iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dana Ciocan

@danaciocan.com

112 followers 427 following 255 posts

I am a Senior Engineer at Octopus Energy. I love being creative in my spare time. I make my own clothes and grow my own food. My pronouns are they/them. I blog about technology at danaciocan.com

Posts Replies Media

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 03/09/2026

This is wild

The most interesting hack in history just got weirder...

YouTube video by Fireship

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 16/07/2026

This video very articulately describes what I've been thinking about AI lately: www.youtube.com/watch?v=mudi... Good to see some folks are waking up

AI Is Stealing From You

YouTube video by Syntax

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 11/07/2026

what a great talk! thanks for sharing 💜

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 11/07/2026

so I can! thank you 😊

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 11/07/2026

This sounds so useful! I'll have to keep an eye out for a recording. This hit really hard for me: "the gap between who you think you should be and who you actually are". I think that's where a lot of my personal burnout stems from tbh.

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 11/07/2026

This is a topic that's very close to my heart - I've had two burnouts in my career and they suck. I'm planning to write a few posts on this topic - the first is an article on the signs that you might be burning out. If you are struggling, my heart goes out to you 💜 danaciocan.com/blog/five-si...

Five signs of burnout

From someone who's been there

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 03/07/2026

I'm a bit late with this week's post, but I had fun writing it! It's been on the cards for a long time - here is my deep dive on Panda CSS. I hope you like it! Have a great weekend 😊 danaciocan.com/blog/panda-c...

Deep dive: Panda CSS

The cutest styling library in town?

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 03/07/2026

Listened to this while working this afternoon - very interesting: www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8yq...

How To Ship Real Code With AI (Not Junk) ft. David Cramer - The Weekly Dev's Brew

YouTube video by Jan-Niklas Wortmann

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 27/06/2026

Honestly, messing around with my blog now that it's self-hosted is _so_ much fun. Should have done it ages ago! Just spent a while making syntax highlighting work for code blocks. Best stop now or I'll be at this all evening 😆

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 26/06/2026

I did some research on data mocking for an RFC this week and ended up doing a pretty deep dive on Mock Service Worker. If your mocks are in a mess then give this week's blog post a read! Hope you're all staying hydrated and not melting too much 🫠 danaciocan.com/blog/herd-yo...

Herd your mocks with Mock Service Worker

Your trusty sheep dog

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 20/06/2026

I've been having fun coding and it's not thanks to AI danaciocan.com/blog/coding-...

Coding is fun actually!

Are we forgetting this in the age of AI?

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 14/06/2026

Hashnode have put a paywall in front of some of their essential features, so I've moved my blog to a self-hosted solution. Heres a post explaining why and how: danaciocan.com/blog/im-leav...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 12/06/2026

I ended up "pre-inlining" it i.e. instead of storing it in a file, just bung the string straight in the CSS. Not ideal, but given it had already taken way too long and we'll be replacing this soon anyway, I decided "screw it". Sometimes you have to know when to give up

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 12/06/2026

Spent far too much time this week trying to figure out why an SVG wasn't working - turns out it was being "inlined" and in the process, URL encoded, which broke it. Wild! I couldn't figure out what to do to get our bundler not to do that - none of the tricks I tried worked. Very annoying!

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 28/05/2026

Breaks are important. End of. This is a post as much for me as it is for you! danaciocan.com/it-s-okay-to...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 27/05/2026

Some interesting ideas here: aurorascharff.no/posts/compon... I am much more experienced with pages router but about to adopt app router, so very interested in all of this stuff. It feels like a big paradigm shift and I'm worried I'm not going to get it "right", but done is better than perfect

aurorascharff.no

Component Architecture for React Server Components | Aurora Scharff

React Server Components let each component fetch the data it needs. Pages stop being giant loaders that prop-drill everything down. Here's how that changes how you architect a page, where loading boun...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 27/05/2026

Gosh I do sometimes miss the days when the frontend was simpler. Whenever I think of implementing a little app for fun I think of having to implement an API to serve the data and I just give up 😆 I guess AI can do it for me and maybe I should just do that, but even so!

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 27/05/2026

I know this is old news by now but bloody hell this is scary: www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwTQ... Anyone else moved moving to pnpm higher up the priority list?

A single PR just hijacked the NPM registry...

YouTube video by Fireship

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 24/05/2026

This one is coming to you from my garden because I had a ramble brewing in my head. Hope you're all having a fantastic weekend ☀️ danaciocan.com/the-joy-of-s...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 15/05/2026

Want to know how I handle tricky problems with lots of unknowns? Read this week's blog post to find out! danaciocan.com/how-i-work-o...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 30/04/2026

I finished a big piece of work, just in time to go on annual leave for a week 🎉 Read all about it in my latest weekly roundup danaciocan.com/a-migration-...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 24/04/2026

I've officially made it to fifty posts! Read all about my plans for the blog, why I love AI now (joking) and some tips for dealing with everyone's favourite, merge conflicts danaciocan.com/my-fiftieth-...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 17/04/2026

Got a weekly round up for you this week 🎉 I've written about how to manage big migrations, pairing and how we seem to be forgetting how to CSS (me included!) Hope you have a lovely weekend 😊 danaciocan.com/tips-for-big...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 11/04/2026

I was going to write a weekly roundup and realised I'm just too tired because it's been a busy couple of weeks, so I'm having another week off. Rest is important. Hope you all have a lovely weekend!

