David Eisinger

Dispatch #26 (April 2025) (2025-03-31)

Nico received a major software upgrade this month. One day he could barely roll over, the next he’s crawling, getting into stuff, maybe even talking? (It’s a little hard to tell but I’m going with “dada” as his first word.) We finally got Nev out of the Pack ’n Play she’s been sleeping in since she moved out of our room and into a proper bed. She loves it, and it’s great that she can just get out of bed and come downstairs by herself when she’s ready to start her day.

Dispatch #25 (March 2025) (2025-03-04)

My family popped down for an unplanned visit, just in time for another big snow – felt like Christmas in February. Claire headed to Mexico with some friends, and it was great to have help with the kids, but it was also pretty special to be Nico’s guy for three days. A lot of the primary parenting duties fall to Claire, and he’s not going to be a baby much longer, so I’m glad we got that time.

Dispatch #24 (February 2025) (2025-02-05)

We actually got some snow here in Durham, which is not something that happens every year. We took the kids out sledding, and, well, I had a good time; they’ll grow into it. Nev and I built a wagon out of scrap lumber and some casters that roll a little bit too well. We let Nev pick the paint colors and so it’s three shades of pink. We built it for her to wheel her toys around, but you know we plopped that boy in there within the first hour.

Dispatch #23 (January 2025) (2025-01-03)

Happy new year! Nev turned three this month, and somewhere – not from us, as far as we know – she’s added the word “sucks” to her vocabulary. “This juice tastes like bananas … and it sucks.” This is, in my estimation, the hardest thing about parenting: how to raise a well-mannered child when there’s nothing funnier than a toddler being crass.

Dispatch #22 (December 2024) (2024-12-04)

I lost my notebook. I’ve been keeping a Bullet Journal-style notebook for the last several years. It’s got everything in it: my daily log, journal entries, short- and long-term todo lists, all my upcoming events, meeting notes, woodworking plans, everything. And I lost it. I brought it to a 1-on-1 meeting with one of my guys at a local bar, and then rushed out to make it to daycare on time, and somewhere along the way, I misplaced it.

Local Docker Best Practices (viget.com, 2022-05-05)

Here at Viget, Docker has become an indispensable tool for local development. We build and maintain a ton of apps across the team, running different stacks and versions, and being able to package up a working dev environment makes it much, much easier to switch between apps and ramp up new devs onto projects. That’s not to say that developing with Docker locally isn’t without its drawbacks¹, but they’re massively outweighed by the ease and convenience it unlocks.

“Friends” (Undirected Graph Connections) in Rails (viget.com, 2021-06-09)

No, sorry, not THOSE friends. But if you’re interested in how to do some graph stuff in a relational database, SMASH that play button and read on.

Making an Email-Powered E-Paper Picture Frame (viget.com, 2021-05-12)

Over the winter, inspired by this digital photo frame that uses email to add new photos, I built and programmed a trio of e-paper picture frames for my family, and I thought it’d be cool to walk through the process in case someone out there wants to try something similar.

Why I Still Like Ruby (and a Few Things I Don’t Like) (viget.com, 2020-08-06)

The Stack Overflow 2020 Developer Survey came out a couple months back, and while I don’t put a ton of stock in surveys like this, I was surprised to see Ruby seem to fare so poorly – most notably its rank on the “most dreaded” list. Again, who cares right, but it did make me take a step back and try to take an honest assessment of Ruby’s pros and cons, as someone who’s been using Ruby professionally for 13 years but loves playing around with other languages and paradigms. First off, some things I really like.

Tomorrow might feel better - annie's blog (2025-04-22)

Anyway a good rule I read somewhere long ago is something like Never trust how you feel about your life after 9pm.

The Business of Empathy — The CEO of Kobo believes books can save us (2025-04-21)

Rakuten Kobo’s Michael Tamblyn believes that in an age of fragmented attention, books remain the deepest form of human connection.

Farming the Universe (2025-04-21)

All labor is a commitment to follow through, a line cast straight out into eternity from a single word of God. My work is a diligent response to a distant revelation.

Life Cannot Be Delegated - by L. M. Sacasas (2025-04-21)

Changing the filter, wiping noses, going to meetings, picking up around the house, washing dishes, checking the dipstick—don't let yourself think these are distracting you from your more serious pursuits. Such a round of chores is not a set of difficulties we hope to escape from so that we may do our ‘practice’ which will put us on a ‘path’—it is our path.

Re-sourcing the Mind - by L. M. Sacasas (2025-04-19)

My contention, then, is that when we are confronted with the opportunity to outsource the labor of articulation, we will find that possibility more tempting to the degree that we experience a sense of incompetency and inadequacy, a sense which may have many sources, not least among which is the failure to stock our mind, heart, and imagination.

AI as Self-Erasure (2025-04-19)

As the father sits with pen and paper, he strives to encompass in words the elusive truth of his daughter, as seen from the unique vantage of a father, in a way fitting for this pivotal moment in the progression of her life. He may find that through the effort of articulating this relationship, it is more fully revealed to him. As Taylor says, the “right word” discloses, “brings the phenomenon properly into view for the first time. Discovery and invention are two sides of the same coin; we devise an expression which allows what we are striving to encompass to appear.”

Presets & Originality (2025-04-17)

To conclude from the outset, while I am involved in creating presets for commercial products, as a composer, I also use presets crafted by other sound designers without any modification. This choice is guided by a distinct aesthetic sensibility. In this essay, I aim to explore how presets are perceived from various perspectives, incorporating examples from 20th-century art, and propose an approach to them from a composer's standpoint.

Herb | HTML-aware ERB parsing (2025-04-16)

Powerful and seamless HTML-aware ERB parsing and tooling. Next-generation HTML+ERB parsing for smarter developer tooling and more.

The Best Programmers I Know | Matthias Endler (2025-04-15)

Clever engineers write clever code. Exceptional engineers write simple code. That’s because most of the time, simple is enough. And simple is more maintainable than complex. Sometimes it does matter to get things right, but knowing the difference is what separates the best from the rest. You can achieve a whole lot by keeping it simple. Focus on the right things.

The Best Programmers | justin․searls․co (2025-04-15)

Anyway, if you're asking me, the single best trait to predict whether I'm looking at a good programmer or a great one is undoubtedly perseverance. Someone that takes to each new challenge like a dog to a bone, and who struggles to sleep until the next obstacle is cleared.