoldsparks on IG)
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
Two important lessons I learned in my twenties: - If you think everyone hates you, you probably need to sleep. - If you think you hate everyone, you probably need to eat.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
SO MANY of the software teams I've talked to have sheepishly told me that their software practices differ from the recommended standard. When I listen to why, it makes a lot of sense for their needs: different org size, different eng team makeup, different shipping cadence. 4/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
Many assume it's a matter a time before certain practices permeate the entire software industry. But if you have piles of legacy code and/or limited engineering bandwidth, it absolutely does not make sense to redo your entire system using something that "makes sense." 5/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
When I was younger, I was obsessed with time management. At some point, I realized that most of the time, it's really about energy management.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
Here's a good article for the people asking me if data anonymization techniques work in preserving anonymity. Tl;dr: no, especially not when you can link different data sets together.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
Taylor Swift as important papers in programming languages, a thread. "An Axiomatic Basis for Computer Programming," C.A.R. Hoare, 1969. Introduced Hoare Logic for proving program properties.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
What programming languages and cars have in common: 🧐 Everyone uses them but few are enthusiasts ✨ Engineering meets design For a timeline cleanse, here's a thread of programming languages as cars. First up: Python as the Honda Civic. Practical; ubiquitous; not the fastest.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
People sometimes ask me what you learn during a PhD. One of the main skills is the ability to be okay with massive uncertainty about how things will turn out--for an indefinite period of time. Also a good skill set for this general period of history. Curious what others think.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
Was talking with a massage therapist who worked with several Bay Area sports teams about just how much effort pro athletes put into recovery. Been thinking about what recovery looks like for people whose work involves giving their minds, rather than their bodies, a beating.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
Been having many conversations with people in their 20s about the paralysis that can arise from having too many life choices. My advice: commit to something and commit hard. Doesn't matter if you switch later. It's easier to prove yourself if you've had to do it once before.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
My Halloween costume: "data anonymization." Because I didn't get a bespoke disguise, you can still tell exactly who I am and what's supposed to be on my shirt. 👹
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
When we talk about "developer experience," we really need to separate dev tools into two categories: ones that simplify things away and ones that help developers engage with complexity. DX needs are different for simplification tools vs complexity-embracing tools! Thread. 👇
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
A disproportionate amount of writing and tooling comes from companies like Facebook, Netflix, LinkedIn, Google, and Amazon. Many people assume there's a trickle-down effect: great engineers at companies with money to burn come up with good solutions to problems everyone has. 2/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
March 1st vs March 31st
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
Fran Allen became a programmer only to pay off her debts so she could go back to teaching—and then ended up doing such seminal work in compilers that she won the Turing Award in 2006. RIP to one of the greatest luminaries in our field. 🙏
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 months
When I was younger, I thought the most valuable skill I'd learn would be kernel debugging or something else technical. The most valuable skill I've actually learned: finishing projects. Many people have ideas. Many fewer people are able to define projects they can deliver on!
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
1 year
Met Gala as monitoring and observability solutions, a 🧵. Kim Kardashian as Datadog. Requires investment to get into. Takes active upkeep. Generally worth it, but there are gaps (and the occasional malfunction). Not an easy situation to get out of.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
The year is 2030. Everybody who is not a founder is now a VC. Companies can no longer hire people to build stuff, so people are just selling their companies to each other. All companies are web4.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
6 years
It's official! Super excited to received the NSF CAREER award to work on making it easier to implement private machine learning algorithms.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
My first week of the PhD, a professor told me that he knew my type, the kind of student who always got the As, and that I needed to get comfortable failing to do great things. That was life-changing advice. There's angst you carry around with you until you're not afraid to fail.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
9 months
Proud to be part of @getpostman ! 🚀
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
What I didn't learn until well into my 20s: *most things in life* are tests of will, not intellect.
@avichal
Avichal - Electric ϟ Capital
4 years
Startups are a test of will, not intellect.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
An opportunity too good to be missed! Oscars red carpet stars as keyboards, a thread.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
6 years
@Spotify Also, if @Uber or @lyft is watching I hope your security/privacy engineering teams are being careful with your download-all-data feature!! Would be pretty bad to get hacked and kidnapped in the same day! cc @44
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Jean's Law: no matter how fast of a machine you get, you will begin regularly using a number of browser tabs that exceeds the smooth functioning capacity of the machine.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
due to inflation k8s is now k9s 🐕
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
As I've been recruiting for my startup, I've found that the women, on balance, are more hesitant to join an early-stage startup than the men are. I'm curious to hear from women: what's your reason for preferring bigger companies, if you've made that choice?
