Personal Interests
Evolving viewpoints, preferences, and favorite systems collected in one place.
I've run different operating systems across different hardware, and developed opinions on their practicality and reliability over time.
My primary choice for an intuitive and practical desktop system.
I find Windows to be the most intuitive operating system, largely because of small design decisions like window snapping and large, easy-to-target window controls. While it certainly has bloat, its hardware and software support remains unmatched.
A beautiful and polished environment, though with some ergonomic trade-offs (in my opinion).
macOS provides incredible polish and aesthetic beauty. While I find Windows more practical for some day-to-day tasks, MacBooks are currently the best all-around laptops available, especially hardware-wise.
My default choice for a reliable Linux desktop experience.
Fedora balances modern Linux well without becoming unnecessarily painful to use. It feels more free and open than Ubuntu while still being far more realistic for normal desktop use than something like Arch.
The backbone of stable and predictable infrastructure.
For servers requiring stability and reliability, where you know it's going to run and run well, Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and Debian are my top choices. This is simply because of their proven track record with stability and reliability, and support across a wide range of hardware.
I'm quite a fan of various types of timepieces, each for different reasons. Aside from the obvious utility of watches alone (telling the time), it is very easy (and reasonable) to appreciate the complex engineering of a timepiece.
It's a symbol of the engineering marvels that our species has been able to achieve: tons of tiny, precisely manufactured parts all working in unity to tell you the time of day (and often more) with remarkable accuracy. Aside from this, timepieces can also reflect your interests, your style, and what you value.
I think it's important to remember: timepieces are never about the money, but about the value they provide you. If you strictly value accuracy, a $20 Casio tells time better than a $60,000 Rolex. If you value durability, a $100 G-SHOCK is more likely to survive a nuclear war than a $10,000 luxury watch. You determine how much a timepiece is worth to you.
I also believe that beautifully designed and engineered timepieces are one of the greatest symbols of fusing aesthetic design and technical engineering to create a masterpiece.
A fusion of mechanical watchmaking and quartz-level accuracy via the Spring Drive movement.
The completely smooth sweep of the seconds hand (via the Spring Drive movement) is a masterpiece of engineering and aesthetically beautiful. Grand Seiko also makes some of the best dials and has some of the best finishing.
Orient Star is an excellent Japanese watchmaker, serving as Orient's premium, higher tier line of watches.
This model is simple but beautiful, and the steel has quite good finishing. The power reserve indicator (signature of Orient Star) is also very practical and certainly worth mentioning, more watches should have this feature.
Overall a very solid and beautiful timepiece.
One of the most aesthetically beautiful and classically refined watches ever made, in my opinion. The bracelet, sunburst dial, fluted bezel, date cyclops, day indicator, and feel, are all seemingly perfectly designed.
The beautiful, luxurious design of this piece never gets old.
The iconic 'Moonwatch', first worn on the Moon during NASA's Apollo missions. Beautiful, reliable, and a piece of human history. I believe it's arguably one of the most, if not the most important timepiece ever produced.
It's impossible to separate this watch from its moon legacy; it's a piece of human history.
The ultra-reliable, near-indestructible choice, with atomic timekeeping, 200m dive-level water resistance, and tough solar power, as well as several other extremely practical functions such as world time, stopwatch, countdown timer, LED backlight, and more.
Near-indestructible and automatically time-correcting. If I could keep only one watch, this would probably be it. In many ways, it puts 'luxury' watches to shame.
A foundational, radically honest watch that I think (rightfully) challenges status-first culture. This watch is excellent at what it does, and has several other practical features such as a stopwatch, alarm, day, date, backlight, and more. It's $20 and puts $20,000 watches to shame in many regards.
This is often called the 'watch for everyone' and very rightfully so. It is designed for telling the time and it does it better than just about any other watch out there. Not to mention the durability, and 7 year battery life.
I value different games or simulation environments for different reasons. KSP, on one hand, prioritizes systems-level depth and provides educational utility, translating complex physical principles into intuitive experiences. Cyberpunk 2077 on the other hand, is one of the best masterpieces ever created in terms of art, design, story, as well as the sheer amount of content and detail packed into it. Both are excellent, but for very different reasons. Entertainment and education are both valuable, and I think it's important to appreciate the different ways games can provide value in both of those dimensions.
KSP is often categorized simply as a game, but I believe it to be one of the most effective tools for learning the foundations of orbital mechanics and spaceflight in general.
It forces you to deal with and understand the (at least basic) physics of launch, orbital trajectories/insertion, Hohmann transfers, and more. It can provide a level of intuition and visualization for spaceflight that traditional textbooks rarely achieve. I believe KSP to be a rare example of entertainment providing educational value in a way that feels natural and fun rather than forced and annoying.
An absolute masterpiece of art, design, storytelling, technical execution, real meaning (in some aspects at least), and much more. It's a truly rare example of a project of this scale where the artistic vision and technical execution feel so cohesive. By far my favorite game of all time, at least from an entertainment perspective.
I like stories that explore the future of humanity and technology. Some represent cautionary tales, while others offer a more optimistic vision of what we could achieve. I also just like super entertaining movies that don't really have a ton of meaningful educational value (I'm not a robot). That said, I try to prioritize listing the ones here that I find meaningful or thought-provoking.
This series started mainly as a comedy, but without a doubt evolved into a deep exploration of social, ethical, and scientific ideas. Super entertaining but also thought-provoking.
I believe The Orville largely represents a very positive future for humanity in many aspects. It shows the kind of future we could achieve if we manage to get our act together as a species and focus on exploration, discovery, and mutual understanding. This is super hard to achieve (obviously) but I really hope we can achieve it, or at least get closer to it.
Wall-E balances a cautionary look at environmental neglect with a focus on persistence and connection. It's also just really entertaining and an amazing story.
I've loved this movie since childhood. It explores the relationship between technological advancement and our care for our planet. I think one (though not the only) takeaway is that while space exploration is a vital frontier for our species, it should ideally be pursued in parallel with, not as a substitute for taking care of our home planet.
A masterclass in problem-solving, engineering under pressure, and the triumph of the human spirit. It depicts the real-life mission that became a 'successful failure'.
This movie is a perfect example of what can be achieved when brilliant minds work together toward a single, critical goal. The scene where they have to 'fit a square peg in a round hole' using only what's on board is one of the most inspiring moments in cinema for any engineer or problem solver.
