12 Nov 2025 #mondaylinks
Hey there.
I just realized I already had 4 links and I didn’t want to wait for next Friday to share them. So here they are.
These first two are just for laughs:
#1. Imagine waking up to an invoice for $0.01 from your cloud provider. Yep, that happened. Here’s the full story (10min).
#2. Now imagine sharing a name with the creator of a major social media platform. You won’t believe how many emails you would receive if your name were Mark Zuckerberg (2min).
On a more thoughtful and serious note…
#3. Everybody blames AI for the recent layoffs, especially the ones at Amazon. But there’s a real reason (1min) and of course, nothing to do with AI.
#4. My best interview was just one call and one open source contribution. That happens rarely. But what if open source contributions were like service duty? (2min).
And in case you missed it, I wrote on my blog about the scariest lines of code I’ve written (2min) and my reactions to r/csharp homepage (4min).
(Bzzz…Radio voice) This email was brought to you by… Check my latest book, Street-Smart Coding: 30 Ways to Get Better at Coding. From Googling to clear communication, you’ll find 30 lessons to help you code like a pro. It’s the roadmap I wish I had moving from junior to senior and the one I hope helps you too.
See you next time,
Cesar
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11 Nov 2025 #coding
Is using AI cheating?
That’s a point Christoffer Madsen made in a recent post on dev.to:
I use AI when I code. I don’t hide that. But I also don’t really talk about it. Because sometimes it feels like cheating.
That made me think:
If I copy-paste from StackOverflow, am I cheating?
If I use an open-source library, am I cheating?
If I ask for help, does that count as cheating?
We do those tasks daily. Maybe not always copy-pasting from StackOverflow.
Where’s the line?
When isn’t using AI cheating? It feels like cheating when AI takes full control and writes code we wouldn’t write ourselves.
I do use AI too: to generate boilerplate code and offload boring tasks. That’s where AI shines. But I stay in control, hands firmly on the wheel.
With or without AI, we’re paid to solve problems, not just to write code. If we only turn user stories or specs into lines of code, AI will eat us all alive.
When AI generates code faster than any of us, it’s time to double down on collaboration, communication, and problem-solving. Those skills make us stand out as coders. That’s why I wrote, Street-Smart Coding: 30 Ways to Get Better at Coding Without Losing Your Mind. Because being a great coder is more than just mastering syntax.
Grab your copy of Street-Smart Coding here. It’s the roadmap I wish I had moving from junior to senior and the one I hope helps you too.
10 Nov 2025 #coding
Like many developers, I’ve struggled to find the right way to use AI.
So far, I’ve settled on using AI as my assistant, but I don’t let it touch my code.
I haven’t followed a strict approach to testing AI. I just use it to offload some boring tasks, like this and this.
Here are the use cases where I’ve found AI shines:
#1. Generate unit tests: I give a sample test class I wrote myself and ask it to use as a guideline to generate tests for a similar object. Especially helpful when I’m not doing TDD but still want unit tests.
#2. Generate CRUD code: I’ve always dreamed of automating CRUDs. It seems we’re closer with AI.
I give AI a handler signature, explain the steps, and let it fill in details. I also provide database object definitions, repository signatures, and legacy code blocks, when I’m in migration mode.
#3. Improve naming: OK, this is one of the hardest tasks in coding. I describe what my class or method does and ask AI to critique or suggest names.
#4. Review code: This is one of my most frequent use cases. I like to feed AI with a diff of my changes and ask it to look for typos and places where I broke conventions. AI has caught me copy-pasting a lot. I tend to forget to update API routes. Oops!
I almost added searching (bye Google!) as a fifth point, but I trust StackOverflow and random people’s blogs more. I’m not sure when AI is simply hallucinating or actually answering correctly.
Lesson: Use AI for pattern matching and boilerplate code. Don’t use it to generate entire modules, make architectural decisions, or ask it to “double check answers and not to make mistakes.”
And if you’re starting out, set strict AI rules or you won’t grow strong coding muscles. Use AI as a learning assistant instead.
It’s tempting to default to AI for its speed. But to shine as a coder, you need more than just speed. Coding is problem-solving, collaboration, and clear communication. That’s why I wrote, Street-Smart Coding: 30 Ways to Get Better at Coding, the roadmap I wish I had on my path to becoming a senior coder. Because coding is more than mastering syntax.
Get your copy of Street-Smart Coding here
09 Nov 2025 #misc
Last week, I shared lessons I learned from a team’s architect.
He taught me to simplify complex coding problems into one line. A skill that has become easier with experience.
The same principle applies to any creative work.
But I completely forgot about it when writing and launching Street-Smart Coding, my latest book.
Movies, novels, and TV shows summarize their plot into a line or short paragraph for posters or synopses.
With a one-liner, writing promotional material is easier. “A vampire romance for teenagers.”
Next time you create something, describe it in a single line. You might need it on your sales pages or simply when someone asks you “what’s your new project about?” With a one-liner, you’ll always have a simple, confident answer.
08 Nov 2025 #books
The title itself is provocative: Steal Like an Artist. Stealing is bad. But “like an artist”?
Does it mean all artists steal? The whole point of stealing is not getting caught. Then what are artists doing to steal differently? Those are questions I asked just by reading this book’s title.
After sitting on my desk for a while, I finally read it. Here are 10 lessons I learned:
#1. Learning is copying. First learn who to copy, then learn what to copy. Once you’ve chosen who to copy, trace their influences too.
#2. If you copy from one person, it’s stealing. But if you copy multiple, it’s inspiration. Creativity is using inspiration to come up with something that doesn’t look stolen.
#3. “There’s nothing under the sun.” This is the author quoting a passage from the Bible. If there wasn’t any new 2,000 years ago, that feels like permission to copy.
If you think it’s new, it’s because you don’t know the original source.
#4. Creativity is subtraction. Creativity isn’t only inventing. It’s also remixing existing ideas and leaving things out to make them new. This reminds me of Idea Calculus from Skip the Line.
#5. Hands first, then computer. With a computer, the line between writing and editing is blurry. A computer wakes up the perfectionist inside us. Go analog to separate creating from critiquing.
In my own writing, I’m adopting this idea for my next books: outline first with index cards, then write on a computer, and then print out the draft to edit on paper.
#6. Use a calendar and deadlines. Work expands to the time available. Use deadlines to focus and to avoid procrastination and perfectionism. Done is better than perfect, perpetually unfinished.
#7. “You’re as good as your last post.” This is an invitation to keep working on your creative side. Don’t be a one-hit wonder.
I was about to write “keep showing up,” but I remember I ditched that line.
#8. Have a victories folder. Every time anything good happens with your art, take a screenshot, and save it for later. I screenshot comments, hit posts, follower count, dashboard with sales…Anything inspiring. This comes in handy when you feel like giving up or facing haters.
#9. Routine over time. The other day, I watched an interview of Steven Pressfield in the Huberman Lab. Steven said he only writes for ~2 hours a day. If a pro writer only writes 2 hours, you don’t need to quit your day job. Build discipline and a routine first.
#10. Keep your day job. It takes time to live off your art. Have something that doesn’t deplete your energy to pay the bills. The time to quit will come later.
This book made me rethink creativity. But it also made me rethink the concept of a book. Steal Like an Artist isn’t a 50,000-word volume on creativity. It’s a collection of 10 big ideas, presented with clear examples and eye-grabbing doodles and visuals. That already feels like permission to steal, remix, and create today.