Sabu Siyad's Blog

Reboot

2026-01-03T00:00:00+00:00

This is another attempt at rebooting my writing habits. I tried to write blog posts again and again in the past, but I never managed to keep it up for long. This time, I'm hoping to make it stick.

As a first step, I revamped this blog's design and structure. It is just pitch black now. The stack is same. Zola is still doing the heavy lifting and GitHub pages is still hosting it for free. The design is much more minimalistic now, focusing on content rather than flashy visuals. To hell with designs.

I also plan to write more regularly. My goal is to publish at least one post per month, mostly on work and life updates. Hope I can keep this up!

Spacing Hard

2025-02-22T05:29:32+00:00

This is going to be short. So I wake early in the morning, had breakfast and opened my laptop. The machine is a 2020 Macbook Air M1. It is a beast when it comes to performance and reliability. Me, an avid open source enthusiast should not be using this but huh it is hard to let this go. I got this one from work but more on that later.

So, long story short, the space bar was stuck. Not stuck as in stuck but the key barely had any travel. If you know me, then you know what I will do next. Yes! Fully confident in my ability to tinker with hardware, I carefully (not really) disassembled the key (not a big deal, I know). Cleaned the area with isopropyl alcohol. Tried to put the key back. Now the think won't go in the way which it came out. I tried to make it push it in but it just did not work.

As a self proclaimed Google (re)searcher, I tried my best at finding resources on how to do this stuff. I found some Reddit posts, with some guidance but none of them really helped. But one of them had a link to this video which did help!

The process is not that hard. It just takes some practice. All it took is a little push at the right point. My space bar is back to it's former glory now. Yay! I may try disassemble the whole keyboard now that I am confident.

Learning and Loving React

2025-02-14T14:36:41+00:00

Interestingly enough, React was my first attempt at frontend web development, back in 2019. It didn't take me much to understand the basics then, but it didn't excite me either. I was in college at the time, having fun with writing Telegram bots and command line tools. Colors in an html file did not really concern me but I tried, and failed. But after 5 years and a lot of Vue, I'm back in the game. This time though its a bit different. The nuances of CSS and insanity of user experience is much more apparent to me.

This is my story of learning and loving React.

The first attempt

Back when I tried to learn React, it was preferring a class based approach. I was not familiar with JavaScript classes at the time. Moreover, it felt somewhat different from all the other frameworks I have seen before. But since it was my first time checking out any frontend web framework, I couldn't really expect anything. My tech stack at the time was mostly NestJs, Flask and Gin. Those frameworks, each from different languages, were beautifully written. Examples were great and tips and tricks were really helpful. Even if I tried, I couldn't write bad code in flask. Maybe because I loved python, or because it was very lite weight, or because it was a backend framework. Mind you, backend developers are obsessed with code quality and overall hygiene. This is were I started my career, and this initial part influenced me from there onwards.

React felt nothing like those frameworks. The getting started documentation was decent enough, but not in a level of NestJS, or Flask, or Gin. Maybe there was some other documentation I could check but I certainly didn't see any. It does not mean the React community is lacking any resources. There are plenty of medium posts, video tutorials, udemy courses and many more. But an official documentation, that too a simple one, is an important first step in a long journey. I don't remember building anything in React at the time, except a counter, which is what every one us build as a first project.

My venture with React then came to quick stop. I could almost say the initial novelty vanished off very quickly. The only outcome of that trial is cementing my belief that backend developers and technologies are superior. I do realise I was wrong, and every piece of technology is important. But lets fast forward 5 years into 2024, and I'm going to try React again.

Once more

The year is 2024, month of September and the occasion is work. It is important to understand that I had an option between Vue or React, and I was fairly good with Vue at this point. But I chose React. Who does not love some challenge? I was practicing some React here and there for some some. I wrote a counter (again) and a tic tac toe game in React, which was a decent experience. React suddenly did not feel as bad how I felt before, so I wanted to continue, have a go at something I couldn't crack before.

Users as a service

I already told you that I was fairly comfortable with Vue. I'll tell you about that later, in another post, maybe. But the exposure to one frontend web framework taught me something. The way you think when writing user facing software is different from that of backend (hidden) frameworks. Honestly, we are the only industry where customers are called users and a for a good reason. People use our product, and we use them. They are our lab rats. They are idiots. They are numbers. A common man (or woman) does not care how good your code is. They don't care if your method is performant. They want to see things. They want things in the way they expect it to be. You can try it yourself. If you are a backend developer with zero interest in user facing stuff, build something you think you are efficient and give them to people for free. You can have plenty of never expecting feedback quickly. I would say it is important to touch grass once in a while, and I did, with Vue. And it made my React learning a little bit better.

