TLDR Dev 2026-03-30
Rendering games in CSS ๐ฎ, uncomfortable AI truths ๐ฌ, better multiline layouts ๐
๐งโ๐ป
Articles & Tutorials
CSS is DOOMed - Rendering DOOM in 3D with CSS (24 minute read)
A version of DOOM was developed that uses CSS for all visual rendering, including 3D projection and lighting, while JavaScript handles the game logic. It shows how modern CSS features like `transform` and `@property` can manage complex geometry and animations without relying on traditional rendering engines.
How Colossus optimizes data placement for performance (10 minute read)
Colossus, Google's foundational distributed storage system, supports all Google products with high throughput, scalability, and various performance requirements. It gets SSD performance at HDD prices by using L4, an advanced distributed SSD caching technology that uses machine learning to optimize data placement for frequently accessed "hot" data.
ChatGPT Won't Let You Type Until Cloudflare Reads Your React State. I Decrypted the Program That Does It (6 minute read)
The author decrypted Cloudflare Turnstile programs used by ChatGPT, revealing a sophisticated bot detection mechanism that analyzes the internal state of the React application to make sure it's a genuine environment. This system identifies bots by verifying application-level state and behavioral biometrics, although its security relies more on complex obfuscation than true encryption.
Some uncomfortable truths about AI coding agents (18 minute read)
An experienced engineer argues against using AI coding agents for production, citing skill atrophy, unsustainable costs, security risks, and legal uncertainties regarding copyright. While useful for research or personal projects, these flaws make them unsuitable for professional software development and core business code.
The first 40 months of the AI era (9 minute read)
The author reflects on 40 months of AI, acknowledging the utility of interfaces like Claude Code while questioning AI's overall impact on coding productivity and creative quality. Despite recognizing its potential for expert-level tasks, he is still skeptical of its ability to replicate personal style or handle complex software development without human intervention.
AI for Industry Challenge: $180K in prizes for complex AI robotics & manufacturing problems (Sponsor)
Not registered yet? Final call! Sign up before April 17th to compete for
a share of $180K while helping solve the toughest industrial manufacturing problems. No electronics expertise required. Developers, roboticists, and engineers, get ready to apply your skills in this global challenge brought to us by Intrinsic, Open Robotics, NVIDIA, and Google DeepMind.
Register now!
jai (Website)
AI agents are already causing data loss, from wiped home directories to deleted files, when granted ordinary machine access. jai provides an effortless, one-command solution for containing these agents on Linux, bridging the gap between full system access and complex virtualization. It works by giving your working directory full access while protecting your home directory with a copy-on-write overlay or complete isolation.
Pretext (GitHub Repo)
Pretext is a pure JavaScript/TypeScript library for fast and accurate multiline text measurement and layout. It circumvents costly DOM reflows by implementing its own text measurement logic using the browser's font engine. The library has two primary use cases: calculating a paragraph's height without DOM interaction for purposes like virtualization, and providing tools to manually lay out text lines for rendering to Canvas, SVG, or server-side.
The Cognitive Dark Forest (6 minute read)
The early internet was an open "bright meadow" where sharing ideas and code led to innovation and success. However, corporate consolidation and the advent of AI have transformed it into a "cognitive dark forest." In this new environment, AI platforms can cheaply absorb emerging human innovations by analyzing user interactions and data, effectively owning the compute, models, and developer data.
AI Agents Could Make Free Software Matter Again (25 minute read)
AI coding agents are going to make "free software,โ defined by users' freedoms to run, study, modify, and share, more relevant than ever. Historically, the rise of SaaS reduced free software's importance as software running on remote servers made source code access impractical for most users. However, agents can now act as intermediaries, allowing even non-technical users to customize software directly if its source code is accessible.
The most important software engineering news in one daily email
Join 450,000 readers for
one daily email