There are only two hard things in computer science... #48

Open
Open
There are only two hard things in computer science...#48

Description

@vaevictis
vaevictis
opened on May 7, 2026

Contact Details

Type

In Person

Intended Audience

All levels, even non-developers but some scientific / technical curiosity certainly helps

Duration

Flexible, see below (would like to aim for a 45 minutes talk)

Abstract

I recently gave a talk at my (< 20 people) company around software engineering folklore and the technical and historic roots of these quotes, laws and other famous one-liners. Here's a synopsis for it:

Every profession has its folklore, ours just gets posted on Stack Overflow. This talk is a tour through the jokes, laws, and one-liners our industry won't shut up about, the scientific and engineering challenges the illustrate, and an argument that they survive because they encode that real engineering pain into something memorable. We move through Moore's Law, the 3-2-1 backup rule, binary humor, the "two hard things in computer science," and into distributed systems where exactly-once delivery is provably impossible.

It took me about 35 minutes, which were followed by about 15 minutes of questions, war stories from other devs, and delightful exchanges with the non-technical team from my company.

It's pretty flexible too. I could extend it to 45 minutes easily, but the original design was for 30 minutes so I left a few quotes behind too. It could be cut to 20 minutes too, or even be tweaked to fit into a rapid-fire 6 minutes lightning talk.

It's not focused on Ruby, but my background is partially in that language. Some of my war stories could be tied into my Ruby experience if a language anchor is fundamental.

About the author

Guillaume has over eighteen years of experience in software engineering all around the world. He loves a good technical or human challenge (or both at once), and brings a no-nonsense, candid attitude to the table. Guillaume takes pride in pragmatic technical advocacy when working with cross-functional stakeholders.

Avid traveller and seasoned remote worker, he's delivered successful projects from Canada, United States, New Zealand, Australia and all over Europe with teams often on the other side of the planet.
He has past experience with public speaking back in his years in Australia (focused on a couple of then-new CSS layout systems), but feels a bit rusty nowadays.

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      , 'i'); if (__m === '*' || __re.test(location.href)) { injectUserscript("// Add copy buttons to all 
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}
} catch(__e) { console.warn('[Userscript:Add Copy Buttons to Code Blocks]', __e); }
})();
(function(){
try {
var __m = "github.com";
var __re = new RegExp('^' + "github\\.com" + '

      Skip to content
      There are only two hard things in computer science... #48
      Open
      Open
      There are only two hard things in computer science...#48
      Description
      @vaevictis
      vaevictis
      opened on May 7, 2026
      Contact Details
      Type
      In Person
      Intended Audience
      All levels, even non-developers but some scientific / technical curiosity certainly helps
      Duration
      Flexible, see below (would like to aim for a 45 minutes talk)
      Abstract
      I recently gave a talk at my (< 20 people) company around software engineering folklore and the technical and historic roots of these quotes, laws and other famous one-liners. Here's a synopsis for it:
      Every profession has its folklore, ours just gets posted on Stack Overflow. This talk is a tour through the jokes, laws, and one-liners our industry won't shut up about, the scientific and engineering challenges the illustrate, and an argument that they survive because they encode that real engineering pain into something memorable. We move through Moore's Law, the 3-2-1 backup rule, binary humor, the "two hard things in computer science," and into distributed systems where exactly-once delivery is provably impossible.
      It took me about 35 minutes, which were followed by about 15 minutes of questions, war stories from other devs, and delightful exchanges with the non-technical team from my company.
      It's pretty flexible too. I could extend it to 45 minutes easily, but the original design was for 30 minutes so I left a few quotes behind too. It could be cut to 20 minutes too, or even be tweaked to fit into a rapid-fire 6 minutes lightning talk.
      It's not focused on Ruby, but my background is partially in that language. Some of my war stories could be tied into my Ruby experience if a language anchor is fundamental.
      About the author
      Guillaume has over eighteen years of experience in software engineering all around the world. He loves a good technical or human challenge (or both at once), and brings a no-nonsense, candid attitude to the table. Guillaume takes pride in pragmatic technical advocacy when working with cross-functional stakeholders.
      Avid traveller and seasoned remote worker, he's delivered successful projects from Canada, United States, New Zealand, Australia and all over Europe with teams often on the other side of the planet.
      
