KrokiKroki is a wonderful tool I discovered during the time I worked as DevRel: it’s a small open source containerized application (compatible with OpenShift off-the-box) written in JavaScript, that encapsulates as many textual diagram formats as possible under a single unified API, offering a convenient way for users to generate diagrams, without needing to install separate libraries everywhere.
ZoteroWriting articles for De Programmatica Ipsum made me adopt a workflow to read and annotate research papers. Most of the material that I use to write articles for DPI are papers, nearly all in PDF format, some with OCR’d text, some without (particularly older ones).
On Writing and Grading Papers in 2025I’ve recently read two articles about the subject of how AI is quickly destroying higher education and what can be done about that; one on The New Yorker and another on The Chronicle of Higher Education, and they are quite similar in spirit: both quote similar sources, both deplore the current state of things, and both fail to provide any actionable idea at the end.
HelixI’ve tried the Helix editor and, to be honest, I’m split. I have three specific things to say, though.
WordStar 7 for DOSI’m a Fedora Linux user, a very happy one at that, and there’s no shortage of decent text editors for Fedora; yet, I have to say that for the past few months I’ve been happily writing my text on the most awkward and backward editor you could think of… and it turned out to be one of the most pleasant writing experiences I’ve had in the past few years.
20 Years BloggingOn Saturday, November 6th, 2004, I wrote the text what would become my first blog post. It’s in Spanish, and I wrote it on my beloved iBook G3 near a boarding gate at the Ezeiza International Airport, after having spent a long month in Buenos Aires visiting family and friends.
BorgesI didn’t grow up in a family where literature played any significant role, other than entertainment, that is. My mother enjoyed reading novels by Jacqueline Susann and Harold Robbins. My mathematician grandmother read French paperbacks from the collection “J’ai Lu” by authors ranging from Agatha Christie to Guy des Cars.
LanguageToolAround two years ago I switched my writing AI helper of choice, going from Grammarly to LanguageTool, for many reasons.
On DocumentationIn my career I’ve seen lots of teams struggling, not only to get their software out of the door, but much more often (even if successful in the previous step) to have a decent level of documentation next to it.
Five Years of De Programmatica IpsumLast Monday I published the 60th edition of De Programmatica Ipsum, also known as “DPI”, the “unusual magazine about programmers, code, and society, written by humans since 2018.” De Programmatica Ipsum has been published continuously every first Monday of each month since October 2018.
Exporting Hugo to PDFHugo is fantastic but it misses one key functionality: the generation of PDF files. This article provides a possible solution for it using Podman, Pandoc, and a custom tool built in Rust.
Hugo in DevOps ModeAs I explained last week I have been updating this website in various ways; I removed the downloadable PDFs, then added privacy-friendly analytics, and finally, I set up a scheduled pipeline in GitLab to automatically build and deploy this website every Friday morning.
EditPlusLast week I was celebrating the 20 years of my Harman Kardon SoundSticks, but last Monday there was another anniversary that some of us celebrated fondly: EditPlus 1.0, released March 20th, 1998, is 25 years old!
Migrating from WordPress to HugoI’ve been migrating old blog posts (2004-2014) to this blog lately, and you can find them by clicking the “Next” button at the bottom of the index.
Text Editors for WorkThere has been a particular text editor that defined each period of my career as a software developer.
How to Write a Programming BookWriting a programming book is not very complicated, to be honest: it just consists of putting one word after another.
JoplinNote taking is very important to me. I keep everything in my notes, from ideas for blog posts like this one, to code snippets, to web pages, to plans of never started businesses, and so much more.
A Compilation of Old Blog PostsLooking inside some old archives I came across my first attempt at a book.
Touch TypingProbably the single most important skill that has always helped me when dealing with computers is the ability to type without looking at the keyboard.
De Programmatica IpsumDe Programmatica Ipsum is a new monthly treatise on individuals, interactions, and the true valuation of the things on the left, to be published on the first Monday of each month.
Markdown FTWMarkdown is my new favorite tool. It all started while looking for alternatives to LaTeX to write documents and booklets, because since the release of the iPad last year, I wanted to publish in PDF and in EPUB format at the same time, and LaTeX does not offer that option off the box.
Olé, olé, oléI just stumbled into this amazing TED talk by Elizabeth Gilbert via James Duncan Davidson (@duncan in Twitter) and I want to share it with you with some very personal thoughts below.
How to Count Words in Latex Files?I am a big LaTeX fan, mostly thanks to my friend Cedric who introduced me to it ;) And I don’t regret it at all; there is simply no better way to create long, beautiful PDF documents, particularly during these times of dissertation writing!
How to create a BibTeX file from a Delicious Library databaseWell, you’re pretty much on your own for that :)