The Curious Engineer

All blogs / Engineering management / careers

Yusuf Aytas

yusufaytas.com

I write about software engineering, leadership, and the judgment built through messy systems, team decisions, mistakes, and curiosity beyond work.

Engineering management / careersSoftware / engineering practiceEssays / personal

’10’15’20’25
Posts
375 from 1 Nov 2007 to 25 Oct 2026
Posting
weekly (55 in the last year)
Kind
personal blog
Feed
https://yusufaytas.com/rss.xml

2026 49

  1. The Years We Can't Hire Back
  2. The Cost of Looking Competent
  3. The Double-Counted Future
  4. 2026-10Posts published during this month.3 posts
  5. Nobody is Thinking Anymore
  6. The Void Job
  7. What Does Retirement Look Like?
  8. 2026-09Posts published during this month.3 posts
  9. There May Be Nobody There
  10. The SDLC Was Designed for Humans
  11. Skellig Michael, Eventually
  12. The Wind at Your Back
  13. The Invariant Is Hiding
  14. 2026-08Posts published during this month.5 posts
  15. Work is Just Other People
  16. Where the Automation Has to Stop
  17. The Engineer in the Half-Space
  18. 2026-07Posts published during this month.3 posts
  19. Old Software Was Fast Because It Had No Choice
  20. Too Liked to Be Useful
  21. Vibe Coder vs Software Engineer
  22. 2026-06Posts published during this month.3 posts
  23. When Code Is Cheap, Does Quality Still Matter?
  24. Why Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Is a Masterpiece
  25. Why We Ignore Advice
  26. The Mirror Is Part of the Machine
  27. When Too Many Maps Overlap on One Person
  28. 2026-05Posts published during this month.5 posts
  29. The Work Runs on Different Maps
  30. Breaking Up With WordPress After Two Decades
  31. Your Work Introduces You
  32. Trial By Fire
  33. 2026-04Posts published during this month.4 posts
  34. The Dude
  35. Why Headcount Math Lies
  36. Capacity Is the Roadmap
  37. The Roadmap Is Not the System
  38. Torres del Paine W Trek
  39. Escaping Status Theater
  40. 2026-03Posts published during this month.6 posts
  41. Incentives Drive Everything
  42. Scaling Culture Without Dilution
  43. What Good Looks Like
  44. 2026-02Posts published during this month.3 posts
  45. Why Airport Security Feels Random
  46. Why Politics Appear
  47. How to Work with Me
  48. The Janus Protocol
  49. 2026-01Posts published during this month.4 posts

2025 46

  1. Multi-Horizon Delivery Framework
  2. What Good Execution Looks Like
  3. Managing Your Manager
  4. Why Kingdom of Heaven’s Director’s Cut Is Better
  5. AI Broke Interviews
  6. 2025-11Posts published during this month.5 posts
  7. Most of What We Call Progress
  8. Managers Have Been Vibe Coding All Along
  9. Stop Wasting Brainpower
  10. Why Over-Engineering Happens
  11. 2025-10Posts published during this month.4 posts
  12. Prisoner's Dilemma
  13. Climbing No More
  14. The Weekly Win
  15. 2025-09Posts published during this month.3 posts
  16. Mevlana Candy
  17. Brewing Turkish Tea
  18. Onboarding Your Engineering Manager
  19. Technical Deep Dives
  20. 2025-08Posts published during this month.4 posts
  21. Yapay Zekâ Çağında Bilgisayar Mühendisliği
  22. Building Remote Teams
  23. From Idea to Launch in 2 Weeks
  24. 2025-07Posts published during this month.3 posts
  25. Reflecting on Software Engineering Handbook
  26. Representing the Business
  27. 2025-05Posts published during this month.2 posts
  28. New Manager Survival Guide
  29. Take Self Reviews Seriously
  30. Chasing Real Respect
  31. The Invisible Difference
  32. Learning the Johari Window
  33. 2025-04Posts published during this month.5 posts
  34. Management is a Lonely Place
  35. Simple Task Management
  36. AI Balance in Work
  37. PIP Manager Insights
  38. 2025-03Posts published during this month.4 posts
  39. Engineering Manager Interview Preparation
  40. Work-Life Balance as a Manager
  41. Bridging the Management Disconnect
  42. Tech Hiring Bubble Bursts
  43. 2025-02Posts published during this month.4 posts
  44. Traits for EMs
  45. Simple Acts of Recognition Matter
  46. 2025-01Posts published during this month.2 posts