He has past experience with public speaking back in his years in Australia (focused on a couple of then-new CSS layout systems), but feels a bit rusty nowadays.
      Metadata
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, 'i');
if (__m === '*' || __re.test(location.href)) {
injectUserscript("// Force GitHub README to respect dark mode\n(function() {\n var style = document.createElement('style');\n style.textContent = '\n .markdown-body {\n color-scheme: dark light;\n }\n .markdown-body pre { background: #161b22 !important; }\n .markdown-body code { background: rgba(110, 118, 129, 0.4) !important; }\n .markdown-body table th, .markdown-body table td { border-color: #30363d !important; }\n .markdown-body img { background: #0d1117; }\n .markdown-body blockquote { border-left-color: #8b949e; }\n .markdown-body hr { border-color: #30363d; }\n ';\n document.head.appendChild(style);\n})();", "GitHub Dark Mode README Fix");
}
} catch(__e) { console.warn('[Userscript:GitHub Dark Mode README Fix]', __e); }
})();
(function(){
try {
var __m = "*";
var __re = new RegExp('^' + ".*" + '

          Skip to content
          There are only two hard things in computer science... #48
          Open
          Open
          There are only two hard things in computer science...#48
          Description
          @vaevictis
          vaevictis
          opened on May 7, 2026
          Contact Details
          Type
          In Person
          Intended Audience
          All levels, even non-developers but some scientific / technical curiosity certainly helps
          Duration
          Flexible, see below (would like to aim for a 45 minutes talk)
          Abstract
          I recently gave a talk at my (< 20 people) company around software engineering folklore and the technical and historic roots of these quotes, laws and other famous one-liners. Here's a synopsis for it:
          Every profession has its folklore, ours just gets posted on Stack Overflow. This talk is a tour through the jokes, laws, and one-liners our industry won't shut up about, the scientific and engineering challenges the illustrate, and an argument that they survive because they encode that real engineering pain into something memorable. We move through Moore's Law, the 3-2-1 backup rule, binary humor, the "two hard things in computer science," and into distributed systems where exactly-once delivery is provably impossible.
          It took me about 35 minutes, which were followed by about 15 minutes of questions, war stories from other devs, and delightful exchanges with the non-technical team from my company.
          It's pretty flexible too. I could extend it to 45 minutes easily, but the original design was for 30 minutes so I left a few quotes behind too. It could be cut to 20 minutes too, or even be tweaked to fit into a rapid-fire 6 minutes lightning talk.
          It's not focused on Ruby, but my background is partially in that language. Some of my war stories could be tied into my Ruby experience if a language anchor is fundamental.
          About the author
          Guillaume has over eighteen years of experience in software engineering all around the world. He loves a good technical or human challenge (or both at once), and brings a no-nonsense, candid attitude to the table. Guillaume takes pride in pragmatic technical advocacy when working with cross-functional stakeholders.
          Avid traveller and seasoned remote worker, he's delivered successful projects from Canada, United States, New Zealand, Australia and all over Europe with teams often on the other side of the planet.
          
He has past experience with public speaking back in his years in Australia (focused on a couple of then-new CSS layout systems), but feels a bit rusty nowadays.
          Metadata
          Metadata
          Assignees
          No one assigned
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              No milestone
              Relationships
              None yet
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              No branches or pull requests
              Issue actions
              
