jonoropeza.com
Making software and software development teams. Mostly the people parts.
Letting o1 Cook - February 8th, 2025
An exercise where I guide OpenAI's o1 through coding a JavaScript game that runs in the browser
The Best Things I Read In 2024 - December 29th, 2024
The best of what I read in 2024 - books, blog posts, substack newsletters, etc
Baking and Complexity - August 19th, 2024
Ways my new favorite bread recipe reminds me of software development.
Spring Cleaning - April 7th, 2024
A summary of what I'm doing with the blog in early 2024.
The Best Things I Read In 2023 - December 27th, 2023
The best essays, books, long-form pieces and poems I read in 2023.
Adding CI & CD is a zero hour task - June 1st, 2023
Why I've started adding continuous integration and continuous deployments to all new projects right away, and you should as well.
Art of Travel - April 25th, 2023
The book Art of Travel by John Gregory, how it influenced me to start traveling, and how I've gotten away from its principles
Travel: How Many Nights Should You Stay? - April 7th, 2023
A framework for deciding how many nights to stay at a destination, either on a short trip or as part of a larger trip
Ernest Hemingway's Writing Technique (That Works For Writing Code Too) - February 14th, 2023
Steal this writing technique from Ernest Hemingway: Always stop when you know what happens next.
Models of Automation - February 5th, 2023
Four of the primary models of automating any process
My Writing System For 2023 - January 22nd, 2023
The system I'm using to write, edit and publish in 2023. Stolen from Jerry Seinfeld.
Communications Skills For Leadership Roles (that they don't teach you in school) - January 14th, 2023
Some essential communications skills for any leadership role, not just tech.
Areas and Distances - January 10th, 2023
Do you know which is bigger by area: California, Italy or Japan?
The Best Things I Read In 2022 - December 31st, 2022
The best things Jon Oropeza read in 2022
Downtime Prevention Technique: Continuous Deployments - December 8th, 2022
How Continuous Deployments (or CD) reduce downtime, amongst other benefits.
Default Software Development Choices for 2023 - December 5th, 2022
Baseline choices appropriate for teams starting new projects in 2023.
Downtime Prevention Technique: Exit if environment variables are not found - October 22nd, 2022
What to do about app environment variables, and why you should exit if they're not found in software development and programming.
The Two Dimensional Web Skills Stack - September 22nd, 2022
Two dimensions of web skills. Code, and the software development lifecycle. Running the code, operating the code.
Andy Grove's High Output Management and the Three High Impact Activities - July 19th, 2022
Another dimension of engineering management: The three highest impact activities.
Roll Back or Fail Forward - July 4th, 2022
Framing the decision between rolling back or failing forward (or fix-in-place) as a policy for a given experience in a given environment.
Dimensions of Engineering Management Focus - November 2nd, 2021
High level framing to either understand your own career or to assist in interviewing/hiring engineering managers.
Second Lap - September 25th, 2021
In which I discuss my own Second Lap: the idea that, having moved up the promotion ladder from entry level to leadership, you move back to an individual contributor role and start the climb over again..
Time Is The Toughest Dimension - June 5th, 2021
Time is the toughest dimension to reason about in software development.
Now - January 6th, 2021
What Jon Oropeza is up to, as of 2024 Q2
Joining AllStripes - December 13th, 2020
My move to AllStripes, a Series A healthcare startup aimed at accelerating treatments for rare disease.
On My Way Back - November 30th, 2020
Introducing Dark Four In Cascadia, my first public creative writing project in nearly a decade.
The Big List of COVID-19 / Coronavirus Pandemic Resources - July 29th, 2020
A list of high-quality, no political bullshit links related to the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic
This Coronavirus Sucks - July 12th, 2020
April 2020 And We Have a Global Pandemic
Gary Snyder's Poem On How We Go On - December 15th, 2019
The poem Axe Handles by Gary Snyder and what it means to me
Use Docker and Docker Compose In Your Static Website Developer Workflow - July 4th, 2019
Use Docker and Docker Compose In Your Static Website Developer Workflow
Wisdom On Practices and Principles of Software Development - July 4th, 2019
Thoughts on the Medium post Production Oriented Development by Paul Osman, including commentary on the specific practices and principles he suggests.
Book I Recommend - July 4th, 2019
The Four Key Activities from Andy Grove's High Output Management
Developer Happiness - July 4th, 2019
Is being happy at work a reasonable expectation?
What The Global Economy Looks Like - July 4th, 2019
Thoughts on Americans working in Europe, and the EU as a federation.
Old Blog Post I'm Dredging Up - July 4th, 2019
Software Development Principles
The Tilt Video adventure has come to an end - October 30th, 2014
Tilt Video's shutdown message. Thank you to everyone involved.
Back In Portland (Again) - April 13th, 2014
Coming back to Portland in Spring, after three weeks working in the Bay Area, and noticing everything I like about the city.
11 Scenes From A Hoh Valley Trip - June 5th, 2006
In 2006 I backpacked up the Hoh Valley to Glacier Meadows at the base of Mt. Olympus.
Off To Europe – Newark Airport - May 28th, 1998
Jon Oropeza goes backpacking through Europe in 1998