Ajit Panigrahi

Uses

2020-08-01T00:00:00Z

Visit uses.tech to see what's all the fuss about.

Hardware

Computer: 2018 MacBook Pro 15" - i7 (8th Gen) 16GB RAM, Radeon Pro 555X 4GB.

Switched from Windows, to Ubuntu, to MacOS. Still Windows for gaming.
Phone: Moto Edge 20 Fusion (6GB).
Tablet: iPad Mini 5 (2019) 64GB.
External Monitor: LG 32GK650F-B. 1440p, 144Hz.
Keyboard: Ducky One 2SF, Black, Year of the Rat, with Cherry MX Speed Silver switches.
Audio: Jabra Elite Active 65t. First go with TWS.
Mouse: RedGear Thor, previously using RedGear Leviathon.
Game Controller: RedGear Elite Wireless.

Software

Editors:
- VSCode, as a sort of IDE.
- Sublime Text 3 for competitive programming or small edits.
- Vim (!) for short & sweet edits. I've dare say I've gotten better at it.
Terminal: iTerm2 with Oh My Zsh.
Themes: Alternating between 👇
- Shades of Purple: VS Code | iTerm2
- SynthWave '84: VS Code | iTerm2
- Winter is Coming: VS Code
Font: Fira Code with ligatures enabled, of course.
Browsers:
- Primary: Safari. Yes, really.
- Secondary: Edge, Brave.
- Testing: Chrome Dev. Firefox Dev.
Designing: Adobe XD. A little bit of Figma just so that I can join the cool gang.
Apps:
- ~~LastPass~~ Dashlane (password manager) + Twilio Authy (2FA).
- Google Keep & Trello for notes. Google Docs for long-form stuff. Notion is too much for me.
- Pocket, mainly for hoarding but also occasionally reading articles.
- Amazon Kindle, for reading novels. Also, for hoarding.
- Procreate (iPad), for casual drawing. I'm not good at it.

Bonus: `neofetch`

Sorting out JavaScript

2020-06-05T00:00:00Z

JavaScript, with its dynamic typing, cannot presume a consistent input for any function. This is pretty much the biggest hold-up with anything to do with this language.

Sorting a list in JavaScript is a common pitfall for beginners, especially for impatient folks ready to skip the docs. Or perhaps "impatient" is unfair to everyone who misunderstood this in-built function, as it is an easy thing to overlook.

Array.prototype.sort(), by default, can be used an array of any kind of elements. So for an array with numbers and strings we can't assume a numeric comparison. In such a case, it sort of makes sense to compare all elements by the lexicographic order instead.

let mixed = ['zero', 45, 555, 3, 444, 36, 'ajit'];

console.log(mixed.sort());
// -> [3, 36, 444, 45, 555, "ajit", "zero"]

See what happened there?

But now if you were quick to assume this behaviour occurs just because we included strings into the mix, then you would be wrong.

let mixed = [45, 555, 3, 444, 36];

console.log(mixed.sort());
// -> [3, 36, 444, 45, 555]

By default, comparisons occur by coercing the type of the element to string.

So if you want a numeric comparison (for obvious reasons), we can pass a comparator function like so:

let mixed = [45, 555, 3, 444, 36];
let comparatorFn = (previousValue, currentValue) => previousValue - currentValue; // hacky magic, expects negative/positive stuff, idk/idc

console.log(mixed.sort(comparatorFn));
// -> [3, 36, 45, 444, 555]

Another catch: Your list of numbers shouldn't contain Infinity or NaN with this particular comparator. That should be an entire different article, but in short previousValue - currentValue for anything involving these values will always result in the same value.

This is just me writing notes for myself at this point. Hope this helps someone.

Replacing substrings with JavaScript

2020-06-01T00:00:00Z

If you've ever had to quickly look up how to replace all occurences of a word or pattern within a string, you've probably come across String.prototype.replace(). It's easy to assume that it'll work as advertised, except that we've all skipped reading the docs and just copied the syntax.