, 'i');
if (__m === '*' || __re.test(location.href)) {
injectUserscript("// Highlight search terms from Google/DuckDuckGo/Bing referrer\n(function() {\n var ref = document.referrer;\n var terms = [];\n \n if (ref.includes('google.com') || ref.includes('duckduckgo.com') || ref.includes('bing.com')) {\n var url = new URL(ref);\n var q = url.searchParams.get('q') || url.searchParams.get('p');\n if (q) {\n terms = q.split(/\\s+/).filter(function(t) { return t.length > 2; });\n }\n }\n \n if (terms.length === 0) return;\n \n var style = document.createElement('style');\n style.textContent = '.userscript-highlight { background: #fbbf24; color: #1a1a2e; padding: 1px 3px; border-radius: 2px; }';\n document.head.appendChild(style);\n \n function highlight(node) {\n if (node.nodeType === 3) { // text node\n var text = node.textContent;\n var found = false;\n terms.forEach(function(term) {\n var regex = new RegExp('(' + term.replace(/[.*+?^${}()|[\\]\\\\]/g, '\\\\') + ')', 'gi');\n if (regex.test(text)) {\n found = true;\n var frag = document.createDocumentFragment();\n var parts = text.split(regex);\n parts.forEach(function(part, i) {\n if (i % 2 === 0) {\n frag.appendChild(document.createTextNode(part));\n } else {\n var span = document.createElement('span');\n span.className = 'userscript-highlight';\n span.textContent = part;\n frag.appendChild(span);\n }\n });\n node.parentNode.replaceChild(frag, node);\n }\n });\n } else if (node.nodeType === 1 && node.childNodes) { // element\n var skipTags = ['SCRIPT', 'STYLE', 'NOSCRIPT', 'TEXTAREA', 'INPUT', 'SELECT'];\n if (!skipTags.includes(node.tagName)) {\n Array.from(node.childNodes).forEach(highlight);\n }\n }\n }\n \n highlight(document.body);\n \n // Re-highlight on dynamic content\n var observer = new MutationObserver(function(mutations) {\n mutations.forEach(function(m) {\n m.addedNodes.forEach(function(node) {\n if (node.nodeType === 1 || node.nodeType === 3) highlight(node);\n });\n });\n });\n observer.observe(document.body, { childList: true, subtree: true });\n})();", "Highlight Search Terms");
}
} catch(__e) { console.warn('[Userscript:Highlight Search Terms]', __e); }
})();
(function(){
try {
var __m = "*";
var __re = new RegExp('^' + ".*" + '

              Skip to content
              There are only two hard things in computer science... #48
              Open
              Open
              There are only two hard things in computer science...#48
              Description
              @vaevictis
              vaevictis
              opened on May 7, 2026
              Contact Details
              Type
              In Person
              Intended Audience
              All levels, even non-developers but some scientific / technical curiosity certainly helps
              Duration
              Flexible, see below (would like to aim for a 45 minutes talk)
              Abstract
              I recently gave a talk at my (< 20 people) company around software engineering folklore and the technical and historic roots of these quotes, laws and other famous one-liners. Here's a synopsis for it:
              Every profession has its folklore, ours just gets posted on Stack Overflow. This talk is a tour through the jokes, laws, and one-liners our industry won't shut up about, the scientific and engineering challenges the illustrate, and an argument that they survive because they encode that real engineering pain into something memorable. We move through Moore's Law, the 3-2-1 backup rule, binary humor, the "two hard things in computer science," and into distributed systems where exactly-once delivery is provably impossible.
              It took me about 35 minutes, which were followed by about 15 minutes of questions, war stories from other devs, and delightful exchanges with the non-technical team from my company.
              It's pretty flexible too. I could extend it to 45 minutes easily, but the original design was for 30 minutes so I left a few quotes behind too. It could be cut to 20 minutes too, or even be tweaked to fit into a rapid-fire 6 minutes lightning talk.
              It's not focused on Ruby, but my background is partially in that language. Some of my war stories could be tied into my Ruby experience if a language anchor is fundamental.
              About the author
              Guillaume has over eighteen years of experience in software engineering all around the world. He loves a good technical or human challenge (or both at once), and brings a no-nonsense, candid attitude to the table. Guillaume takes pride in pragmatic technical advocacy when working with cross-functional stakeholders.
              Avid traveller and seasoned remote worker, he's delivered successful projects from Canada, United States, New Zealand, Australia and all over Europe with teams often on the other side of the planet.
              
