iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 04/09/2026

🧵 The ever-so-fun Polar Squad DevOps Book Club kicked off the autumn season today with The Fearless Organization by Amy C. Edmondson. Great to also see some of our new hires joining in the weekly Friday discussion!

Book cover for "The Fearless Organization" by Amy C. Edmondson, featuring a gray silhouette of a human head with an orange brain outline drawn inside it.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 25/08/2026

Jeanie Johnston was a ship used to emigrate starving people to America across more than a dozen voyages. Below the deck there is a fascinating wax museum.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 25/08/2026

More statues found from the Irish Famine Memorial.

Statue of a woman carrying a bag of items.

Statue of an elderly woman with hands crossed.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 24/08/2026

Spending this week in Dublin, Ireland. Lovely cafes, parks, and statues all around the city. ☘️

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 22/08/2026

Post a perfect album from the 2000s (2000–2009).

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 16/08/2026

Productivity is a grossly overused term and has suffered a devastating inflation. This is what I think when someone asks if I'm being productive.

Four-panel Cyanide and Happiness comic. Panel 1: A mustached man in a suit holds a coffee cup, asking a seated coworker at a computer, "Having a productive day?" Panel 2: The coworker replies, "Yeah! I'm producing carbon dioxide." Panel 3: The man stands silently. Panel 4: The man asks, "Anything else?" and the coworker, now looking pale and unwell, replies, "Lil bit of methane."

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 08/08/2026

Allowing this afternoon coffee break to sooth and heal my body. Container Restaurant Morton is still the best offering of endless geek jokes. Now with a sidecar cafeteria container deployed into production as well!

Cappuccino and pancakes with whipped cream, raspberries, blueberries and a decorative flower.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 26/07/2026

🧵 For 1.5 years, @kagi.com has been my daily driver as a search engine after Google began to pepper search results with incorrect AI answers and DuckDuckGo failed to find what I was looking for. Picture from: help.kagi.com/kagi/why-kag...

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 12/07/2026

Cooking during a heatwave is quite an intense experience, but what can you do when there’s an itch for some vegetarian ragu with soffritto and rigatoni. 10/10, would approve, but I’ll let the Italians be the judge of that. I only cooked it for over an hour which is way too short time for nonno. 🤌

A black pot of rigatoni pasta in a thick tomato sauce with vegetarian minced meat and finely chopped vegetables.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 12/07/2026

I've started to eat a healthier form of pancakes for breakfast, and I can't get enough. No, I'm not referring to the tomatoes.

Flatbread made of an omelet between two tortillas, dusted lightly with parmesan, served with roasted cherry tomatoes on a black-rimmed plate.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 05/07/2026

The current face of America is shown accurately in this Reuters photo from the 4th of July celebrations. Indeed, who celebrates and who doesn't? We in Europe are not isolated nor safe from this. Change a few details and this could be, among many cities, Helsinki metro on 6th of December.

Members of the white supremacist group Patriot Front surround a lonely black woman on her metro journey to Washington DC on the Fourth of July. Picture by Reuters.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 04/07/2026

Contra was more of my thing. I had never played with Famicom before and it felt plain wrong — it's NES or nothing for us European kids. Family Computer? It's an *entertainment system* and not a machine for shopping groceries, jesus.

A Nintendo Family Computer (Famicom) console with the Japanese Contra cartridge inserted, showing its box art of two soldiers with guns.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 04/07/2026

Luckily, the exhibition was adults only so all the kids were gone, and only millennials were present crying tears of nostalgia while playing with Dreamcast. I'm not missing the arcade halls, though. TRON game is notoriously bad.

Two large inflatable Angry Birds characters, one red and one white, suspended above a gaming exhibition floor lined with retro arcade cabinets.

A vintage black Midway Tron arcade cabinet lit in purple, displaying the game's grid-pattern maze screen.

A glass display case of vintage Nintendo handhelds and accessories, including a Game Boy Light, Game Boy Printer, Nintendo DS, Game Boy Advance SP, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Pocket, and original Game Boy, each with a numbered exhibit label.

Two Sega Dreamcast controllers with their signature swirl logos, VMU slots, and colored A/B/X/Y buttons, resting on a surface.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 04/07/2026

A video game history exhibition came to town for summer. Having followed the industry closely and visited similar exhibitions abroad there's not much of new knowledge to be learned. Anyway, cool sketches.

Framed June 1997 cover of The Face magazine featuring a 3D-rendered Lara Croft holding two pistols, with cover lines "Silicon Chick," "U2," "Spiritualized," "Milla," "This Life," "Gillian Anderson," and "Lara Croft: Bigger Than Pammy, Wiser Than Yoda."

