Stars

Written: 2025-01-23 | Philosophy Tech Work
Updated: 2026-06-27

Being idealistic is hard for me to brush off. I overly enjoy perfection and the feeling of having created something just right.

Having guidelines, or rules matters only if consistently applied. Code fits greatly to this via linter, type checkers, formatters, etc.

For other things, I find it useful to have guiding principles, less as strong rules and more as unreachable states. Aiming, if never reaching, for something perfectly great.

Here is a constantly-updated list of guiding stars I collected.

TBD: write a small paragraph for each.

It’s written, so it exists ¶

Having an awful memory, and low object permanence, it’s a challenge to trust what is in my head and what people say. Using a written proof of an exchange, decision, idea, and tracking it (ideally with a VCS), is the best way to make it real.

Relates to existence isn’t correctness.

It’s tested, so it might work ¶

Comments lie ¶

Comments are often under less scrutiny than code. It is more difficult to lint and test them. So they often drift from the code and offer little help.

Consider:

// make sure we get a correct difference between x and y
func Diff(x, y int) int {
    // substract y from x only if x is bigger than y
    if (x > y) { return x - y }
    // otherwise substract x from y
    return y - x
}

Every comment here is misleading or useless. They add only to the clutter and confusion of the code they are surrounding.

Corollary to comment via types and names.

Comment via types and names ¶

Programming languages offer many functionality to explain code that doesn’t require comments: the types and names of functions, variables, namespaces, etc.

Consider:

type length int

func AbsoluteDiff(x, y length) length {
    if (x > y) { return x - y }
    return y - x
}

Corollary to comments lie.

Everything decays ¶

Code create bugs ¶

Understanding is a muscle ¶

Geniuses are liabilities ¶

Completion is illusory ¶

API is mandatory ¶

Everything should have a URL ¶

https://ben.balter.com/2015/11/12/why-urls/

Compose from small ¶

Prefer the least ¶

Whenever it’s about clothings, tools, third party libraries, … Each brings additional responsibility. Caring for the end result should be prioritized over caring for the way to get there.

Find what is truly necessary, learn to live with less.

It’s never about you ¶

Speak less, listen more ¶

Become nonessential ¶

Feedback over feelings ¶

Prefer intelligent pushback to thoughtless acceptance. - @gleeblezoid

ISO 8601 ¶

What where you doing on 08-03-11?

I was either:
Celebrating the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day (2011-03-08)
Dancing to the #1 song: Crazy In Love - Beyonce Ft JayZ (2003-08-11)
Hearing that W. H. Taft got elected 27th president of the USA (1908-11-03)

Time is confusing enough as it is, there’s no need to sprinkle some nonsensical ordering in the mix.

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