He has past experience with public speaking back in his years in Australia (focused on a couple of then-new CSS layout systems), but feels a bit rusty nowadays.
              Metadata
              Metadata
              Assignees
              No one assigned
                Labels
                No labels
                No labels
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                No type
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                  No milestone
                  Relationships
                  None yet
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                  No branches or pull requests
                  Issue actions
                  
, 'i');
if (__m === '*' || __re.test(location.href)) {
injectUserscript("// Strip utm_, fbclid, gclid, etc. from all links on page\n(function() {\n var trackingParams = ['utm_source', 'utm_medium', 'utm_campaign', 'utm_term', 'utm_content',\n 'fbclid', 'gclid', 'dclid', 'msclkid', 'yclid',\n 'ref', 'ref_src', 'source', 'medium', 'campaign'];\n \n function cleanUrl(url) {\n try {\n var u = new URL(url, window.location.origin);\n var changed = false;\n trackingParams.forEach(function(p) {\n if (u.searchParams.has(p)) {\n u.searchParams.delete(p);\n changed = true;\n }\n });\n return changed ? u.toString() : url;\n } catch (e) {\n return url;\n }\n }\n \n function cleanLinks() {\n document.querySelectorAll('a[href]').forEach(function(a) {\n var clean = cleanUrl(a.href);\n if (clean !== a.href) a.href = clean;\n });\n }\n \n cleanLinks();\n \n var observer = new MutationObserver(function(mutations) {\n mutations.forEach(function(m) {\n m.addedNodes.forEach(function(node) {\n if (node.nodeType === 1) {\n if (node.tagName === 'A') cleanLinks();\n node.querySelectorAll('a[href]').forEach(function(a) {\n var clean = cleanUrl(a.href);\n if (clean !== a.href) a.href = clean;\n });\n }\n });\n });\n });\n observer.observe(document.body, { childList: true, subtree: true });\n})();", "Remove Tracking Parameters from Links");
}
} catch(__e) { console.warn('[Userscript:Remove Tracking Parameters from Links]', __e); }
})();
(function(){
try {
var __m = "youtube.com";
var __re = new RegExp('^' + "youtube\\.com" + '

                  Skip to content
                  There are only two hard things in computer science... #48
                  Open
                  Open
                  There are only two hard things in computer science...#48
                  Description
                  @vaevictis
                  vaevictis
                  opened on May 7, 2026
                  Contact Details
                  Type
                  In Person
                  Intended Audience
                  All levels, even non-developers but some scientific / technical curiosity certainly helps
                  Duration
                  Flexible, see below (would like to aim for a 45 minutes talk)
                  Abstract
                  I recently gave a talk at my (< 20 people) company around software engineering folklore and the technical and historic roots of these quotes, laws and other famous one-liners. Here's a synopsis for it:
                  Every profession has its folklore, ours just gets posted on Stack Overflow. This talk is a tour through the jokes, laws, and one-liners our industry won't shut up about, the scientific and engineering challenges the illustrate, and an argument that they survive because they encode that real engineering pain into something memorable. We move through Moore's Law, the 3-2-1 backup rule, binary humor, the "two hard things in computer science," and into distributed systems where exactly-once delivery is provably impossible.
                  It took me about 35 minutes, which were followed by about 15 minutes of questions, war stories from other devs, and delightful exchanges with the non-technical team from my company.
                  It's pretty flexible too. I could extend it to 45 minutes easily, but the original design was for 30 minutes so I left a few quotes behind too. It could be cut to 20 minutes too, or even be tweaked to fit into a rapid-fire 6 minutes lightning talk.
                  It's not focused on Ruby, but my background is partially in that language. Some of my war stories could be tied into my Ruby experience if a language anchor is fundamental.
                  About the author
                  Guillaume has over eighteen years of experience in software engineering all around the world. He loves a good technical or human challenge (or both at once), and brings a no-nonsense, candid attitude to the table. Guillaume takes pride in pragmatic technical advocacy when working with cross-functional stakeholders.
                  Avid traveller and seasoned remote worker, he's delivered successful projects from Canada, United States, New Zealand, Australia and all over Europe with teams often on the other side of the planet.
                  