2024 42

  1. The Question I Ask Every New Report
  2. 2024-12Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. The Reality of an Employer's Market
  4. Bridging Ideals and Reality
  5. Hiring Red Flags
  6. Why The Godfather Is So Damn Good
  7. Subteam Tenets
  8. 2024-11Posts published during this month.5 posts
  9. No Fluff Please
  10. Losing a Top Performer
  11. Balancing Act of Reliability
  12. 2024-10Posts published during this month.3 posts
  13. Building Trust in Engineering Teams
  14. Ideal Number of Direct Reports
  15. Overriding a People Leader’s Decision
  16. From Misperception to Promotion
  17. Perception vs Perspective
  18. 2024-09Posts published during this month.5 posts
  19. Setting Goals
  20. 2024-08Posts published during this month.1 post
  21. From Engineer to Manager
  22. Getting Delegation Right
  23. Interviewing Your Future Boss
  24. 2024-07Posts published during this month.3 posts
  25. Celebrating Our Book in Iceland
  26. Operational Skills Needed
  27. 2024-06Posts published during this month.2 posts
  28. On Writing Software Engineering Handbook
  29. Charlie Munger Quotes
  30. 2024-05Posts published during this month.2 posts
  31. Working with Dependencies
  32. 2024-04Posts published during this month.1 post
  33. From Las Vegas to Canyons
  34. 2024-03Posts published during this month.1 post
  35. Navigating Layoffs
  36. 2024-02Posts published during this month.1 post
  37. Handling Competitive Dynamics
  38. A Weekend Getaway to Malta
  39. Engineering Health Essentials
  40. Should Dev Managers Code?
  41. Confronting the Life on Pause
  42. 2024-01Posts published during this month.5 posts

2023 45

  1. Winning Eleven
  2. Kindness is A Choice
  3. 2023-12Posts published during this month.2 posts
  4. Bireysel Katılımcılar ve Yöneticiler
  5. Leading from Where You Are
  6. The Subtle Art of Listening
  7. Coding in Leadership
  8. The Power of Consistency
  9. The Making of a Leader
  10. The Path to Leadership
  11. Embracing TikTok
  12. Talent Sourcing Journey
  13. Leading Self Managing Teams
  14. Cracking Coding Bottlenecks
  15. Quick Reflexes in Decision Making
  16. Achieve More by Meeting Less
  17. The Metamorphosis of Iron Mike
  18. Becoming a Rockstar Engineer
  19. A Weekend in Amsterdam
  20. Leadership Archetypes
  21. Turning Defensiveness Into Growth
  22. Silent Guardians of Quality
  23. Why You Should Read More Code
  24. 2023-11Posts published during this month.20 posts
  25. Restful Sleep: The Ultimate Debugger
  26. Embrace the Unknowns
  27. Hiring Harmony
  28. Estimation Accuracy
  29. Why Legacy Systems Are Worth Your Time
  30. Why Metrics Don’t Equal Quality
  31. A Sunny Day in Edinburgh
  32. 2023-10Posts published during this month.7 posts
  33. Life's Compounding Effect
  34. 2023-08Posts published during this month.1 post
  35. Hiking Trip to Errigal Mountain and The Stairway to Heaven
  36. 2023-05Posts published during this month.1 post
  37. Passing Through Bulgaria
  38. Blessington Greenway Trail
  39. 2023-04Posts published during this month.2 posts
  40. Quotes from Ali
  41. Teaching Software Engineering
  42. 2023-03Posts published during this month.2 posts
  43. Visiting Vienna in January
  44. Pamukkale, Ephesus, Bodrum
  45. 2023-01Posts published during this month.2 posts