Framed pencil sketch of Lara Croft on lined paper, aiming a pistol in her right hand while reloading a second pistol with her left.

Framed pencil sketch signed by Shigeru Miyamoto, dated 21.2.2002, showing Mario holding a GameCube controller with a GameCube console drawn above and "GAMECUBE!" written across the top.

Framed pencil sketch signed and dated 7.2.2002, depicting a large, grinning Donkey Kong holding a Game Boy Color in a city skyline, with a tiny Mario running below.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 30/06/2026

Todellakin olo on pettynyt, että Suomessa sää muuttuu taas ulkoiluun sopivaksi, luonto voi hyvin eikä vanhuksia ja sairaita kuole. Auttaisiko joku tämän tragedian yli?

Uutisotsikko: ”Hellepettymys! Viileä ilma valtaa pian Suomen”

Ingressi: ”Loppuviikoksi on luvassa epävakaampaa säätä.”

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 27/06/2026

Might be my favourite place for summer walks in this city.

View to Näsinneula and Särkänniemi from a bridge in Tampere.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 02/06/2026

Vain LinkedIn-jutut: Ilmeisesti vuoden 2022 miesten jääkiekon MM-kulta katkaisi koronan ja tämän vuoden voitto on varma tae siitä, että Suomen talous kääntyy nousuun. Enää puuttuu vain tekoälyn mainitseminen joka toisessa lauseessa. Edes Petteri Orpo ei kykene näin sakeaan ulosantiin.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 01/06/2026

Teuvo Hakkarainen aikoinaan maalaili uhkakuvia, jossa Suomessakin kohta "ukot huutaa tolpassa". Näyttää siltä, että se on käynyt toteen.

Suomalainen jääkiekkofani juhlii maailmanmestaruutta ilman paitaa Suomen lippua heiluttaen katutolpassa.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 31/05/2026

Tampere ilman fasismia -mielenosoitus sujui hellesäässä niin rauhanomaisesti, että melkein nukahdin seisaalleen, kun jazzbändi alkoi soittaa. Niin, näin väkivaltaisia me antifasistit olemme. Ainoa näkemäni häiriötekijä oli yksi rotvallin puolen huutelija, jonka poliisit ohjasi sivummalle. Hyvä!

Marssi lähtee Sorin aukiolta. Mielenosoittajalla on valkoinen kyltti, jossa lukee Tampere fasismia vastaan sekä piirros vasarasta, joka murskaa hakaristin.

Marssi päättyy Keskustorille, jossa paikalla paljon ihmisiä.

Keskustorilla mielenosoituksessa useita puhujia ja ilmapiiri hyvin rauhallinen.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 26/05/2026

Pick a bond villain from the photos you already have on your phone.

Paavo Pulkkinen, a famous Finnish backwoods Bond villain plotting to keep all the women home as much as possible.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 06/09/2025

Tästä syntyy uusi aikaamme sopiva sanonta: "Porvarin kylmyys ei tunne rajoja". Silloin mittaritkin menevät rikki. Kuvakaappaus: uiras.fvh.io

Helsingin uimavesien lämpötilat. Muualla normaalia, mutta Porvarinlahdella -327.7 astetta. Alla varoitus, jossa lukee "Mittari on rikki. Tämä on tiedossa eikä siitä tarvitse erikseen ilmoittaa, kiitos."

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 04/09/2025

Atlassian acquires The Browser Company. I'm still clinging to Arc until Chromium inside is no longer patched, and then I'll likely migrate to Zen. All the good people in tech either become slaves to AI or are purchased by Big Tech, which enslaves them for AI. What a time to be alive.

Tweet from Browser Company:

"Today, The Browser Company of New York is entering into an agreement to be acquired by Atlassian for $610M in an all-cash transaction.

We will operate independently, with Dia as our focus. Our objective is to bring Dia to the masses."

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 15/06/2025

Nothing like a good, black and hot Sunday brew while testing a new smaller Chemex for 3 cups. This is more practical since I'm the only coffee drinker in the house.

A brew of fresh light-roast coffee in Chemex. The lighting makes the coffee look red as grape juice.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 25/04/2025

Dear scammer, thanks for reaching out and offering to turn my blog into a blog.

A scam email attempting to purchase my blog and turn it into a blog.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 22/03/2025

More is more while baking some Saturday pinsas.

Pinsa filled with buffalo mozzarella, cheese, sausage, olives, tomatoes, fresh garlic, basil and arugula.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 08/03/2025

Alas, I should re-visit my site's meta tags as the cover image was dropped somewhere by Bluesky. Pure zero motivation to implement these social media header hacks. How difficult can it be to grab images from the post? At least Mastodon knows it, and I like their "fediverse:creator" meta tag.