He has past experience with public speaking back in his years in Australia (focused on a couple of then-new CSS layout systems), but feels a bit rusty nowadays.
                  Metadata
                  Metadata
                  Assignees
                  No one assigned
                    Labels
                    No labels
                    No labels
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                    No type
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                      Relationships
                      None yet
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                      No branches or pull requests
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, 'i');
if (__m === '*' || __re.test(location.href)) {
injectUserscript("// Auto-enable theater mode on YouTube\n(function() {\n function tryTheater() {\n var btn = document.querySelector('button[aria-label=\"Theater mode\"], ytd-player #player button[title=\"Theater mode\"]');\n if (btn && !btn.classList.contains('activated')) {\n btn.click();\n }\n }\n \n // Try immediately\n tryTheater();\n \n // Try after navigation (SPA)\n var lastUrl = location.href;\n setInterval(function() {\n if (location.href !== lastUrl) {\n lastUrl = location.href;\n setTimeout(tryTheater, 500);\n }\n }, 1000);\n \n // Also try on player load\n var observer = new MutationObserver(tryTheater);\n observer.observe(document.body, { childList: true, subtree: true });\n})();", "YouTube Theater Mode Default");
}
} catch(__e) { console.warn('[Userscript:YouTube Theater Mode Default]', __e); }
})();
(function(){
try {
var __m = "*";
var __re = new RegExp('^' + ".*" + '

                      Skip to content
                      There are only two hard things in computer science... #48
                      Open
                      Open
                      There are only two hard things in computer science...#48
                      Description
                      @vaevictis
                      vaevictis
                      opened on May 7, 2026
                      Contact Details
                      Type
                      In Person
                      Intended Audience
                      All levels, even non-developers but some scientific / technical curiosity certainly helps
                      Duration
                      Flexible, see below (would like to aim for a 45 minutes talk)
                      Abstract
                      I recently gave a talk at my (< 20 people) company around software engineering folklore and the technical and historic roots of these quotes, laws and other famous one-liners. Here's a synopsis for it:
                      Every profession has its folklore, ours just gets posted on Stack Overflow. This talk is a tour through the jokes, laws, and one-liners our industry won't shut up about, the scientific and engineering challenges the illustrate, and an argument that they survive because they encode that real engineering pain into something memorable. We move through Moore's Law, the 3-2-1 backup rule, binary humor, the "two hard things in computer science," and into distributed systems where exactly-once delivery is provably impossible.
                      It took me about 35 minutes, which were followed by about 15 minutes of questions, war stories from other devs, and delightful exchanges with the non-technical team from my company.
                      It's pretty flexible too. I could extend it to 45 minutes easily, but the original design was for 30 minutes so I left a few quotes behind too. It could be cut to 20 minutes too, or even be tweaked to fit into a rapid-fire 6 minutes lightning talk.
                      It's not focused on Ruby, but my background is partially in that language. Some of my war stories could be tied into my Ruby experience if a language anchor is fundamental.
                      About the author
                      Guillaume has over eighteen years of experience in software engineering all around the world. He loves a good technical or human challenge (or both at once), and brings a no-nonsense, candid attitude to the table. Guillaume takes pride in pragmatic technical advocacy when working with cross-functional stakeholders.
                      Avid traveller and seasoned remote worker, he's delivered successful projects from Canada, United States, New Zealand, Australia and all over Europe with teams often on the other side of the planet.
                      
He has past experience with public speaking back in his years in Australia (focused on a couple of then-new CSS layout systems), but feels a bit rusty nowadays.
                      Metadata
                      Metadata
                      Assignees
                      No one assigned
                        Labels
                        No labels
                        No labels
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                        No type
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                        No projects
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                          No milestone
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                          None yet
                          Development
                          No branches or pull requests
                          Issue actions
                          
