iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 26/09/2026

Traveling keeps reminding me of how much work it is to: a) deal with impromptu to-do items (usually via email) b) keep everything charged Somehow we’re serfs to email and chargers, and nobody is setting shit on fire.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 25/09/2026

Happy Negroni week to everyone who celebrates!

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 16/09/2026

*takes a glance at my GitHub inbox* I’m gonna block so many accounts once I’m back.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 08/09/2026

One meal in, Albania is solidly in my Top 5 cuisines. 🤤

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 06/09/2026

In a mad dash before my first proper vacation this year, here's pgbg 26.2 with the non-Postgres parts ripped out and imported from bgt. Architecturally, I'm very happy with both and hope y'all try to play around with it! github.com/hynek/pgbg/r...

github.com

Release 26.2.0 · hynek/pgbg

Highlights These are some big changes but I think they're worth it: everything that does not depend on Postgres, has been moved into its sibling project bgt1 because they solve real problems and I'...

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 04/09/2026

Due to popular demand (it's me—I'm the demand), I've decided to cut pgbg in two and liberate the database-agnostic parts. So if you want a self-healing way to run a background thread in Python with flexible wakeups, check it out! bgt.hynek.me/stable/

bgt.hynek.me

bgt - bgt

Supervised background threads for Python: crash-only service loops, restarted with backoff, instrumented with structlog and Prometheus.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 02/09/2026

When I was advocating for nogil/free-threading, I always said that it’s important not to judge threads by the APIs we have, but by the APIs we will build once they’re worth the trouble. Here’s my first contribution: github.com/hynek/pgbg 1/2

github.com

GitHub - hynek/pgbg: PostgreSQL-orchestrated background threads for Python

PostgreSQL-orchestrated background threads for Python - hynek/pgbg

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 23/08/2026

Only one year in, I have finally found the final shape for the example project of my uv x Docker video. Of course, it means another script rewrite, so there couldn't be a more appropriate thing to do than going to see The Odyssey.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 23/08/2026

til `set -e` is “exit immediately” and `set -x` is “print commands before executing” For years I thought it’s vice versa and since I use them usually together there was never a reason to find out 😳

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 20/08/2026

Happy/nervous to announce argon2-cffi-bindings, the low-level C binding wheels used by argon2-cffi. It's a big release w/ wheels for new platforms, but the biggest item is the liberation from setuptools w/ great help by Nathan Goldbaum & @henryiii.bsky.social! 🥳 #Python github.com/hynek/argon2...

github.com

Release 26.1.0 · hynek/argon2-cffi-bindings

Highlights Big and scary release! We've switched from setuptools to scikit-build-core and added wheels for pyemscripten and (provisionally) RISC-V. Full changelog below! Special Thanks This release...

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 16/08/2026

To me, the biggest fall from grace re software quality is clearly Fantastical. I don't even want to put it on vibe coding because there were times of flakiness before, but oh boy is it barely usable nowadays. Guess it's time to get used to BusyCal.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 16/08/2026

“cancel”, "canceled, and “canceling” – but “cancellation”. thanks ben franklin.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 16/08/2026

between weird LinkedIn influencers urging to delete tests that never failed and Richard’s learnings I know on what team I want to be and whose software I want to use

a slide from Richard Hipp’s “Reliability Lessons From SQLite” talk enumerating:

What Richard Has Learned

• Testability must be a design objective
• 100% MC/DC testing works
• sizeof(tests_cases) >= 10*sizeof(code)
• Approx 10-20% of code used only for testing
• Clear, concise documentation
• Expect to spend most of your time testing
• Good version control - situational awareness

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 14/08/2026

i'll vote for anyone for the packaging council who does something against cookie-licking on pypi like pypi.org/project/diri...

pypi.org

Client Challenge

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 13/08/2026

when I said that “even AGI can't solve exponential complexity curves”, I meant something like this: blog.florianherrengt.com/ai-removing-...

blog.florianherrengt.com

AI is removing the middle class of software engineering

AI makes projects with weak engineering culture fail much faster.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 10/08/2026

First feedback to the script of my next video is coming in – be hype: > I feel like I'm reading the third act of the king in yellow

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 07/08/2026

I’m old enough to remember when we as a community of professional developers came together to tell McKinsey to fuck off b/c developer productivity is not measurable with simplistic metrics. newsletter.kentbeck.com/p/measuring-...

newsletter.kentbeck.com

Measuring developer productivity? A response to McKinsey

Part 1 of 2

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 03/08/2026

github is cooked let’s go shopping

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 02/08/2026

it's so baffling that Apple still hasn’t shipped a native version of Bartender, while constantly breaking all existing tools that provide that functionality

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 01/08/2026

the BVG ticket apps (all 3 of them 🫠) are completely cooked, aren’t they? Can’t see my Deutschlandticket for August and couldn’t even buy another ticket. Getting generic network errors everywhere.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 31/07/2026