The catch: this method only changes the first occurence of the pattern.

The method expects two parameters: the substring to be replaced (say, target), and the substring to replace it with (say, replacement). What often passes unnoticed during development or during code reviews is the target.

Here, target can either be a string or a regular expression.

If we want to replace all occurences of the pattern, we need to pass a regular expression with the global flag enabled. This flag matches with all occurences of that pattern. All standard regex rules still apply, so always cross-check your pattern.

// Example:
let phrase = "some cool words and some not so cool ones";

let newPhrase = phrase.replace("cool", "nice");
console.log(newPhrase);
// -> 'some nice words and some not so cool ones'

let regexp = /cool/g;
let newPhrase = phrase.replace(regexp, "nice");
console.log(newPhrase);
// -> 'some nice words and some not so nice ones'

But this is still prone to mistakes.

With a cursory glance, it is not immediately clear whether we are replacing all occurences or not. A simple change (or lack there of) from target to /target/g is not immediately apparent to a team member unfamiliar with the exact specification or those who jump in between cross-functional teams & various languages.

The better alternative with modern JavaScript is to use String.prototype.replaceAll(). While replace() has been supported from the beginning, replaceAll() is a recent addition.

It has the exact same API as replace(), with some minor changes like requiring the RegExp (if used) to have the global flag enabled.

// Example:
let phrase = "some cool words and some not so cool ones";

let newPhrase = phrase.replace(/cool/g, "nice");
console.log(newPhrase);
// -> 'some nice words and some not so nice ones'

let newPhrase = phrase.replaceAll(/cool/g, "nice");
console.log(newPhrase);
// -> 'some nice words and some not so nice ones'

Readability improves with a simple addition of three characters.

No support for IE11 though. Naturally.

How bright is the sun?

2019-12-28T00:00:00Z

Twenty.

Hello World

2019-12-14T00:00:00Z

As I set out to design my website, I ended up spending most of my time exploring countless beautifully designed websites for inspiration. With how creative people can get, it was quite easy to forget the original reason why I wanted a website in the first place.

Each portfolio and blog I went through displayed the unique tastes of the creator, with a subtle charm which brought life to their work. They brought with them their quirky twists to the expected, painting their imagination within a virtual space.

Me? I wanted to explore writing a technical blog, which could also showcase my experience, something akin to a portfolio. What did I end up with? 3 months of running behind a mistaken target.

After seeing all these lovely websites, I could only comfort myself by hiding behind a label of facing a "Designer's Block", one that made an existing Writer's Block even more uncomfortable.

The process of moulding disparate thoughts into a well-crafted "product" is not a straight-forward task, nor does it have a scientific approach. Sure, there are guidelines, but there is no single correct way of doing things.

The so-called "creative process" is, at best, an unorthodox – and often unclear – path in collecting our thoughts in a presentable manner. For my website, the standard way to approaching this would have been to just take the next best framework you can find and get started with a template.

This blog is my solution to disrupting the standard process. To moving forward.

Here's what I plan to do instead: With a minimal Hugo setup using the XMin theme, I'm going to update this blog regularly while updating the styling for better aesthetics and accessibility.

What I realised in these past few months, is that my initial motivations for wanting a personal website had changed. Last year just before applying for internships, I had created my first version of this website on GitHub in just under 30 minutes, some from scratch, some from stitching together some of my code from different places. It was okay.

This year, I've joined a Hyderabad-based company, Keka HR, as an intern and I'm planning to blog more often as I learn more things. I've been regularly trying to write more articles and drafting my ideas over the weekend. This little space, so to speak, is my place to collect my writings and to showcase a few trinkets that I'm building.

Thoughful design begins with content; when the content changes over time, the design needs to follow. This is my attempt at creating a hopefully creative, functional website.

I dare say the benchmarks will call this a pretty fast website.