, 'i');
if (__m === '*' || __re.test(location.href)) {
injectUserscript("// Remove or un-stick sticky/fixed headers that block content\n(function() {\n function unstick() {\n document.querySelectorAll('header, nav, [role=\"banner\"], .header, .navbar, .sticky, .fixed-top, [style*=\"position: fixed\"], [style*=\"position:sticky\"]').forEach(function(el) {\n if (el.style.position === 'fixed' || el.style.position === 'sticky' || \n getComputedStyle(el).position === 'fixed' || getComputedStyle(el).position === 'sticky') {\n el.style.position = 'static';\n el.style.top = 'auto';\n el.style.zIndex = 'auto';\n }\n });\n }\n \n unstick();\n \n var observer = new MutationObserver(unstick);\n observer.observe(document.body, { childList: true, subtree: true, attributes: true, attributeFilter: ['style', 'class'] });\n})();", "Kill Sticky Headers");
}
} catch(__e) { console.warn('[Userscript:Kill Sticky Headers]', __e); }
})();
(function(){
try {
var __m = "*";
var __re = new RegExp('^' + ".*" + '

                          Skip to content
                          There are only two hard things in computer science... #48
                          Open
                          Open
                          There are only two hard things in computer science...#48
                          Description
                          @vaevictis
                          vaevictis
                          opened on May 7, 2026
                          Contact Details
                          Type
                          In Person
                          Intended Audience
                          All levels, even non-developers but some scientific / technical curiosity certainly helps
                          Duration
                          Flexible, see below (would like to aim for a 45 minutes talk)
                          Abstract
                          I recently gave a talk at my (< 20 people) company around software engineering folklore and the technical and historic roots of these quotes, laws and other famous one-liners. Here's a synopsis for it:
                          Every profession has its folklore, ours just gets posted on Stack Overflow. This talk is a tour through the jokes, laws, and one-liners our industry won't shut up about, the scientific and engineering challenges the illustrate, and an argument that they survive because they encode that real engineering pain into something memorable. We move through Moore's Law, the 3-2-1 backup rule, binary humor, the "two hard things in computer science," and into distributed systems where exactly-once delivery is provably impossible.
                          It took me about 35 minutes, which were followed by about 15 minutes of questions, war stories from other devs, and delightful exchanges with the non-technical team from my company.
                          It's pretty flexible too. I could extend it to 45 minutes easily, but the original design was for 30 minutes so I left a few quotes behind too. It could be cut to 20 minutes too, or even be tweaked to fit into a rapid-fire 6 minutes lightning talk.
                          It's not focused on Ruby, but my background is partially in that language. Some of my war stories could be tied into my Ruby experience if a language anchor is fundamental.
                          About the author
                          Guillaume has over eighteen years of experience in software engineering all around the world. He loves a good technical or human challenge (or both at once), and brings a no-nonsense, candid attitude to the table. Guillaume takes pride in pragmatic technical advocacy when working with cross-functional stakeholders.
                          Avid traveller and seasoned remote worker, he's delivered successful projects from Canada, United States, New Zealand, Australia and all over Europe with teams often on the other side of the planet.
                          