CSS

I hated CSS. It never made sense to me. But at some point in my career, I was forced to embrace it and that changed my perspective. Don't get me wrong, CSS is still somewhat weird, but I do see how people do it, how we can use it and how good it is. Most of my CSS experience is with Tailwind. Without it I couldn't call myself a CSS ninja. We could almost say Tailwind is synonymous with CSS these days. But enough about it, React don't need CSS to work.

From a Vue perspective

Even though I don't want to have a bias towards Vue, it is almost impossible to do the comparison. And this comparison is especially relevant when TypeScript is involved. I assume you know what TypeScript is and why it is needed. I won't be killing your time preaching something you already know.

Vue supports TypeScript but React is TypeScript.

The goodness of typing, whole of it, is readily available in React. This is no magic, React is simply a collection of functions that compile into native JavaScript, while Vue do some magic to convert Vue DSL to JavaScript. The difference is that the developer experience, at-least at the surface level, is much better with React. You use native array map to loop through your list of items, unlike magic in Vue. This make React somewhat east to pick up.

Hooks

But but! Why wasn't I able to learn this thing some time ago? Well the answer mostly is hooks. Hooks are a newer addition to React, and these tiny blocks of logic replaced classes. So everything is a function now, and fortunately it felt very similar to what I did with Vue. I feel hooks and functions are much better than classes. I personally feel the code is much more splittable now, and it kind of helps with bigger codebases. But do not take my word for it, for I am still learning the framework. Hooks brings their own chaos though. There are annoying rules I have to follow when writing components. I don't know why they have to be there but I'm sure there is a reason.

Ecosystem

The ecosystem! How can I not talk about the React ecosystem? If there something you want, there is a plugin for that in React. Whether you want design systems, tooling or anything remotely related to React, it is there. All you have to do is a basic web search. I love shadcn/ui, I love Zustand and I'm sure there are plenty of other such plugins we will love.

Conclusion

I am learning and loving React at the moment. But there are annoyances too. There is a lack of overall code hygiene. There are signs of mediocrity. But as someone said, this is no time for hate. That comes later.

Adios!

Breath In

2025-02-13T18:41:08+00:00

This is my first time writing anything in a span of an year. I rarely wrote anything in paper in this decade. When I did, it was mostly office work or chores. I can even say I forgot the pleasure of having a pen on paper. It used to be quite satisfying, and now I forgot that feeling. It is not an issue with pen and paper though. The case is same with digital tools. Though I spend a lot of time with my computer, I rarely write anything other than code. Code, on the other hand, is not satisfying as it once used to be.

None of those issues are unique to me. Many of my friends and colleagues are facing the same thing. I have neither the time nor the patience to investigate why. Alas, maybe its the very reason why we are in such a situation. One thing for sure is that it has to change, for better of-course.

This is not a petition to myself, nor this is an attempt at finding anything. This is simply me trying to write something once again, even if this is not paper. I made some progress in my career and overall personal life. But one I miss is my willingness to spend time to read and write. Hopefully I may turn it around this time. Mind you, this is not first time I tried to restart my habits but I really hope this is the last.

I made some changes to this very website. It may not look prettier to you but does to me, and I am happy with that :) I learned React in that past 4 months. Its neither better nor worse than Vue. I kinda like it at times but not always. More on it later.

In the meantime, welcome back - me to myself.

Retrospect

2023-01-28T01:35:30+00:00

Would you prefer if people only talked about the necessary bits, leaving any emotion out of it? Regardless of your answer, it is most effective communication method I know. Things could be very straightforward and clear, removing any cloud of doubt in the message. This combined with logical reasoning might the best ever form of communication we are capable of. Does this mean a perfect human is one without emotions? Doesn't it mean we will achieve greater efficiency and success with it?

But it also means we lose apathy right? What new heighs are we going climb without it? Why are we climbing anyways? Why not just enjoy it from the valley? This reminds me of Equilibrium. Nice Movie. Would recommend.

What do we die for?

I am one of those who seek the meaning of life. People believe in different things. Some strive for eternal paradise, some for peace and some for whatever niceties they can get before and after death. Death was always interesting for me. Maybe because dearest people died in front of me. Did they have something to tell me, after they were dead? Or were they just, dead? I don't know. What I know is that there isn't much for me the grand scheme of things. There is probably no purpose to my life. There is (probably) nothing that awaits me after death. It is said that the lifetime of a universe is the time of breath cycle of Brahma, and we are so in-significant that the next universe will be created right after.

