Top all-time · #1484
Michael Nygard
Personal blog · michaelnygard.com/blogprogrammingsystems
Michael Nygard's personal blog at michaelnygard.com covers programming and systems. Since 2008, 48 different Hacker News readers have linked it 62 times, most often “Coherence Penalty for Humans”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-08, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (5) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Michael Nygard's blog for writing on production software and cloud design, such as the circuit breaker pattern, the fear cycle and fast iteration, and his book Release It!.
- Recommended for · 3 comments
- Book Release It! recommended for server software; 'Also read this' on fast iteration; another article called interesting.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 5 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- Coherence Penalty for Humans5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2018-01-13
- In Love with Your Warts3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2016-04-09
- The Entity Service Antipattern3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2018-01-19
- The Fear Cycle3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2015-07-16
- Counterfactuals are not causality3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2021-06-20
- Wide Awake Developers: The Future of Software Development3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2010-04-21
- AI versus Microservices3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2026-05-11
- Bad Layering2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2015-04-15
- Monolith to Microservices – Evolving Away from Entities2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2018-05-03
- Fast Iteration versus Elegant Design2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2009-02-22
What Hacker News says?
This is now reminding me of this blog I found on HN yesterday: http://www.michaelnygard.com/blog/2015/07/the-fear-cycle/ Once you have enough sewer/natural gas/electric/cable/telephone/fiber/water/who knows what else/ lines buried under the streets I can totally understand how nobody would want to touch that with a ten foot pole, just like legacy code :)
Comment linking /blog/2015/07/the-fear-cycle/
on “Why New York City Stopped Building Subways”Submitted Coherence Penalty for Humans as a story · 135 points
HN discussionIf you are writing server software, I recommend Michael Nygard's book "Release It!: Design and Deploy Production-Ready Software" . Measuring event loop lag sounds like Nygard's "Circuit Breaker" pattern to avoid cascading failures. The book's examples and text are all Java, but the lessons are applicable anywhere. He offers many scalability patterns (resource pools) and anti-patterns (runaway log files) with interes…
Comment linking /
on “Building A Node.js Server That Won't Melt”Submitted Counterfactuals are not causality as a story · 89 points
HN discussionAlso read this: http://www.michaelnygard.com/blog/2009/02/fast_iteration_ver... Fast iteration wins. OpenStack is far ahead in this regard and only picking up speed.
Comment linking /blog/2009/02/fast_iteration_versus_elegant.html
on “If OpenStack has won, then cloud computing has lost”Submitted Why Do Enterprise Applications Suck? as a story · 58 points
HN discussionSome information at: http://www.michaelnygard.com/blog/2010/04/the_future_of_soft... "The Future of Software Development"
Comment linking /blog/2010/04/the_future_of_software_develop.html
on “Ask HN: Is Java Dying?”Submitted The Fear Cycle as a story · 52 points
HN discussionAlso references another interesting article about a stateful service design antipatter: https://www.michaelnygard.com/blog/2018/01/services-by-lifec...
Comment linking /blog/2018/01/services-by-lifecycle/
on “Data, objects, and how we're railroaded into poor design”Submitted Bad Layering as a story · 19 points
HN discussionSubmitted Amazon Blows Away Objections as a story · 17 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Perils of Semantic Coupling as a story · 13 points
HN discussionSubmitted Quantum Backups as a story · 12 points
HN discussionSubmitted Wide Awake Developers: Steve Jobs Made Me Miss My Flight as a story · 10 points
HN discussionSubmitted Fast Iteration versus Elegant Design as a story · 9 points
HN discussionSubmitted Wide Awake Developers: Kudos to Relevance and Clojure as a story · 8 points
HN discussionSubmitted Transactions Aren't Everything as a story · 5 points
HN discussionSubmitted Wide Awake Developers: The Future of Software Development as a story · 5 points
HN discussionSubmitted Counterfactuals Are Not Causality as a story · 4 points
HN discussionSubmitted When Should You Jump? JSR 308. That's When. as a story · 4 points
HN discussionSubmitted Consequences are not Pros or Cons as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Entity Service Antipattern as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Entity Service Antipattern as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted QA Instability Implies Production Instability as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Future of Software Development (2010) as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted AI versus Microservices as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted AI versus Microservices as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Why did we stop at 2? as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Counterfactuals Are Not Causality as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Wittgenstein and Design as a story · 2 points
HN discussion
