Top all-time · #6678
Richard Towers
Personal blog · richard-towers.comprogrammingdata
Richard Towers's personal blog at richard-towers.com covers programming and data. Since 2013, 12 different Hacker News readers have linked it 16 times, most often “TypeScripting the Technical Interview”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-03-17, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (14) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Richard Towers' 2023 "TypeScripting the Technical Interview" post, which solves interview-style problems such as N-queens and Game of Life purely in TypeScript's type system, as a homage to Aphyr's post.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 14 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- TypeScripting the Technical Interview11 people · 13 mentions · first linked 2023-03-12
What Hacker News says?
“During the transpilation process, no type checking is performed, and types are discarded.” this node feature is primarily around disregarding typescript in favor of the underlying javascript it represents. that reminds me of this fun article: https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “Node.js adds experimental support for TypeScript”Submitted Representing Graphs in PostgreSQL as a story · 193 points
HN discussionI expected some job interview meme[1][2] but I did not know this one and it looks like a real story too! Thanks for sharing, that was a fun read. [1]: https://aphyr.com/posts/342-typing-the-technical-interview [2]: https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “4 billion if statements (2023)”Submitted TypeScripting the Technical Interview as a story · 1 points
HN discussionThere's notable similarities between this article and this parody piece. https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-... I'm not drawing any conclusions, just pointing out the odd coincidence. Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35120084
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “The FizzBuzz that did not get me the job”See also https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “Programming with Less Than Nothing”An amazing (if a bit flowery) read that highlights more arcane stuff you can do with the TS type system: https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “Playing Sudoku in TypeScript while the type checker highlights mistakes”I'm not gatekeeping proofs here, and I'm glad you got math pizza :) If proofwiki had exhaustively printed all possible arrangements, or the decision tree of constructing them, or if they had even included the code that would do the checking (like, say, https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-... ), then I would agree it counts. But without even a rough ballpark estimate of possible arrangements t…
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “ProofWiki: Online compendium of mathematical proofs”This technique is good for job interviews, when they ask me to solve leetcode problems. I was inspired by the blog: https://aphyr.com/posts/342-typing-the-technical-interview and related to Rust, the solution https://github.com/insou22/typing-the-technical-interview-ru... Or Typescript https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “Doing First Grade Math in Rust's Type System”I made a start [1, 2]. No intersection detection yet though. [1] - https://github.com/richardTowers/Sprou.ts [2] - http://richard-towers.com/Sprou.ts/Sprouts/
Comment linking /Sprou.ts/Sprouts/
on “Sprouts Explained”Most importantly, this means my type system N-queens solution now works for an 8x8 chessboard (actually up to 10x10) instead of complaining about recursion depth: https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “TypeScript Native Previews”Love it! Reminds me of the hilarious "Typing the technical interview" [1] and "Typescripting the technical interview" [2], a couple of my favorite blog posts of all time. [0] https://aphyr.com/posts/342-typing-the-technical-interview [1] https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “Show HN: Conway's Game of Life in TypeScript's type system”Typescript too: https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-... Tbvh the biggest downside of a Turing complete type system is that you can theoretically implement an application that compiles to dust.
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “A Couple Million Lines of Haskell: Production Engineering at Mercury”I should add that Nim still still has a 'separate language' for types, so doesn't quite fit OP's bill. Nevertheless, it's quite easy to build type constructs using statically resolvable expressions. I'd love to know if anyone could reproduce the N-queens example in Nim: https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-... I believe it is possible, but don't have the time to try it out. > The Nim compiler…
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “Functions and algorithms implemented purely with TypeScript's type system”The following homage to Aphyr’s "Typing the technical interview" solves the N-queens problem using types in Typescript. This is both funny and insightful. https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “Functions and algorithms implemented purely with TypeScript's type system”Ah, thank you so much! Great spot. I've corrected this, and credited you in the errata - https://www.richard-towers.com/2023/03/11/typescripting-the-...
Comment linking /2023/03/11/typescripting-the-technical-interview.html
on “TypeScripting the Technical Interview”
