Hi! Tell us about who you are and what you do.
Hiya, I am lrlna! I am a Rust engineer leading the apollo-rs project, an ecosystem of GraphQL tools + compiler in Rust. I spent my childhood in Ukraine before immigrating to Vancouver, Canada with my parents, and have since lived in London, Berlin and as of recent Copenhagen.
I used to do a lot more computers and open-source after work, but my recent job has been keeping the computer part of my brain quite content! So instead, outside of office hours I’ve been focusing on making programming (and non-programming) zines, and growing veggies on my balcony. I’ve got two black norwegian forest cats, Nori and Chashu, whom I love to bits.
I also occasionally give talks, like this (quite old) one on HTTP/2, or the one on working in Rust + wasm, or this most recent one about my work on apollo-compiler.
What is your hardware setup?
COMPUTE.
Back when I started programming I had this really old incredibly bulky (6 kilos at least, I swear) laptop running Linux Mint. I loved it, because it was my own, and I fixed every single thing that went wrong with it including a weekly driver issue. I hated it, because of the aforementioned weekly driver issues. Also 6+ kilos!
I’ve made my life a lot easier since. I have a travel work-issued 2020 MacBook Pro (M1) that I take with me for conferences, offsites or when I work from my coworking space (coworking space is a stretch, it’s actually a Riso publisher, a café, and a fermentation library where I come to work from once or twice a week to hang out with people way cooler than me \o/).
At home I have a custom-built PC running Windows my partner helped me build. It’s a very smol , , , , but very powerful (baby).
The story of it is that it got assembled in quite a haste in May 2021 because my previous computer refused to run rustc on pretty much anything but hello-world repos. Terrible timing really - you may remember finding a CPU and a video card in early 2021 not only required you to pay triple the price, but also giving up an arm, a leg and your first born child (as supposed to only an arm and a leg as of the time of this writing). Regardless though, I am pretty happy with it!
Notable parts that may be of interest:
- Lian Li PC-Q37 Mini ITX Tower Case. I really wanted something small, aesthetically pleasing with a super clean front. Voilà, Lian-Li mini!
- AMD Ryzen 9 5900X CPU. A gift, an offering, if you will, to the Rust compiler.
- There were no video cards when this was built originally, so thankfully the original MSI GeForce GT 710 2 GB we put in got replaced with MSI GeForce GTX 1650 G5 4 GB in January 2022. I can now watch videos…. because with the initial card I couldn’t!
- GIGABYTE X570 I AORUS Pro Wi-Fi Mini ITX AM4 motherboard. A smol case needs a smol motherboard, and this one fits perrrrfectly.
- Vortex Race 3 Keyboard with ~ blue ~ switches. I’ve been using the grey keycaps that it came with lately, but sometimes I spice things up with the Norbauer + Co’s After School 1992 keycaps.
The entire spec (minus the keyboard) of my PC is on pcpartpicker, for those interested! I have very little interest in hardware and really just wanted rustc to go brrrrr, so huge thank you to my partner Yoshua Wuyts for helping me put this together.
DESK & ACCESSORIES.
I use my office as a workspace and as a cozy studio I can create in, or come read in on the weekends. In the summers it also functions as a plant sowing station (🌱 surprise 🌱).
All of this to say, I spend an unreasonably large amount of time here. Pretty much everything I choose for my desk is to make me feel comfortable and at ease while working or making things.
My partner and I used to live in a much smaller space where I didn’t have my own office. Luckily, last year we moved to a slightly larger flat, and I have an office. Something, something must have money and a room of one’s own if she is to write fiction code.
A few interesting specifics about my workspace:
My desk is part of the Poul Cadovius Royal System shelving. It’s a lot smaller than most people’s setups. I can keep it tidy a lot easier than some of the larger setups I had before, and the simplicity of it helps me focus in just the right way. The shelving system itself houses ~ some ~ of my books. Unfortunately, I have a downright awful habit of buying more and more books so I am running out of space very quickly.To extend the desk a tiny bit (but mostly to fit my Røde mic), I also have this super cute clamp tray I got from Present & Correct in moss.An LG 27” 4K monitor that fits pretty much exactly in the space I have (score).
A teeny tiny portable B&O Beoplay 1 speaker (if you’re about to buy this exact one my recommendation is to a b o r t , a b o r t , a b o r t).