2022 20

  1. Erzurum Gezisi
  2. 2022-08Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. System Design Interviewing Tips
  4. Lough Ouler in May
  5. 2022-06Posts published during this month.2 posts
  6. Fusilli with Yogurt
  7. 2022-05Posts published during this month.1 post
  8. Engineering Strategy and Planning
  9. Data as a Product is a Promise
  10. 2022-04Posts published during this month.2 posts
  11. Update Statements on Production
  12. Engineering Roles and Responsibilities
  13. 2022-03Posts published during this month.2 posts
  14. Essential Engineering Principles
  15. Pulling the Plug from a Project
  16. Addressing Technical Debt
  17. Building a Technical Vision
  18. 2022-02Posts published during this month.4 posts
  19. Manager as a Service
  20. 2022-01Posts published during this month.1 post

2021 23

  1. Service Overload Strategies
  2. Designing A Key-Value Store
  3. 2021-12Posts published during this month.2 posts
  4. Promoting Learnings in Incidents
  5. 2021-11Posts published during this month.1 post
  6. A Trip To My Village
  7. 2021-10Posts published during this month.1 post
  8. Messi’nin Vedası
  9. 2021-08Posts published during this month.1 post
  10. Greatest XI of All Time
  11. Why Data Fails to Capture the Magic of Fenomeno
  12. 2021-07Posts published during this month.2 posts
  13. Apple ve Gizlilik
  14. Bray Head Walk
  15. Quotes from Mill
  16. M1 işlemcili MacBook Pro
  17. 2021-06Posts published during this month.4 posts
  18. Wicklow Mountains
  19. 2021-05Posts published during this month.1 post
  20. Code Author
  21. 2021-03Posts published during this month.1 post
  22. Missed Opportunities
  23. 2021-02Posts published during this month.1 post

2020 8

  1. Risk Comes First
  2. Dönmek mi, Dönmemek mi
  3. Quotes from Atatürk
  4. 2020-12Posts published during this month.3 posts
  5. Message Brokers Are Modern Grids
  6. 2020-11Posts published during this month.1 post
  7. Leetcode Hard
  8. 2020-06Posts published during this month.1 post

2019 15

  1. Verifying passed arguments partially
  2. 2019-11Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. Compatibility Is a Feature
  4. 2019-10Posts published during this month.1 post
  5. Yazılım Mühendisliği Kariyer Merdiveni
  6. 2019-09Posts published during this month.1 post
  7. Good APIs Age Slowly
  8. Before You Import That Library
  9. On Writing Wrapper Libraries
  10. 2019-08Posts published during this month.3 posts
  11. Firefox: Son Kale
  12. Yeni MacBook Pro
  13. Minimum Viable Agile
  14. What's wrong with Agile Frameworks
  15. 2019-07Posts published during this month.4 posts

2018 8

  1. The Real Work Is Social
  2. 2018-12Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. Simple Mutual Exclusion
  4. 2018-07Posts published during this month.1 post
  5. Hype in Software Development
  6. 2018-06Posts published during this month.1 post
  7. Why I like JavaScript
  8. 2018-01Posts published during this month.1 post

2017 11

  1. How Teams Choose Language
  2. Yazılım için İngilizce Öğrenin
  3. Yusuf'un Yeri
  4. I'm no longer a Scrum Master
  5. You Know State Is NO Good
  6. 2017-12Posts published during this month.5 posts
  7. Roma
  8. Refactoring Untested Code
  9. 2017-05Posts published during this month.2 posts
  10. Duplicate code isn't that bad
  11. 2017-04Posts published during this month.1 post

2016 13

  1. How I Work as a Software Engineer
  2. 2016-12Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. Smaller is Faster
  4. 2016-10Posts published during this month.1 post
  5. You Cannot Fix What You Cannot See
  6. 2016-09Posts published during this month.1 post
  7. Ufak Servisler
  8. Who needs an Architect?
  9. 2016-07Posts published during this month.2 posts
  10. Shoulder Ship It
  11. Scrum, Kanban, or just Agile
  12. Consistency Matters
  13. 2016-03Posts published during this month.3 posts