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Just had a conversation with an early PhD student thinking about whether they should leave grad school. It made me think about how it must be hard for junior people in general (in academia + industry) to find comfort in work right now. Here's a thread of what I told this person.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
Upon popular request: skincare products as developer tools, a thread. Starting with CeraVe Facial Moisturizing Lotion with SPF as a linter. One of the highest-leverage, lowest-cost things you could invest in. Prevents headaches and slows down aging.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
#MetGala2021 as programming languages, a thread. Starting with @LilNasX as Rust. Shiny with a lot of enforcement.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
6 years
Been talking to students who are figuring out what they want to do with their lives. My advice: many people rarely know exactly what they want to do. In the meantime, 1) collect as much leverage as possible and 2) leave everything in better shape than when you found it.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
I've been thinking about how "rtfm" ("read the f'ing manual") culture creates obstacles to good developer experience. Not only does it lead tool creators to assume users will read docs and follow rules, but users themselves are often hesitant to ask questions and give feedback.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
If you're fully vaccinated, you may now program without using static types.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
7 years
Latest blog post, about how the myth of instagenius harms us all.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
| ̄ ̄ ̄ ̄ ̄ ̄ ̄ ̄ ̄ | | WHY DO PYTHON | | VERSION ISSUES | | AFFECT MY | | ENTIRE LIFE | | ___________| (\__/) || (•ㅅ•) || /   づ
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
6 years
@Spotify Companies should really put some multi-factor protections on how a folding containing all of one's personal data, ever could be accessed!! It would have been a lot better, for instance, if Spotify had made this file available only after authenticating via email.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
Every now and then, someone asks me what jobs should someone consider if they're interested in programming languages, compilers, and/or programming tools. "Like" if you'd be interested in a blog post about this!
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
1 year
When ChatGPT came out, I was excited about the ability to prototype with AI. Everyone now has an ML team at their fingertips! What I underestimated: how much ChatGPT is a *UI* prototyping tool. Quick thread about how our team prototyped 4+ new capabilities in < 1 week. 1/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
What does LLVM stand for? Wrong answers only.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
My new style: work-from-home tech goth.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Tell me your programming language of choice without using code from your language of choice
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
Programming and software engineering have become entirely different activities. Increasingly, creating programs from scratch happens only for fun. But people still think of programming this way. Software developers instead spend time collaborating, deploying, and maintaining.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
"Why is Santa easy to track on Christmas?" "Because he always accepts cookies." Merry Christmas!! 🎄🎅🍪🕵🏻‍♀️ (Joke courtesy of @kayvonf 's brother.)
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
What people think programming languages research is, vs what programming languages research actually is
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
What's stopping you from programming like this?
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
At one point in my mid-twenties, a friend observed that we were nearing the end of getting opportunities because of our potential and would soon be evaluated on what we've actually done. This was a real turning point in my thinking on how much space I should take to find myself.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
During my nightly stroll down the internet rabbithole, I discovered a fun fact: there was a single point in time when the Google-searching public cared more about data breaches than they did at Taylor Swift, and that was in the aftermath of Equifax, September 2017.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Why aren't there more startups based on programming languages and software analysis? There's definitely a need for SOMETHING, as developers have so much pain. I was recently on a panel where someone asked this question. I didn't have time to answer then, so here's a thread. 1/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Thought my friends who have worked on languages and compilers might appreciate this one. 😊
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Could people be upset about #CoPilot because it's making clear that the harder part of creating software is often choosing the problem and solution strategy, not the algorithms and data structures stuff that people love to judge programmers on? 😼 ::ducks and runs::
@burkeholland
Burke Holland
3 years
CoPilot nails the interview
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
The year is 2022. All meetings between two people involves each person trying to hire the other. There is a quarterly rematch for meetings that end in a tie.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Someone asked me for a working programmer's guide to static analysis, what you can and can't enforce with mainstream programming languages, etc. There is no such guide that I know of and I've been thinking of writing one. Is this something that would be interesting to people?