Looks like I'm attending PyBeach because apparently I didn’t have enough SoCal in 2026!? Looking forward to a cozy conference with friends abound! 2026.pybeach.org

2026.pybeach.org

PyBeach 2026

PyBeach is a Python conference in Los Angeles, California.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 30/07/2026

i don't like how it reflects on me as a human that the majority of open PRs on my projects are still open because i'm stopping myself from leaving FOAD review and yet somehow we've ended up in an adversarial relationship with "contributors”

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 30/07/2026

Happy to announce v3.0.0 of my build-and-inspect-python-package GitHub Action that does what the name says. If u maintain a Python pkg u should really give it a look! Much, much fewer broken pkgs have been pushed to PyPI & who doesn't love automatic trove classifier → GHA test matrix conversion‽

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 26/07/2026

To clean myself of my writing dry spell, here’s a TIL that probably should’ve been a blog post: TIL: SQLite WAL Mode Can Lock Short-Lived Readers hynek.me/til/sqlite-r...

hynek.me

SQLite WAL Mode Can Lock Short-Lived Readers

Locked SQLite database errors aren’t just for writers.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 26/07/2026

Good morning! Since it's become a drag to support in mainline, I've extracted svcs's Pyramid support into an own package svcs-pyramid. That means, the next svcs version will ship WITHOUT a `svcs.pyramid` module: github.com/hynek/svcs-p...

github.com

GitHub - hynek/svcs-pyramid: Pyramid integration for the svcs Python service locator

Pyramid integration for the svcs Python service locator - hynek/svcs-pyramid

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 25/07/2026

still the only good Opus 5

a photo of the installation CD for Directory Opus 5 Magellan for the Amiga

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 23/07/2026

to those who came to the #EuroPython Software Design and Architecture open space (and everyone else really): we mentioned the excellent book Grokking Simplicity and noticed that it's kinda pricey! Conveniently, it's on sale right now: $34.64 for digital and $37.79 for print (shipped from EU). 1/2

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 22/07/2026

Career advice from people who cannot follow it themselves, but whose careers benefit from your following it, should be taken with a grain of salt. #influencers

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 21/07/2026

It was to be expected, but I need to stress how much #EuroPython benefitted from being the host of the CPython Core Summit this year. As I keep repeating, the main value of #PyConUS for the COMMUNITY is the gathering of stakeholders for in-person exchange. 1/2

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 21/07/2026

phew it's Golden Gate forever, not Tahoe forever

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 21/07/2026

so is it confirmed that macOS Golden Gate is killing off general-purpose Rosetta? 😬 How about x86 virtualization like Orb/Docker?

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 14/07/2026

Fish shell adding support for Darcs is something I truly didn't have on my 2026 bingo card! It was the first DVCS that clicked with me after I bounced of Arch and before hg/git came on the stage. I could even host source trees on my homepage! github.com/fish-shell/f...

github.com

Add `fish_darcs_prompt` by toastal · Pull Request #12860 · fish-shell/fish-shell

Improves on the prompts floating around the internet (which I forked a long time ago)—specifically copied the ability to reorder statuses from the other VCSs, added ! for showing that there are mer...

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 12/07/2026

i see apple still hasn't fixed the bug in keynote where the d key randomly stops working when editing speaker notes in rehearsal mode 🫠

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 11/07/2026

who's got two thumbs and learned last night, with a drink in his hand, that he needs to start practicing again 👍👍 If you didn't get in last time around, this is your chance! Content is obviously adapted for 2026 as prep for PyTexas. #parachuteUnderstudy ep2026.europython.eu/session/desi...

ep2026.europython.eu

Design Pressure: The Invisible Hand That Shapes Your Code

What if there're invisible forces that make your code mutate to weird shapes over time?

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 11/07/2026

I would really like to know how Apple decides which apps the tremendously useful keyboard shortcuts ⌘ ⌃↑/↓ (move line up/down) get and which don’t. E.g., Apple Notes got it, but Pages or Keynote do not.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 09/07/2026

“””I’m looking for a senior developer for Interview / Job proxy collaboration. I am offering an exclusive opportunity for highly skilled developers to access high-paying positions with US-based companies.””” what a time to be alive

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 06/07/2026

the biggest downside of using Zed is realizing that Electron and everyone who made it deserve EVEN MORE contempt

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 02/07/2026

WHOA, Pyrefly is adding proper attrs support in 1.2dev!!! 🤩 pyrefly.org/en/docs/attrs/

pyrefly.org

attrs Support | Pyrefly

Pyrefly support for the attrs library.

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Hynek Schlawack @hynek.me · 24/06/2026

A quick shadow drop of sorts: who hasn't implemented a cache on top of Postgres? I know, everyone has. And yet, here's another contender that's based on psycopg and can use existing SQLAlchemy engines (or whatever you implement): ⚡️psycache ⚡️ 1/2

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