2015 7

  1. Local vs Production Debugging
  2. 2015-10Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. Babalık Bağı
  4. 2015-09Posts published during this month.1 post
  5. Mock methods that manipulate parameters
  6. A guide for Code Reviews
  7. 2015-08Posts published during this month.2 posts

2014 8

  1. Java Developer vs. Software Engineer
  2. 2014-10Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. Açık Kaynak Lisansları
  4. 2014-07Posts published during this month.1 post
  5. Moving from Java to Python
  6. 2014-03Posts published during this month.1 post
  7. Spring Cache Abstraction
  8. 2014-01Posts published during this month.1 post

2013 14

  1. Implementing HTML5 Bomberman
  2. 2013-12Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. Yazılım Mühendisliği Mülakatlarına Hazırlık Rehberi
  4. 2013-11Posts published during this month.1 post
  5. Ronaldo Luis Nazario De Lima
  6. 2013-10Posts published during this month.1 post
  7. JavaScript Execution Context
  8. 2013-06Posts published during this month.1 post
  9. Dependency Injection in JavaScript
  10. Achieving Abstraction In JavaScript
  11. 2013-05Posts published during this month.2 posts
  12. Buggy Code on Production, Survived
  13. Doğum Günü Kurabiyeleri
  14. 2013-04Posts published during this month.2 posts

2012 12

  1. XA Transactions: A Simple Guide
  2. 2012-10Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. Faster JavaScript
  4. 2012-08Posts published during this month.1 post
  5. Caching With Guava
  6. 2012-05Posts published during this month.1 post
  7. Çevik Yazılım
  8. 2012-03Posts published during this month.1 post
  9. Red Hot Chili Peppers
  10. 2012-02Posts published during this month.1 post
  11. Cepheye Yönelik Programlama
  12. 2012-01Posts published during this month.1 post

2011 4

  1. FC Barselona Rüya Takım mı?
  2. 2011-11Posts published during this month.1 post
  3. Jose Mourinho
  4. 2011-04Posts published during this month.1 post

2010 13

  1. Mediator
  2. Strategy
  3. 2010-11Posts published during this month.2 posts
  4. Composite
  5. 2010-10Posts published during this month.1 post
  6. Observer
  7. 2010-08Posts published during this month.1 post
  8. Facade
  9. Adapter
  10. Abstract Factory
  11. Factory
  12. Singleton
  13. 2010-01Posts published during this month.5 posts

2009 17

  1. Yazılım Mimarisi
  2. Inheritance ve Polymorphism
  3. Modern Warfare 2
  4. 2009-12Posts published during this month.3 posts
  5. Linux mu Windows mu?
  6. 2009-11Posts published during this month.1 post
  7. Antivirüs İncelemesi
  8. 2009-07Posts published during this month.1 post
  9. Şampiyonluğun Hikayesi
  10. HP Faciası
  11. 2009-06Posts published during this month.2 posts
  12. Binary Search Tree
  13. RAM(Random Access Memory)
  14. Quick Sort
  15. 2009-03Posts published during this month.3 posts
  16. SSL(Secure Socket Layer)
  17. 2009-02Posts published during this month.1 post

2008 18

  1. 24 Kasım
  2. Google
  3. Use of Pointers For Lists
  4. Bilgisayar Tarihi
  5. FC Barcelona
  6. 2008-11Posts published during this month.5 posts
  7. Java Link List Implementation
  8. Fsb
  9. Pointer Şeması
  10. Hoş Bir Gün
  11. Selection Sort
  12. 0 veya 1
  13. Heap-Allocated 2D Structures in C++
  14. Programlama Dilleri Tarihi
  15. A Basic Pointer Example
  16. Type Casting
  17. Pass By Reference
  18. 2008-10Posts published during this month.11 posts

2007 2

  1. Hello World
  2. 2007-11Posts published during this month.1 post