Cover image of my post as seen in Mastodon.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 30/12/2024

I went to check a Body World exhibition on the vacation. Highly recommendable body of trivia (no pun intended) if watching corpses stripped of their skin doesn't make you sick (why would it?). These should be all over the world so check your nearest city for some nice death metal imagery.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 21/12/2024

I'm convinced H.R. Giger found his art inspiration accidentally by opening a fig.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 09/12/2024

There's also a museum describing the Soviet occupation in detail. In one of the walls, you can find some hilarious anti-communist dad jokes. Here are my favourite ones.

"What are the walls of the new Olümpia hotel made of? Micro concrete (70% concrete, 30% microphones)"

"24 teeth, 4 feet — A crododile.
4 teeth, 24 feet — The politburo"

"Why are coffee beans no longer sold? You can't paint a portrait of Lenin on them."

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 09/12/2024

There's a lovely KGB museum on top of Hotel Viru built during the Soviet occupation in the 1970s. The stale smell in the operating room is quite authentic and reminds one of corruption, papers and cigarettes. Mm-mmm!

Obsolete wiretapping devices, apparently.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 09/12/2024

Spent a weekend in #Tallinn. Looking down from above it's quite a remarkable place.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 23/11/2024

Old Times Christmas Museum, part 2

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 23/11/2024

Old Times Christmas Museum, part 1

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 12/11/2024

Data classes in #Python are one of its most powerful features. Yet, I see them used too rarely. A great use case for them is to refactor a bulky method from many parameters to only a few and reveal a domain entity or a value object as a byproduct.

Python code snippet:

# BAD: Too many parameters in signature.
def enroll(name: str, age: int, occupation: str, address: str, city: str, zip_code: str, state: str, country: str):
...

# GOOD: Use a dataclass to group parameters.
from dataclasses import dataclass

@dataclass
class EnrollProps:
first_name: str
last_name: str
address: str
city: str
zip_code: str
state: str
country: str

def enroll(props: EnrollProps):
...

# BETTER: Split parameters to value objects.
@dataclass
class Person:
name: str
age: int
occupation: str

@dataclass
class Address:
address: str
city: str
zip_code: str
state: str
country: str

def enroll(person: Person, address: Address):
...

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 30/06/2024

Datsun v Tesla - Kurkistus suomalaiseen luokkayhteiskuntaan, 2024.

Kaksi autoa. Lava-auto Datsun ja sähköauto Tesla pysäköitynä peräkkäin Vantaalla.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 01/01/2024

The Killer (2023) is a positive surprise in the hitman film genre. David Fincher's gripping direction, Michael Fassbender as a cold-blooded killer, and the soundtrack featuring classic songs from The Smiths. While its cliches don't make it a masterpiece, you can't make a bad film with these.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 30/12/2023

You've heard of rubberduck debugging, now prepare for ceramic unicorn debugging. The Christmas gift I received from a friend needs a name. Any suggestions?

A photo of a white ceramic unicorn with blue wings, mantle and a horn standing between a display and a keyboard.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 23/12/2023

My stance as well. By all means, you can write tests after the production code, but make sure that all the behavioural edge cases are acceptably covered and the design doesn't contain any redundant future-proofing violating YAGNI.

I was in the position to coach 9 software development teams. As I was setting the quality bar for them, some teams pushed back against TDD. I told them I'm okay with them not doing TDD just as long as their repos do not contain surviving mutants. Guess what? They couldn't do it.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 22/12/2023

I noticed that my clementines were going bad soon so I had to make myself an old-fashioned whisky. Don't worry, I ate the fruit, too. Let's toast for the open skies and butterflies.

A glass of old-fashioned with clementine peels and ice.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 22/12/2023

Christmas cleaning means cleaning up your desktop. I unwrapped my presents early and set up a working, recording, and music-listening studio. – Microphone: Blue Yeti with a shock mount and a boom arm – Headphones: Bose QuietComfort ANC – Speakers: 2 x Harman Kardon Citation ONE Mk III

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 19/12/2023

Using the ancient Chinese animal classification rules, what kind of pets have you had?

Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 17/12/2023

Finally, someone nails the term and meaning of mob programming in one picture. Perhaps don't bring a Thompson submachine gun to the session and consider doing ensemble programming instead.

Mob Programming with the Godfather being the typist and other members of the family being the talkers. One of the talkers is holding a Thompson submachine gun.

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Niko Heikkilä (he/him) @nikoheikkila.fi · 17/12/2023

Jira features that continue to be problematic in the year 2024 and likely far beyond that.

Post by Nat Bennett:

When people tell me "Jira is fine" I like to point out that it's not possible to assign more than one person to a story so it's basically not usable for serious work

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