I think anything eternal will eventually become boring. I love to drive, but driving forever is a punishment. Same for my favourite snack/game/movie/paradise. Maybe eternal hell will be boring as well

Night

Night is special for me. Earth (I never been outside so can't talk about other planets) is so much more enjoyable without the light of sun. Everything comes to life at night. There is a certain beauty to the darkness that it becomes so possessive at times.

Fun fact: I was nicknamed owl in high school

Football (Malayalam: പന്തുകളി)

Northern Kerala (Malabar) has a special festival that happens mostly in winter. It is called sevens football tournaments. Trust me, we love football. But we also love to butcher it. If you know football, you know it is (officially) played with 11 players on each team. But we play it with 7 on each. Matches are extremely physical, and are played in a mud pitch. Venues are usually wide fields (we have a lot of paddy fields) or school grounds. They may not have the necessary infrastructure, hence everything is built temporarily, using arecanut tree, including the gallery. The atmosphere is usually electric, sometimes violent, and rarely chaotic.

It has been a while since I went to one of these events. Past week, me and a friend very accidentally got into one. We were out for our usual evening walk, and saw fireworks from distance. I knew about the event and we decided to check it out. By the team we reached there, it was already half time. I was not really interested in getting in. Mostly because I unknowingly developed this football elitism, in which only higher tier (read English Premier League) football is considered actual. All other forms are seen as disgraces. But as you may have imagined, we finally got in. This happened because of two things

There was nobody to check tickets
The atmosphere suddenly became so loud (became interesting)

I did not know which teams were playing, or at what time this will end. Any of decision is immediately followed by a regret check. I don't regret any of it, but sometimes make changes to catch up. In this case, I felt like I am alone in a crowd (friend beside me), and it wouldn't be false to say I considered leaving. After a while though, I found myself cheering both teams. I cussed at both teams, and found home in both teams. These tournaments import a lot of manpower from african continent. They don't understand the local language, nor does locals understand them. But in the heat of the moment, everybody understand everybody else. I could read their happiness, curses, antics and whatnot without any words. I know they were not teaching quantum physics in that football field, but I felt emotions are as powerful as words.

Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth later in uglier ways. - Sigmund Freud

Kathakali (Malayalam: കഥകളി)

Kathakali (katha: story, kali: play) is a classical dance form native to (Southern) Kerala. It is boring, not at all engaging and you need to have a lot of knowledge to even understand what is going on. The pace is usually extremely slow and it takes forever to finish.

I watched kathakali before, but as part of school and college art festivals. But that is not why we (or me) attend such events. The blood brooding youth does not usually show interest in such art. Long story short, even though it is very popular in my state, I had no idea what it actually is.

Me and friend were out for some shopping. And while passing a temple, we heard some music. On the way back, curious to know what was happening there, we went in. Unsurprisingly, it was kathakali. Now you know I don't like it, but decided to give it a try. We spent about 2 hours there, and realized

I'm not in school/college anymore
I don't understand a thing

Third point must be obvious. You have to have some knowledge about the story that is being presented. I don't have any such knowledge, and didn't understand a thing.

Kathakali actors don't speak (the speak a sign language tbf), they only act. There is supposed to be a song in background iirc, but wasn't that case here. I might be wrong tho. Maybe we need words to effectively communicate

I was more invested in the music, acting and atmosphere. It was all dark except for a few lamps in the building. There was a traditional fire lamp in front of the stage, and a few other lamps in the stage. It all means, everything other than the stage/actor was grayed out. So you could really notice all the expressions and emotions on his face, and the accompanying music amplified it the next level. Every bit of that music transferred his emotions straight into my heart. I could feel the anger, panic and ultimately regret. It made me so immersed that I could visualise the scene myself (not knowing the story became a boon, because I now have the freedom to make up my own). It made me think if sound/atmosphere actually contribute to effective communications. My answer would be yes, it does. Interestingly, this came into mind.

Kantara

You might know Kantara. It tells the story of a remote village and their traditions. I'm not a movie reviewer so I can't entertain you with all the technicalities. The movie did not impress me much, except the rare occasions in which the demigod appears. I am not a believer, so I won't talk about god and stuff. What made it interesting is the background score. It was so chilling and engaging that it conveyed the message pretty well. But in the end, it is a movie and I'm watching it in air conditioned cinema theater.