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
I saved one of the biggest lessons for last: reducing angst overhead. A lot of the time I used to spend working, I was actually angsting. This took energy and did not get me anywhere! This was such a big lesson for me I wrote a blog post about it here:
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Every now and then, I see a thread about how functional programming languages are The Way, wondering why they aren't more popular. A big problem is that people talk about functional programming as The Way for Everything. FP has its place. All tools have their roles. 🧵 1/
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
Ok I have developed an apparently controversial view on tech debt: it's more like a house mortgage than a student loan. Almost everybody takes it on; the question is on what terms. It can also often be advantageous towards your goals to take one on.
@6502_ftw
Dave (also @cursed.monster on bsky)
2 years
Not addressing your tech debt is like not brushing your teeth; it saves you a tiny bit of time and money up front, but it has a way of catching up to you in the WORST ways down the line.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
The most important thing I learned was to recognize if I'm not working productively on something and step away. To make a sports analogy, pushing through fatigue is how you get better but you shouldn't push through injury. Taking a break early can give you a lot more time back.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
When I was a first-year PhD student, one of my mentors told me I was never going to do great work until I got over my fear of failure. Great reminder that graceful failure is a skill (and skills take practice)!
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
Had a great conversation with @johnregehr today about how a lot of stuff that seems very much backend-only/hard tech (compilers; security tools) actually requires a ton of UX engineering. Nobody cares about your tool if they can't understand the output!!
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
This is the real AI takeover.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
6 months
When I started Akita, we had an office and people loved coming in. In 2020, I pivoted almost my entire team. A big part of it: finding people who worked well remotely. What I learned about remote vs in-office: they require VERY different cultures. You can't just flip a switch!…
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
Whoa what 🤯
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
6 months
New headshot who dis
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Something all work/life balance conversations I've ever heard have missed: what to do if you are an obsessive person. If you are like me, you do best when you have something all-consuming to channel your energy into. I tried for years to have more balance but that's just not me.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
As someone who needs to believe 100% in my work, I've been envious of people who can do something simply because it is their job. In the age of the Great Resignation, many more people seem to be questioning their relationship with work. Here's how I figured it out for me. 🧵
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
post a picture of yourself as the leader of an underground organization without downloading any new pics.
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@tsunamino
Danielle Leong
3 years
post a picture of yourself as the leader of an underground organization without downloading any new pics.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
Unpopular opinion: the best thing young people can do early in their careers is to not take random advice off Twitter.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
What's stopping you from programming like this?
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
PHP
@AnaSamways
Ana Samways
8 years
What’s considered trashy if you're poor, but classy if you're rich?
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
9 months
My PhD advisor liked to say that his favorite kind of problems were the ones where you tell everybody exactly what you're going to do, nobody believes you can do it, and then you do it anyway. Find differentiation that doesn't require secrecy!
@eladgil
Elad Gil
9 months
When I started my first company, I was paranoid about sharing information or telling people what I was doing outside of the company When I started my second company, I was much more open with information to investors, advisors, other founders in the market etc
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
1 year
In my college compilers course we built: ⚒️ A MIPS simulator ⚒️ A tiny C-to-MIPS compiler ⚒️ A tiny Scheme-to-C compiler ⚒️ A basic type-checker for our Scheme language ⚒️ A polymorphic type-checker on top of that ⚒️ A register allocator This was one of my favorite classes.
@racketlang
Racket
1 year
What was the first programming language you wrote?
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
3 years
I recently learned how to take timer selfies. This is my lucky launch day outfit. 💖
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
Hi, @noopkat and I are starting a women in developer tools Slack. Let us know if you're interested in joining!
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
We've found it: the unification of my interests
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
2 years
Throughout my career, people have kept asking why I don't work on [trendy thing] instead of dev tools. To me, empowering developers to build better software is just THE thing to work on. It's cool to see dev tools get more buzz. I hope leads to better software for all!!
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
4 years
When I walked in the door today, my boyfriend, a university professor whose in-person classes have been cancelled, was setting up Twitch for his lectures.
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@jeanqasaur
✨ Jean Yang ✨
5 years
Computer scientists as @Pixar characters, a thread. In collaboration with @kayvonf , who pointed out that I looked a lot like Edna Mode yesterday.
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