To the surprise of many people, I don’t have a special desk chair! It’s just a regular dinner table chair from TAKT. I like these better than any of the swivel chairs, plus it’s easier to sit cross-legged (important).
I got a cutting mat to use as a desk mat lol. Seriously though, none of the desk mats I saw I liked, plus this cutting mat does a nice job of turning me into a computer person from the 70s (time to learn how to work an IBM).
I like to have a nice smelling candle, especially once summer is over and it keeps getting darker (and darker and darker and darker and hello welcome to the north darker). Right now it’s the Frama’s Deep Forest one (in a P.F. Candle Co jar cuz the original one broke). Sometimes I alternate this for my little MUJI diffuser.
I need noise cancelling to focus, so I either listen to music with my B&O Beoplay 9 over-ear headphones (if you’re considering buying these, my recommendation is to a b o r t , a b o r t , a b o r t), or use my Happy Ears ear plugs (best purchase ever)
And what are the favorite items in your workspace?
What I enjoy the most about my space is how everything comes together, and the routines and habits I establish around my workspace. For example, I really enjoy shutting everything down at night, and starting everything up fresh in the morning. I love starting my day making a pour-over, bringing it to my desk, powering up my pc to open up to read a thing or another.
There are a few cozy spots I keep for my cats for when they come to hang out with me - a little soft blanket under my desk for Chashu-cat, and a HAY box for Nori-cat to curl up in. Naturally, my efforts in creating comfortable spots for cats are quite often futile (they sleep in most random spots), but at least make for a really cozy workspace for me, myself and I.
I also really like my lil nicknacks and books I brought back with me from various places of my life. Noticing them during the day brings me a lot of joy (everything from my past that didn’t bring me joy went in the bin as per Marie Kondo ofc) and helps me destress if I am dealing with a problem I can’t solve.
I keep this mini crate full of zines that I’ve collected over the years from friends and independent publishers. Also a bunch of small press poems and writing collections I pick up from used book stores whenever I go places. There is one called Horticultural Appropriation by Claire Ratinon & Sam Ayre; a riso-printed poetry collection called Silencio by Maria Meiga; another is IMAGO, a poetry magazine published by University of Calgary English department, in what year, I don’t know; a few palm-sized beautifully illustrated zines by my friend Marina Kukso including Head in the Clouds and Secret Art.
I’ve got a beautiful vase by a Berlin-based ceramist Violaine Toth that I bought during the pandemic to cheer myself up; and another one by Jérémy Belina that lasted a grand total of 2 days before being knocked over by a cat (the culprit has disappeared and has yet to be found).
My mum collects squirrel figurines (I collect books, collecting runs in the family apparently). She brought me one of these super cute marble vintage ones when she came to visit me in the summer. It’s now part of the nicknack collection keeping my pilea company, I don’t make the rules.
I have these two cassettes by Plazas and Mu I’ve been moving with since Vancouver.
A combination of all of these things and then some makes me really quite happy. It helps me enjoy coming into my workspace to start my day whether it’s working on my projects at work, or just creating something.
What is your software setup?
I don’t have too many software tools I use as of late. I used to have all sorts of scripts I’d write or hyper specific tools I’d use. I, for some reason, thought it would give me the “proper hacker” accolades among other programmers, but now I don’t give a shit and just do what actually makes me most productive!
From home I work on a Windows machine. Developing on a Windows has come a great way since the terrible time many of you and myself probably had growing up.
But right now, brief break, Nori wants to say hi———————–9iupo90-[].
As I was saying, writing Rust on Windows so far has been easy and hassle free, at least in the space I work in. I run vscode with vim bindings using rust-analyzer and nushell. I’ll rebase/reflog/cherry-pick from the cli, but I also sometimes just use Github Desktop. The diffs become so much more readable, and some things are just chiller and allow me to just focus on the actual coding.
The one feature that I miss the most working primarily on a windows machine is airdrop. All the drawings I make on an ipad for my zines or my talks need to make their way over to a pc, and I really wanted to do that with the same ease as airdrop. An unlikely hero stepped in to make this work seamlessly - Tailscale. Aside from being a VPN service (a very excellent VPN service, in fact), it also lets me transfer files instantly between all my devices that have it running with a feature they call Taildrop. Genius!
