Engineering blog

Message queue using MySQL: SELECT * FOR UPDATE

4/29/2024

Writing a queuing system does not have to involve using complex software or writing hundreds of lines of code. In this post I want to explain how using a simple MySQL table and a terminal you can make a queuing system, which you can then implement in any language.

Phi3 vs Llama3: the new generation LLMs

4/26/2024

The new language models such as Phi3 for me are a revolution because being much smaller has several advantages: they are faster, therefore cheaper, and you can run them on virtually any platform.

MySQL: ENUM Datatype

4/24/2024

Today I discovered that MySQL has a data type which is an ENUM. It allows you to define up to 2^16 or 65536 different values. The peculiarity is that you can define a set of values such as “status” => “pending”, “wip”, “done”, and MySQL itself converts them into values 1, 2, 3... Important: the values start at 1 and not 0. Note that it can have either a DEFAULT value or it can be NULL and in this case, if it is not defined, the field value will be NULL.

How to make presentations with Reveal.js (HTML, JS and CSS)

4/22/2024

YouTube

Looking for the best tool to create presentations, I'll tell you why I chose Reveal.js over other tools like PowerPoint.

My working setup: adding acoustic treatment

4/16/2024

One of the things I have always done is to progressively improve my setup. In the last few months I have improved the quality with which I record videos: both image and sound. And don't think that you need a lot of money for this: my equipment for recording videos is very cheap and I'm happy with the result.

Solving Sudokus with backtracking in Python

4/15/2024

YouTube

Sudokus is something that has always caught my attention and, when I learnt about backtracking during my degree in computer engineering, in the artificial intelligence subjects, I came up with the idea of solving sudokus using this method.

My first "viral" video

4/12/2024

A few months ago I decided to upload a video every week to YouTube that would allow me to explore some topic in depth, and give it a different format than a written post. I do this mainly because I like to talk about the problems I am solving, because I am sure I can provide knowledge to other people, just as I learn from others who share their experiences.