Essays

The Tool I Actually Used

11 May 2026

The Tool I Actually Used I. Introduction AI is a normal part of software engineering now, and ICS 314 treated it that way. We were expected to use it, think about how we used it, and be honest about what...

Software Engineering Artificial Intelligence Reflection ICS 314

You're Going to Be Wrong — Estimate Anyway

04 May 2026

The First Number You Put Down Is a Guess When ICS 314 introduced effort estimation, my first reaction was skepticism. I did not know how long things would take. Nobody does at the start. Writing down a number felt like...

Software Engineering Project Management Effort Estimation ICS 314

The Blueprint Already Exists

30 Apr 2026

Nobody Starts From Zero My first instinct when I started writing code was to figure everything out from scratch. If I needed to manage state, I would think through how to manage state. If I needed to connect to a...

Software Engineering Design Patterns Next.js React

Where's the Truck? A Crowdsourced Food Truck Tracker for Oahu

01 Apr 2026

The Problem Food trucks are one of the best parts of eating in Hawaii. The food is good, the prices are reasonable, and they show up all over Oahu. The problem is finding them. Most trucks post their location on...

Software Engineering Nextjs

Why UI Frameworks Are Worth the Pain

26 Feb 2026

The Learning Curve Is Real Learning Bootstrap 5 felt like learning a new language. Not in the fun way where things click quickly, but in the frustrating way where you spend an hour figuring out why your navbar won’t align...

UI Design Bootstrap 5 Web Development Software Engineering

ESLint Errors Made Me a Better Programmer

12 Feb 2026

Fighting the Red Underlines My first week using ESLint with VSCode felt like the tool was working against me. I’d write code that ran fine and produced the correct output but ESLint would light up my editor with red and...

Coding Standards ESLint TypeScript Software Engineering

TypeScript Fits How I Actually Learn

22 Jan 2025

First Impressions of TypeScript I came into this course with experience in Java, C, C++, HTML, CSS, and Python. TypeScript felt comparable in difficulty to what I already knew which made the transition smoother than expected. The main difference was...

TypeScript Software Engineering Learning WODs

Smart Questions Get Smart Answers

22 Jan 2025

Why Smart Questions Matter Asking questions the smart way matters more than most software engineers realize. The difference between a well-asked question and a poorly-asked one determines whether you get useful help or waste everyone’s time including your own. Eric...

StackOverflow Communication Software Engineering

Building Systems That Serve Communities

21 Jan 2025

Why Data Structures and Security Matter I’ve always been interested in creating things that solve problems but lately I’ve realized that building something functional isn’t enough. Software needs to work efficiently and resist attacks. That’s why I want to deepen...

Software Engineering Cybersecurity Data Structures Career Goals