Watching kathakali though, is a very similar very different experience. Everything felt hyper realistic, nerve chilling and engaging. Our ability to communicate (universally) with slighter movements of muscles is fascinating. I would recommend you to try any of these arts. There are plenty in our great nation.

Why though?

These events (with numerous others) taught me that we are, in the end, simply live to live. It is hard to survive in a world where competition is in it's extreme. We often forget to enjoy the things around us. We miss the opportunity to actually live instead of being in a rat race. I still don't know the purpose of life, but I now know there are places to go and things to do, starting from home. Maybe we don't need to be all logical. Some things don't make sense at all, but they still make you happy (how do you define happiness?). Maybe words are not the basis of communication. Instead they could be tip of this iceberg. With emotions deep under.

'Which is more important,' asked Big Panda, 'the journey or the destination?' 'The company,' said Tiny Dragon.

Thanks for bearing with me, adios!

Veronika Decides To Try JavaScript

2022-08-23T20:52:29+05:30

That’s a joke, she didn’t. Instead, she decides to die only to meet a new world of infinite possibilities that awaited her. She is a character from Paulo Coelho’s stellar novel titled ‘Veronika Decides to Die’. If you haven’t read it already, I suggest you do. It’s a good book with a very much relatable setting. Meanwhile, I thought it might make a good title so here we are.

You might be thinking, what is this about then, if not Veronika? yes! it’s JavaScript! Even tho I’m not a big fan of JavaScript, I find it quite tinker-able and useful. JavaScript makes its way into almost everything, from front-end web development to smartphone applications. If you’re one of those who use VSCode, your editor runs on JavaScript. If you happen to use any cross-platform desktop applications, it is probably an electron app that renders JavaScript in a polished window. That being said, if you’re a JavaScript guru, please ignore the rest of this post, and wave your hands as you close this window. If you’re going to continue reading, let me welcome you to the problem and the reasons for it.

The Backstory

> a = 1
1
> b = 1
1
> a == b
true

This is good, both a and b have a value of 1 and when we check if a and b are equal (==), it returns true which means both a and b have equal values. Let's also note that,

> typeof a
'number'
> typeof b
'number'

And let's try,

> a = {}
{}
> b = {}
{}
> a == b
false

Why wouldn't a and b not equal? They are both empty right? Well, as developer docs says,

If the operands are both objects, return true only if both operands reference the same object.

That means a and b have different memory addresses unlike,

> a = b = {}
{}
> a == b
true

where a point to b and equality is satisfied. In the case of primitive values like in the first case, we have a different condition that says,

If the operands have the same type, they are compared as follows:

String: return true only if both operands have the same characters in the same order.
Number: return true only if both operands have the same value. +0 and 0 are treated as the same value. If either operand is NaN, return false.
Boolean: return true only if operands are both true or both false.

The Problem

We know that,

> typeof new Date()
'object'

and let's try,

> new Date() == new Date()
false

This is known since both have different memory addresses and variables referencing different objects do not satisfy equality. But then we can,

> new Date() <= new Date() && new Date() >= new Date()
true

which to be frank, looks like an abomination but helps me spit this point. This essentially means we have equality satisfied but at a very high cost. But why would this work when == doesn’t? Because we have a different algorithm for < and >. From developer docs,

First, objects are converted to primitives using Symbol.ToPrimitive with the hint parameter be 'number'.

If both values are strings, they are compared as strings, based on the values of the Unicode code points they contain. Otherwise JavaScript attempts to convert non-numeric types to numeric values: Boolean values true and false are converted to 1 and 0 respectively. null is converted to 0. undefined is converted to NaN. Strings are converted based on the values they contain, and are converted as NaN if they do not contain numeric values. If either value is NaN, the operator returns false. Otherwise the values are compared as numeric values.

So what < and > does is converting the date object to its numerical value, which is the number of milliseconds between 1 January 1970 00:00:00 UTC and the given date aka the epoch.* JavaScript use Date.prototype.valueOf() behind the scenes to convert a date object to a primitive value. But we can use Date.prototype.getTime() since Date.prototype.valueOf() is usually called internally by JavaScript and not explicitly in code.

The Solution

Now we know what was wrong, and how we should actually equality check date objects

> new Date().getTime() == new Date().getTime()
true

That's it!

JavaScript is a weird programming language to learn, but it's also a fun experience. So if you decide to try it, like Veronika, I'd recommend you to play with its core, there is a lot to explore. Thanks for reading!