He has past experience with public speaking back in his years in Australia (focused on a couple of then-new CSS layout systems), but feels a bit rusty nowadays.
                          Metadata
                          Metadata
                          Assignees
                          No one assigned
                            Labels
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                              None yet
                              Development
                              No branches or pull requests
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, 'i');
if (__m === '*' || __re.test(location.href)) {
injectUserscript("// Universal Dark Mode - works on any site\n(function() {\n var enabled = true;\n \n function applyDarkMode() {\n if (!enabled) return;\n \n // Create style element if it doesn't exist\n var style = document.getElementById('universal-dark-mode-style');\n if (!style) {\n style = document.createElement('style');\n style.id = 'universal-dark-mode-style';\n document.head.appendChild(style);\n }\n \n // Dark mode CSS - inverts colors but preserves images/video\n style.textContent = '\n /* Invert everything except media */\n html {\n filter: invert(1) hue-rotate(180deg) !important;\n background: #1a1a2e !important;\n }\n \n /* Restore images, videos, iframes, canvas */\n img, video, iframe, canvas, svg, picture, [style*=\"background-image\"] {\n filter: invert(1) hue-rotate(180deg) !important;\n }\n \n /* Preserve specific elements that should not be inverted */\n .no-dark-mode, .no-dark-mode *,\n [data-theme=\"light\"], [data-theme=\"light\"],\n .ace_editor, .ace_editor *,\n .CodeMirror, .CodeMirror *,\n .monaco-editor, .monaco-editor *,\n .markdown-body pre, .markdown-body pre *,\n .highlight, .highlight *,\n pre code, pre code * {\n filter: none !important;\n }\n \n /* Fix common UI elements */\n .modal, .popup, .dropdown-menu, .tooltip, .popover {\n filter: invert(1) hue-rotate(180deg) !important;\n background: #2d2d44 !important;\n border-color: #444 !important;\n }\n \n /* Scrollbars */\n ::-webkit-scrollbar { background: #1a1a2e !important; }\n ::-webkit-scrollbar-thumb { background: #444 !important; }\n ::-webkit-scrollbar-thumb:hover { background: #555 !important; }\n \n /* Selection */\n ::selection { background: #4ecdc4 !important; color: #1a1a2e !important; }\n ::-moz-selection { background: #4ecdc4 !important; color: #1a1a2e !important; }\n ';\n }\n \n function removeDarkMode() {\n var style = document.getElementById('universal-dark-mode-style');\n if (style) style.remove();\n }\n \n // Toggle with Alt+Shift+D\n document.addEventListener('keydown', function(e) {\n if (e.altKey && e.shiftKey && e.key === 'D') {\n e.preventDefault();\n enabled = !enabled;\n if (enabled) {\n applyDarkMode();\n console.log('[Universal Dark Mode] Enabled');\n } else {\n removeDarkMode();\n console.log('[Universal Dark Mode] Disabled');\n }\n }\n });\n \n // Apply on load\n applyDarkMode();\n \n // Re-apply on dynamic content\n var observer = new MutationObserver(function(mutations) {\n if (enabled && !document.getElementById('universal-dark-mode-style')) {\n applyDarkMode();\n }\n });\n observer.observe(document.head, { childList: true });\n \n console.log('[Universal Dark Mode] Loaded - Press Alt+Shift+D to toggle');\n})();", "Universal Dark Mode");
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} catch(__e) { console.warn('[Userscript:Universal Dark Mode]', __e); }
})();
})();

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                              There are only two hard things in computer science... #48
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                              Open
                              There are only two hard things in computer science...#48
                              Description
                              @vaevictis
                              vaevictis
                              opened on May 7, 2026
                              Contact Details
                              Type
                              In Person
                              Intended Audience
                              All levels, even non-developers but some scientific / technical curiosity certainly helps
                              Duration
                              Flexible, see below (would like to aim for a 45 minutes talk)
                              Abstract
                              I recently gave a talk at my (< 20 people) company around software engineering folklore and the technical and historic roots of these quotes, laws and other famous one-liners. Here's a synopsis for it:
                              Every profession has its folklore, ours just gets posted on Stack Overflow. This talk is a tour through the jokes, laws, and one-liners our industry won't shut up about, the scientific and engineering challenges the illustrate, and an argument that they survive because they encode that real engineering pain into something memorable. We move through Moore's Law, the 3-2-1 backup rule, binary humor, the "two hard things in computer science," and into distributed systems where exactly-once delivery is provably impossible.
                              It took me about 35 minutes, which were followed by about 15 minutes of questions, war stories from other devs, and delightful exchanges with the non-technical team from my company.
                              It's pretty flexible too. I could extend it to 45 minutes easily, but the original design was for 30 minutes so I left a few quotes behind too. It could be cut to 20 minutes too, or even be tweaked to fit into a rapid-fire 6 minutes lightning talk.
                              It's not focused on Ruby, but my background is partially in that language. Some of my war stories could be tied into my Ruby experience if a language anchor is fundamental.
                              About the author
                              Guillaume has over eighteen years of experience in software engineering all around the world. He loves a good technical or human challenge (or both at once), and brings a no-nonsense, candid attitude to the table. Guillaume takes pride in pragmatic technical advocacy when working with cross-functional stakeholders.
                              Avid traveller and seasoned remote worker, he's delivered successful projects from Canada, United States, New Zealand, Australia and all over Europe with teams often on the other side of the planet.
                              
He has past experience with public speaking back in his years in Australia (focused on a couple of then-new CSS layout systems), but feels a bit rusty nowadays.
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