rewinfrey

I've been working on a detailed blog post about the history and algorithms behind content-defined chunking (CDC). A bit niche but is background for my master's thesis. This is a short gif of an animation I'm using to help introduce the 2016 version explaining how the FastCDC algorithm works.

12.02.2026 06:06 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

Distributing Go binaries like sqlite-scanner through PyPI using go-to-wheel I’ve been exploring Go for building small, fast and self-contained binary applications recently. I’m enjoying how there’s generally one obvious way to do things and the resulting code is boring …

I've been experimenting with distributing Go binaries as wheels on PyPI so you can execute them without installing them first using commands like "uvx sqlite-scanner ~/Downloads" - I wrote sqlite-scanner in Go

I built go-to-wheel to help implement this pattern simonwillison.net/2026/Feb/4/d...

04.02.2026 15:03 — 👍 56    🔁 5    💬 3    📌 3

Anatomy of a Line Field Animation Rick Winfrey

I wrote up a reflection and some lessons from a silly side quest to realize an idea I had for a background animation for my personal site. Beyond vibing, I find LLM’s are great for learning, diving deeper into unfamiliar topics, and engaging in creative play.

rickwinfrey.com/writings/202...

16.01.2026 06:57 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

Wondering how many surfers here are coordinating with their code agent of choice via smart watch in between sets?

15.01.2026 04:47 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

Had my first encounter with an owl this evening… based on detections from my BirdWeather PUC, this is a Great Horned Owl.

06.08.2025 03:19 — 👍 2    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

Male Ana’s hummingbird feeding from Dudlea flowers.

Male Ana’s hummingbird feeding from Dudlea flowers.

Female Ana’s hummingbird feeding from Dudlea flowers.

Diadasia bee (specific species unknown) sleeping in an abutilon palmeri flower (Indian mallow).

Most of my entertainment now comes from observing the ecosystem in my garden. Sharing some of my favorite daily encounters!

28.05.2025 18:41 — 👍 2    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

First experience with openAI’s deep research offering today. My prompt was ~1200 words, and it returned a sophisticated response in about 15-20 mins. Its strengths were in retrieving and summarizing a wide breadth of concrete details, research papers, and software libraries for the topic I gave it.

04.03.2025 02:43 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

View of a SpaceX launch from my backyard in Southern California, up the coast from San Diego. The detail visible in the exhaust plume is surprisingly clear, and it’s also easy to see the twin booster separation.

11.02.2025 03:49 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

Hey friends, If you are having trouble, or struggling with GitHub Actions, I would like to sync with you. My DMs are open.

Y'all share this broadly.
Thanks.

27.01.2025 19:19 — 👍 0    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0

Congratulations to @hendrik.van-antwerpen.net for his decade of PLT research and work culminating in the successful defense of his PhD dissertation entitled "Declarative Name Binding for Type System Specifications" 👏🥳

15.01.2025 18:03 — 👍 4    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

My neighbor wants to start surfing and couldn’t have picked a better time than the winter. The water is 60F / 16 C, almost no crowds, and the sting rays have mostly migrated to deeper water. It’s also the best exercise! 🏄‍♂️

07.01.2025 03:34 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

A picture of Reviewers' Choice Award 2024 for the Design Principles of the Elixir Type system by Giuseppe Castagna, Guillaume Duboc, and José Valim, in The Art, Science, and Engineering of Programming.

We saw tons of progress on Elixir's type system in 2024. We started the year with a Best Paper award, then Elixir v1.17 in May with data-type warnings, and now Elixir v1.18 with type checking + inference on function calls.

Today I started working on v1.19, I'll share more here as it progresses!

23.12.2024 19:53 — 👍 273    🔁 31    💬 6    📌 0

Highlight of Oxford (apart from the learning) was touring the Divinity School, parliament room, and the oldest reading room in the Bodleian Libraries. The structure goes back to the late 1400’s.

25.11.2024 15:18 — 👍 1    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

First pub was the Kings Arms, down the way on Broad St from the city centre. But don’t worry, Stephanie was properly introduced to the Royal Oak! And my personal favorite (next to Kellogg College) The Rose and Crown!

25.11.2024 14:55 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 1    📌 0

From Oceanside, CA to Oxford, UK. 6000 miles traversed via car, train, plane, and bus. 24 hours later, first stop, a pub!

16.11.2024 17:23 — 👍 4    🔁 0    💬 1    📌 0