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 03/04/2026

No weekly roundup this week, but have a review of the Unicorn Project instead. In my opinion, this and the Phoenix Project should be required reading for everyone in an engineering leadership position. danaciocan.com/book-review-...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 26/03/2026

I gathered some thoughts about our careers as software engineers and why it doesn't matter whether you did a bootcamp or got a Computer Science degree. We all contribute in our own unique ways and that should be celebrated! danaciocan.com/my-career-is...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 20/03/2026

This week's blog post is full of the joys of spring (plus some visual regression testing and ramblings about communication). Have a lovely weekend! danaciocan.com/visual-regre...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 13/03/2026

This week's roundup is here! Hope you all have a lovely weekend 🎉 danaciocan.com/a-circleci-t...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 11/03/2026

Finished reading This is for Everyone by Tim Berners-Lee while going to and from work today and it was such an engaging and fascinating book that I had to write up my review before bed. Highly recommend you check it out! danaciocan.com/book-review-...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 06/03/2026

Time off is important. I had three days off this week and did nothing but make clothes, go for walks and read books. It was glorious. No blog post this week because I was too busy resting. Hope you have a lovely weekend!

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 27/02/2026

This week's post is early because I'm off today - take care of yourselves and see you next week! danaciocan.com/self-care-sa...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 22/02/2026

If you wanted more rambly thoughts about AI from me, here you go. If not, keep scrolling and have a nice Sunday! danaciocan.com/ai-is-there-...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 20/02/2026

I'm tired and AI really isn't helping... But - I passed my probation this week 🎉 so I'm definitely treating myself to a nice rum this evening! That doesn't preclude me from being wrong though - read all about it on my blog this week. Hope you have a good one! danaciocan.com/ai-fatigue-i...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 18/02/2026

I've gathered some thoughts about why taking a step down in your career is a Good Thing and nothing to feel bad about. To be honest, I am still trying to convince myself of this a bit sometimes, so maybe this article is for me as well as for you. danaciocan.com/there-is-no-...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 13/02/2026

This week I remembered how awesome feature flags are, how much I like technical writing and that AI isn't always to be trusted... Hope you had a good one! danaciocan.com/feature-flag...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 11/02/2026

Super interesting article: localghost.dev/blog/stop-ge... I feel like a lot of people aren't really thinking about the wider implications of AI, mostly because they're afraid of getting left behind...

Stop generating, start thinking - localghost

Instead of wanting to learn and improve as humans, and build better software, we’ve outsourced our mistakes to an unthinking algorithm.

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 09/02/2026

This pretty neatly sums up my feelings towards AI: nolanlawson.com/2026/02/07/w... "I don’t celebrate the new world, but I also don’t resist it." - yup

nolanlawson.com

We mourn our craft

I didn’t ask for this and neither did you. I didn’t ask for a robot to consume every blog post and piece of code I ever wrote and parrot it back so that some hack could make money off o…

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 06/02/2026

I've got another day off today, so here's this week's post - I wrote about how releasing new features doesn't have to be a big deal, context switching (the bane of my existence) and impostor syndrome. I'll be back to my normal schedule next week, but until then - bye! danaciocan.com/releasing-ne...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 30/01/2026

Got another blog post for you! This one talks about knowing when to quit, AI being a godsend actually (with caveats) and how to deal with the isolation of working from home. I have today off and am off to Costco later because of _course_ I am! danaciocan.com/on-knowing-w...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 26/01/2026

I keep forgetting this, so I'm posting it here in the hopes I don't forget next time: in Next.js app router, client components get an initial render on the server and are then hydrated in a second pass. This is very similar to how pages router used to work, just on a component rather than page level

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 24/01/2026

I had my weekly roundup all ready to go and... I forgot to post it. So here it is - I talk about the importance of monitoring, multitasking with AI, asking for help and dealing with feelings danaciocan.com/weekly-round...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 22/01/2026

I feel like I missed out given I read the book!

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 22/01/2026

Trying to get out of the Google ecosystem after decades of being in it is kind of tricky... First step: Brave.

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 21/01/2026

I know right? 😆

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 21/01/2026

jQuery 4.0 is out - while this makes me nostalgic, I can't really see myself reaching for it. you? blog.jquery.com/2026/01/17/j...

blog.jquery.com

jQuery 4.0.0 | Official jQuery Blog

jQuery: The Write Less, Do More, JavaScript Library

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 20/01/2026

Did another book review! This one is about a book called Techno Feudalism. The TL;DR is that this is very economics heavy and tech light, but I still learned some interesting stuff danaciocan.com/book-review-...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 16/01/2026

This week's roundup has a lot of Next.js app router in it - I must make some more detailed posts about what I'm learning because it's fascinating! danaciocan.com/weekly-round...

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Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 12/01/2026

It's wild isn't it?! That subtitle is very apt, though I don't think the others come out of it well either... Just not very nice people all round!

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 10/01/2026

I've written my first book review! This is something I've wanted to do for ages as I love reading and this is a fun way to combine my two hobbies. "Careless People: A Story of Where I Used to Work" is Sarah Wynn-Williams' compelling memoir about her time at Facebook. danaciocan.com/careless-peo...

Dana Ciocan @danaciocan.com · 09/01/2026

This week's roundup: danaciocan.com/weekly-round... My ramble this week is about post-Christmas brain, how to make your migrations easier with tests, what to do when launches don't quite go to plan and the importance of fun at work. Have a lovely weekend everyone!

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