ClubHouse Sucks

2022-08-23T20:37:30+05:30

If you don't know what ClubHouse is, check out:

Inherent Problems

When I look back at social media platforms I been a part of, it makes me think if ClubHouse will ever be able to solve it's inherent problems of being an online platform. Provided, ClubHouse is still in beta and registration is solely based on invitation from existing users. Even then I saw an noticeable number of faceless folk here and there. Don't get me wrong, I very much promote anonymity in public places, especially when it comes to online communities. But a platform which very much boast it's real identity policy, it seemed like the very opposite of what the platform stands for. A few of them were even moderators of some really big chat rooms where a lot of real people did not have the chance to speak.

To quote Martin Garrix,

Using social media to hurt and destroy is callous, acted out by cowards hiding behind computers. My advice is to ignore negativity. Focus on the love around.

ClubHouse managed to fix this to a point, but not in a perfect way. Something like strict verification using volunteers/staff would have been a lot better.

Freshness

A lot of people I know praise ClubHouse for it's freshness. I don't get it. As far as I understand, ClubHouse is a modern-podcast platform aka the voice chat. The idea of podcasts are very well known and there are multiple instant messengers with voice chat, like WhatsApp and Telegram. And there is numerous video-communication services which is nowadays used by people all around the world to conduct meetings and stuff. Heck, there is discord which is literally ClubHouse + numerous other features like text channels, roles and much more good moderation. You should give it a try if you didn't already. That being said, ClubHouse is old wine in new bottle. There is nothing new as advertised.

Privacy (or Anonymity)

It should be an important aspect of every communication medium in today's world, or so I believe. No one would know what happens in China if anonymity was not important. Arab Spring wouldn't have happened. No news of anything that ever happens in any authoritarian country will reach us. Anonymity is really a boon when it comes to real life. I understand that it is sometimes a pain in the ass to control these trolls and whatnot, but it is a price we pay for having platform where we can safely and courageously broadcast or ideas. Without anonymity, I would have be jailed/dead already, much like a majority of people I interact with. In a modern world where criticism against governing bodies are being suppressed with great strength, it is important to have such anonymous friends to speak up certain things.

When it comes to privacy, I'd like if ClubHouse does not tell my followers what I am listening to, or speaking to, in their front page. I very much hate that. If I participate in a discussion, it means I'm interested in it and does not mean I want all my friends to let know I'm in such a discussion. It is even worse when anyone could follow me and spy me like ever before.

Thus, I suspect if ClubHouse have any preference for privacy or anonymity and I very much hate that.

Synchronicity

From Wikipedia:

synchronous: At the same time, at the same frequency

Almost every online communication tool is asynchronous, and there is a reason for it. Our real life is very much different from our online life, even if seems to be the one and same. Let's assume they are two threads in our program. online life is fast and you may loose many updates if you try to block it for even a little interval. real life on the other hand is slow and you're committed to it 100%.

From Inception:

Cobb: Well, dreams, they feel real while we're in them right? Its only when we wake up then we realize that something was actually strange.

Like dreams, you engage too much in social media, you lose track of real life and start to live in a very artificial -handpicked for you- mental state. This is why a lot of social media platforms start as asynchronous and starts to sync you in with constant notifications. An asynchronous platform is where you start something, do something else, come back and finish what you previously started. This enables you to engage in both worlds while being a slave to neither.

as an exact opposite to this, ClubHouse starts synchronous and stay synchronous. You are expected to stay 100% committed to any event unlike asynchronous platforms where you could take occasional breaks.

I'd also say, ClubHouse success is a side effect of recent situations where a lot of us are unable interact with the society around us, which leaves a big gaps in our daily schedule and let us commit to things we disagreed to before.

Sound as a medium

I very much like to listen to things, but I like to read more. So my views are biased and may make no sense to you, beware. We all value our time. Me too. I'd love it when people actually prepare beforehand and talk about about things clear and fair. Unfortunately that's not what I experienced from ClubHouse. After all, we are all common people and have our own weaknesses, but I'd rather listen to TED talk rather than a ClubHouse discussion.

That being said, it is impossible to re-read (or re-analyze/re-listen) conversations, unless you manage to record them, which I consider to be very unethical if you don't have permission from every speaker participating. Even if a re-reading/re-listening is possible, it will be very harder to cross reference than in case of text.

Also, me being an introvert, would like to participate in a way other than speaking, and an absence of such feature makes me think if ClubHouse is not for my kind.

Does it really suck?

I think so. But in the end, it is just my opinion. Yours may differ and I'm perfectly okay with that. I'll encourage you to contribute more and more the society we live in. It just feels that it is not for me.

Regards.