Top all-time · #871
Kartik Agaram
Personal blog · akkartik.name/post · on HN as akkartikprogrammingsystemswriting
Kartik Agaram writes Freewheeling Apps, a personal blog at akkartik.name about programming, systems and writing. Since 2007, 75 different Hacker News readers have linked it 411 times, most often “Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong (2014)”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-05-24, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (17) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Kartik Agaram's blog for writing on minimal, readable programs, the Mu project and software archaeology. Commenters cite posts such as 'deepness', wart-layers and 'comprehension'.
- Recommended for · 5 comments
- Enjoyed the writing, found via Ribbonfarm (one reader); a 'neat' wart-layers response; about page 'strongly resonates'; listed as a great blog.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 17 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong (2014)10 people · 18 mentions · first linked 2014-10-05
- I'm working on ways to better convey the global structure of programs (2013)8 people · 33 mentions · first linked 2014-02-09
- Layered Programming (2013)6 people · 17 mentions · first linked 2013-11-26
- /post/deepness5 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2014-10-15
- Mu4 people · 21 mentions · first linked 2015-08-17
- A new way of testing4 people · 9 mentions · first linked 2013-11-09
- /4 people · 7 mentions · first linked 2009-05-12
- Nobody's just reading your code4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2018-02-26
- /post/2012-11-21-07-09-03-soc4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2017-06-29
- Habitable Software3 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2016-09-19
What Hacker News says?
Kartik Agaram [1], The paper about his Mu project [2] presents a rationale for a particular kind of minimalism, and its realization. 1. https://akkartik.name 2. https://akkartik.name/akkartik-convivial-20200315.pdf
Comment linking /akkartik-convivial-20200315.pdf
on “Niklaus Wirth has died”Submitted Plain text, with lines as a story · 533 points
HN discussionI've been slowly detaching myself from the web for the past 10 years. These days I mostly build offline apps using native technologies. Those capabilities are still around. They just receded for a while because they'd gotten so polluted with toolbars and malware. But now the malware is on the other side, and native apps are cool again. If you know where to look. Here's my shingle: https://akkartik.name/freewheeling-…
Comment linking /freewheeling-apps
on “Why wordfreq will not be updated”Submitted Nobody's just reading your code as a story · 352 points
HN discussionIf you're so sensitive to superficial syntactic issues you're gonna miss out on a lot of reading/learning pleasure in this life. (It's one of my pet peeves: http://akkartik.name/post/readable-bad )
Comment linking /post/readable-bad
on “Build Your Own Text Editor”Submitted How I Program in 2024 as a story · 317 points
HN discussionHigh-volume sites are not a good use case for RSS. We already have various social ways to filter. Like the site you're on. I think RSS should be for high-quality niche sites where you care about every single post. I subscribe to 200+ feeds, but only read a dozen or so stories a week on them: http://akkartik.name/feeds.xml
Comment linking /feeds.xml
on “It’s Time to Get Back to RSS”Submitted Bicycles for the mind have to be see-through [pdf] as a story · 210 points
HN discussionIt's at the core of my software life for several years now: http://akkartik.name/about
Comment linking /about
on “Ask HN: What is your favorite CS paper?”Submitted The cargo cult of versioning as a story · 198 points
HN discussionYou're assuming that your closed source vendors are perfectly aligned with you. In practice they almost inevitably seem to cause capture ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture ). Open/closed is a red herring here. Projects slowing down as they succeed seems to be a universal phenomenon, from startups to civilizations. Specialization leads to capture. I think almost exclusively about how to fix this: http…
Comment linking /about
on “Node.js in Flame Graphs”Submitted Ten years against division of labor in software as a story · 173 points
HN discussionWithout over-training on this one incident, and without guidance on how to get from here to there (I'm still working on that): 1. Don't get suckered by interfaces, share code. If you create code for others to share ("libraries"), stop trying to hide its workings. 2. You don't have to learn how everything works before you do anything. But you should expect to learn about internals proportional to the time you spend o…
Comment linking /about
on “Node.js in Flame Graphs”Submitted Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong (2014) as a story · 144 points
HN discussionThanks for the luck. We might be in violent agreement or disagreement depending on what code you consider aesthetically pleasant. Everyone can agree on the crap, but can you share examples of code that you liked that might help me triangulate on your aesthetics. Alternatively, I'd be interested to hear if my published projects are pleasant or not. To help you triangulate on mine: http://akkartik.name/post/readable-b…
Comment linking /post/readable-bad
on “New Requests for Startups”Submitted Literate programming: Knuth is doing it wrong (2014) as a story · 132 points
HN discussionI didn't say we need to teach people to write elegant code. See my examples at http://akkartik.name/post/tracing-tests . I take this perverse joy in coming up with ugly code that is suited to its surroundings, and I'm extremely well-suited for programming because when it comes to code our aesthetics are like George Costanza's instincts ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Opposite ). I want programming to be like read…
Comment linking /post/tracing-tests
on “New Requests for Startups”Submitted Mu: A minimal hobbyist computing stack as a story · 105 points
HN discussionThanks! No new projects/demos/prototypes yet beyond the links at the bottom of http://akkartik.name/about , but I have a half-baked project in the works. Let's chat more offline; I sent you an email.
Comment linking /about
on “New Requests for Startups”Submitted Mu: Sketching out a minimal system programming language as a story · 102 points
HN discussionSpeaking from personal experience, the thought: "Take away languages. Now what do I use instead?" can be paralyzing. I'll suggest an alternative approach that might stimulate your neurons. Look back at the ways that your life is improved reading code today compared to twenty years ago. When I look back, the highlights for me are: a) version control, and b) automated tests Forget all their benefits to the people writ…
Comment linking /post/wart-layers
on “New Requests for Startups”Submitted Using computers more freely and safely (2023) as a story · 101 points
HN discussionI've really enjoyed your writing on your blog at http://akkartik.name which I found through your guests posts at Ribbonfarm. Have you been writing anywhere else about your work or thoughts about readable programs?
Comment linking /
on “New Requests for Startups”Submitted Layered Programming (2013) as a story · 82 points
HN discussion> What comes after programming languages? I've been working on this for several years, though a startup seems the wrong vehicle for it. I think the description in the RFS is misguided: "We’re interested in helping developers create better software, faster. This includes new ways to write, understand, and collaborate on code, and the next generation of tools and infrastructure for delivering software continuously and…
Comment linking /about
on “New Requests for Startups”Submitted How the right syntax can help teach recursion as a story · 68 points
HN discussionIn similar vein to tomp's comment: if someone's interested in the bonus project of implementing macros, I've implemented a simple lisp with first class macros (fexprs): http://github.com/akkartik/wart . Moreover, you can write anonymous macros out of more primitive constructs. Over time it's accumulated other features: http://akkartik.name/post/wart . But hopefully it's still easy to understand, because it has thoro…
Comment linking /post/wart
on “Learn C and build your own Lisp”Submitted The Patterns of Barricelli (2024) as a story · 55 points
HN discussionOh I agree so much with you. https://akkartik.name/freewheeling
Comment linking /freewheeling
on “Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software (2019)”Submitted Mu's Neighborhood as a story · 55 points
HN discussion
Linked by the same people?
- V
Vivek Haldarblog.vivekhaldar.com - L
Leah Neukirchenleahneukirchen.org - B
blog dot information dash superhighway dot netblog.information-superhighway.net - LLord.iolord.io
- KKonrad Hinsen's blogblog.khinsen.net
- I
I write, therefore I amiwriteiam.nl - M
Mohammed AlQuraishimoalquraishi.wordpress.com - D
datagubbedatagubbe.se