I also have NextDNS running on all of my devices for that extra firewall protection. Super easy to use, install and forget about it sort of thing.
I make drawings for my zines in Procreate on ipad pro, and finish them off in Affinity Publisher. Along the same lines all the drawings for my talks are also done in Procreate. I used to use google slides for all my talks for years, but recently switched to making them on my ipad or mac in Keynote. The main reason is because I could save and reuse certain styles for shapes and fonts, as well as use previously installed fonts that aren’t part of google font suite.
I need to listen to music while I work. I cancelled spotify a while back, so all my music now is either via youtube, or records I buy on bandcamp, or our household’s NAS (software x hardware collab) via Emby media server via Tailscale.
This isn’t quite software, but more of a productivity setup, but I’ve been following pomodoro videos in the past couple of weeks while working. Abao in Tokyo channel is my go-to. Abao’s vibes sorta match my workspace vibes - a pleasant and much appreciated coincidence.
I also use things like Hackmd and Notion depending on the need and context. Hackmd is nice when the final thing needs to be in markdown, Notion is my little personal database for articles, travel/hiking planning, noting down where I bought one part or another.
Any favourite programs/apps/tools?
As all rust developers, I must first sing praises to rustc (there is some sort of unspoken agreement idk, but we all do it!). I have literally never been as happy writing code as I am when writing rust with the help of its compiler. I no longer shout at my computer, but instead have somewhat intelligent discussions (ok fine, sometimes negotiations) with the borrow checker and the compiler.
I love rust-analyzer, and honestly any LSP. Makes life easier, thinks about the basic stuff so you don’t have to because you’ve already spent the last 10 years thinking about basic stuff so now it’s LSP’s turn etc, etc.
My hands down most favourite organisational tool is a bullet journal. That’s right, my day-to-day organization lives outside of a computer world entirely (computers were a mistake etc etc). I have used all the todo apps under the sun, but nothing except a bullet journaling has ever been able to keep me from forgetting things. I still forget lots and lots of things, but just imagine what it was before the bullet journal. Plus, it gives me a bit of time during my work day to be away from a computer to organise myself. Surprisingly does wonders for productivity.
What are your favourite programming or scripting languages?
rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust catt rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust catt rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust as a long-time nodejs girl, i’ll still do any smol scripting in nodejs mainly cuz it’ll usually take me a whooping 3 mins, but also rust isn’t really a scripting language rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust catt rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust rust
Is there anything you are missing in your setup?
I’ll be forever looking for good lookin cable management solutions that are functional and fit with the aesthetics of my space. I am sure I’ll find it right on my very last day before retiring from computers, because that’s just how life goes sometimes and you know what, I am okay with that.
A better camera and a better light setup. Logistically it might not work in my space, simply because I don’t have much space left. But maybe something will? This one I haven’t given up on just yet.
I would also love to draw on stream, but unfortunately that requires another video card, and I am out of slots on my motherboard. That being said, I did stream a few times, and it’s been years since, so perhaps this is just really not meant to be.
I want to get my computer off the ground! I am currently thinking of trying to find a vintage Componibili trolley/storage unit. It might also solve my cable situation (meaning I shove all my cables in one of the drawers and forget about them).
What book comes to your mind that you would like others to read?
As you may have gathered from this piece and these photos, I read a bunch, so this is a marvelous question. I’ll give you three books: a computer, a fiction, and a poetry collection.
A computer book. Engineering a Compiler by Keith D. Cooper & Linda Torczon.. An excellent, in-depth read on compiler design. I go back to it regularly in my current day-to-day work.
A fiction book. The Passion According to G.H. by Clarice Lispector. My friend Sy Brand mailed me this book last year for my birthday, and boy is this a wonderfully weird read! This sculptress in Rio runs into a dying insect and goes into this whole existentialist and spiritual crisis. It’s just all very wild. Also incredibly well written. Clarice Lispector is a genius, honestly.
A poetry collection. Soon, the Future of Memory by Anja Saleh. Incredibly touching poetry of the life of a German woman of African descent. A few of my favourites include, “anja [an-yaa]”, “questions from an african mother to her european child”, “rev/ululate”. I cried a lot, it’s beautiful.