Michael Lynch

Over the last few weeks, I launched my book, learned some useful typography tips, and started using @atuin.sh mtlynch.io/retrospectiv...

I've made lots of little improvements to my book's typography in the past few weeks. Individually, each felt small, but collectively, they made a noticeable difference.

How do LLMs keep advancing so rapidly while coding agents can't even juggle multiple tasks?

What are your favorite anti-patterns in software blogging?

I'm pleased to announce the official release of my book, Refactoring English. I've spent the past two years capturing all the techniques for improving my writing that I've learned over the course of my career as a developer. Grab yours for 30% off during launch week.

Today I'm parting ways with fly.io. It's been a privilege. I'm off to tilt at a big old windmill with Kurt, again. sockpuppet.org/blog/2026/09...

I decided to offer a print copy of my book and am more excited about it than I expected mtlynch.io/retrospectiv...

My article "How to Write an Effective Software Design Document" is on the front page of Hacker News today. I tried submitting this myself 4x a couple months ago, and it flopped every time, so I'm excited to see this hit #1.

In July, my book sales tripled, and then I spent a few weeks fighting scraper bots. mtlynch.io/retrospectiv...

I had a great time returning to the TMPDIR podcast to talk about how developers can improve their writing tmpdir.org/053/

The first time I saw Michelangelo’s David in person, I wept. Never in my life have I witnessed a more beautiful piece of content. refactoringenglish.com/blog/why-i-s...

Today is the last day to buy my book, Refactoring English, at its 40% early access discount. The book is for any software developer who wants to improve their writing, from emails to design docs to blog posts. refactoringenglish.com/early-access/

Launching Rowset: an open-source, self-hostable dataset backend for AI agents. Give trusted agents private, structured data they can create, search, and update through MCP or REST. Use it hosted or run it on your own infrastructure. No lock-in. Your data. Your backend.

If you're a developer who wants to improve your writing, this is the last week to purchase my book, Refactoring English, at a 40% early access discount. refactoringenglish.com/early-access/

June was the best month of sales for my book since the original Kickstarter launch, and I owe it all to design docs. mtlynch.io/retrospectiv...

If you're a developer who wants to improve your writing, this is the last week to purchase my book, Refactoring English, at a 40% early access discount. refactoringenglish.com/early-access/

Developers hate design docs because they're unpleasant to write and only a few orgs know how to write them well, but they're incredibly valuable in maturing as a developer, so I'm sharing my approach to writing effective design docs.

Software developers are amongst those with the lowest divorce rates (19%) whilst massage therapists are one of the highest (48%) according to data from the American Community Survey. Make of that what you will. flowingdata.com/2026/05/07/d...

In my April retrospective, I reveal my double life as a bug bounty hunter and debate whether I should continue cybersecurity research or just focus on my book about helping devs improve their writing mtlynch.io/retrospectiv...

Darn! Forgot to take this bet.

I bought parts for my last PC on Black Friday 2024. I bought 64 GB of RAM for $209.99. Price today for the same exact sticks: $979.99

Any web #hosting company will rent you space on their servers. At Henhouse Computing Cooperative, you *own* the server. You also get a vote in how the service is run and share of any profits. Now taking beta testers at henhouse.coop.

I launched an indie webcomic hosting platform several months ago that offered a free and a $4/mo paid plan. This was purely to cover the cost of the infrastructure. But in seeing it grow, I'm no longer worried about the cost. So yeah Webcomic Studio is now free. webcomic.studio

With AI-generated writing flooding the Internet, how can you avoid "sounding like AI?" Lean into your personality! Developers sanitize their writing to sound clinical and impersonal. Thienan's post is an excellent example of a blogger who's willing to sound like themselves.

I wrote a new article! Adding a feature to a closed-source app using LLMs: www.stavros.io/posts/adding...

AI has good suggestions for bad writing but bad suggestions for good writing.

Was talking to @nik.digital earlier and he mentioned he never knew I wrote blog posts outside of the CS stuff. He’d found samwho.dev/blog/having-... and found it funny that I threw my back out waiting for my wife to give birth. 🫠

i didn't want to buy an Oura Ring, so i decided to learn vibe coding instead! Sleep Lab - a progressive web app to make use of Garmin's sleep data and measure which tactics actually improve my sleep, starting with mouth tape 😂 github: github.com/chiaracokien... all tips & advice welcome!

In my March retro, I explain why the next few years will be scary in terms of software security and what the prototype of my family photo sharing app looks like mtlynch.io/retrospectiv...

We're not prepared for how quickly AI models have progressed at discovering security vulnerabilities mtlynch.io/claude-code-...

Glad to see healthcare providers actually facing consequences for their terrible data privacy practices: theshoestring.org/2026/03/24/j...

@jmduke.com www.jmduke.com/posts/mistre... Yes! Great movie. "There's no adultery when you're eighteen. You should all be touching each other all the time."

I spent 16 hours writing a design doc by hand. Then, I used AI to generate competing docs in 5 minutes. Can you pick out the human design doc from the AI versions? refactoringenglish.com/blog/ai-vs-h...

I made my first contribution to Firefox. It's a one-character fix to prevent a crash when reading a particular type of malformed Ogg-Vorbis media file. Surprisingly fast review from Mozilla! Reviewed and merged in under 1h. phabricator.services.mozilla.com/D288636

In my February retrospective, I discover most people who purchase my writing book live in countries where English is not the primary language. And I realize I've been using AI coding too much. mtlynch.io/retrospectiv...

I've worked as a developer for 20 years, and writing has always been a key part of my career and technical growth. refactoringenglish.com/chapters/why...

Me, two days after discovering I can purchase remote nix builds as a service

Over the summer, I met a romance novelist at a party, and she gave me one of the best tips I've found for attracting new readers to my book: showcase other writers. mtlynch.io/retrospectiv...

exe.dev is still behind a credit card for now while we develop some more techniques for dealing with people who abuse systems (even a credit card doesn't entirely work). But if you are a human who wants an invite code to skip the CC for a month, happy to DM you one.

I tried to claim a rebate for installing an EV charger at my home, and I discovered my electricity supplier was publicly exposing all of my information, including home address, phone number, email, plate numbers, and VIN. mtlynch.io/eversource-r...

I've now been an indie founder for eight years, and last year was my favorite. I wrote all year and figured out what kind of business matches me as a founder. mtlynch.io/bootstrapped...

I'm Kat Abughazaleh and I approve this message.

log.pfad.fr/2026/softwar... This is such a cool feature of NixOS that I should use more

I've been leaning towards Tubi being the streaming service, and now I think it's official: they have Season 1 and Season 2 of one of the best science and technology comedy shows ever made… "Look Around You". Thanks, Tubi. Thubi. tubitv.com/series/30001...