Top all-time · #11023
David Kopec
Personal blog · observationalhazard.comprogrammingcareer
David Kopec writes Observational Hazard, a personal blog at observationalhazard.com about programming and career. Since 2014, 6 different Hacker News readers have linked it 67 times, most often “Put a date on your blog post (2014)”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2025-12-28, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (1) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
The only comment is a possible-typo note with a link to the site, so the comments say nothing about the writing. The site is the personal blog of David Kopec.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 1 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
David Kopec's blog.
Most-linked posts?
- Put a date on your blog post (2014)2 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2014-09-13
- Writing Computer Science from Scratch2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2025-12-03
- The Web Has No Design Standards2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2021-01-10
What Hacker News says?
Just to add to this list, even MacPaint used RLE on a per-scan line basis. I recently wrote about decoding MacPaint files[0]. So, replying to the gp post, yes it is in a sense reinventing the wheel. But sometimes the wheel needs to get reinvented because you have a new vehicle that could use a different type. And I would say the original poster felt he needed part of the modern wheel without the tire, so he had to g…
Comment linking /2021/09/building-retro-dither-dithering.html
on “QOI: Lossless Image Compression in O(n) Time”Submitted After 10 years, Yelp gave my app 4 days as a story · 866 points
HN discussionThis is totally anecdotal, but earlier this month, in a two week period, I interviewed with 8 different companies. None of them pulled out or hinted they were pulling out. I wrote about the experience here: https://www.observationalhazard.com/2022/05/my-experience-wi... I bring this up to present a counter to your experience and encourage you to keep applying. While I'm doubtless many companies have/will pull back,…
Comment linking /2022/05/my-experience-with-technical-interviews_36.html
on “Tell HN: Job interview canceled due to looming recession”Submitted On Taking Criticism as a story · 72 points
HN discussionYou definitely should put a date on everything. Without a date, your post loses much of its context: http://www.observationalhazard.com/2014/09/put-date-on-your-...
Comment linking /2014/09/put-date-on-your-blog-post.html
on “What is the best hard drive?”Submitted Put a date on your blog post (2014) as a story · 32 points
HN discussionI wrote an essay “Introductory Programming Assessment Must Accommodate Copilot-like Assistants” about this same topic last month and came to the option 3 conclusion (use more exams or in-class live coding assignments): http://www.observationalhazard.com/2022/07/introductory-prog...
Comment linking /2022/07/introductory-programming-assessment.html?m=1
on “Coping with Copilot”Submitted Put a Date on Your Blog Post as a story · 20 points
HN discussionIf you’re tangentially interested in the history of the technologies behind web programming specifically, check this out (author): http://www.observationalhazard.com/2018/06/history-of-web-pr...
Comment linking /2018/06/history-of-web-programming.html
on “Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?”Submitted My Experience with Technical Interviews in 2022 as a story · 5 points
HN discussionYou guys both inspired me to write my own: http://www.observationalhazard.com/2014/12/my-2014-in-side-p...
Comment linking /2014/12/my-2014-in-side-projects.html
on “This year in side projects”Submitted Classic Computer Science Problems in Python Is Published as a story · 5 points
HN discussionI wrote a review of this here: http://www.observationalhazard.com/2021/06/book-review-sid-m... In short, I think it has some great tips if you’re an amateur interested in game design.
Comment linking /2021/06/book-review-sid-meiers-memoir.html?m=1
on “Sid Meier's Memoir: A Life in Computer Games”Submitted Apple Apologetics as a story · 4 points
HN discussionRelated—I wrote a novelty dithering Mac app and released it this week. It dithers photos and converts them to MacPaint format for display on old black and white Macs. As another commenter pointed out, dithering was less about compression and more about just making things look okay on the limited displays of the time. The original Macintosh had only black and white pixels (no grayscale). Here's the app: https://oaksn…
Comment linking /2021/09/building-retro-dither-dithering.html
on “Dithered images and websites (2020)”Submitted Book Review: Unix: A History and a Memoir by Brian Kernighan as a story · 4 points
HN discussionIn 2014 I wrote a "History of Web Programming" that's a good accompaniment to this article since it goes into some more detail on some of the older technologies: https://www.observationalhazard.com/2018/06/history-of-web-p...
Comment linking /2018/06/history-of-web-programming.html
on “A brief history of web development, and why your framework doesn't matter”Submitted My 2014 in Side Projects as a story · 4 points
HN discussionYes, he’s what I’ve termed an Apple apologist: https://www.observationalhazard.com/2021/08/apple-apologetic...
Comment linking /2021/08/apple-apologetics.html?m=1
on “Thoughts and Observations in the Wake of Apple's 'It's Glowtime' Keynote”Submitted Building Retro Dither: Dithering Algorithms, Run-Length Encoding, Resource Forks as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSeems like a pretty good article, but as a blog, his site is violating the "put a date" principle: http://www.observationalhazard.com/2014/09/put-date-on-your-...
Comment linking /2014/09/put-date-on-your-blog-post.html
on “Should I use a Swift struct or a class?”Submitted The Web Has No Design Standards as a story · 3 points
HN discussionUnfortunately I made a typo in writing my URL (should be https://observationalhazard.com/ not https://obervationalhazard.com/ ) and this has no way to update it.
Comment linking /
on “Show HN: Hacker News User Blogroll”Submitted Building SeaTurtle, a Logo-Like Language in Swift and SpriteKit as a story · 3 points
HN discussionIronically, I was working on a book with a similar concept in the exact same time frame originally titled "Fun Computer Science Projects in Python" that came out as "Computer Science from Scratch: Interpreters, Computer Art, Emulators, and ML in Python" with No Starch Press. Like Austin it contains a CHIP8 chapter and a couple chapters on making a programming language. The difference with regards to his experience a…
Comment linking /2025/12/writing-computer-science-from-scratch.html
on “I canceled my book deal”Submitted History of Web Programming (2014) as a story · 3 points
HN discussionI had fond memories of Atkinson dithering from my time on early Macs as a child. That led me to create the ultimate 1-bit dithering Mac app (it even exports to MacPaint format so you can display photos from your modern Mac on your '80s B&W Mac). I wrote about the experience of implementing Atkinson dithering here: http://www.observationalhazard.com/2021/09/building-retro-di... There's some stuff in there both about…
Comment linking /2021/09/building-retro-dither-dithering.html
on “Pixel Accurate Atkinson Dithering for Images in HTML”Submitted Writing Computer Science from Scratch as a story · 2 points
HN discussionTypo? https://www.observationalhazard.com/
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: Could you share your personal blog here?”Submitted Writing Computer Science from Scratch as a story · 2 points
HN discussion