Daily Dose of Pottekkat

Handbrake life turns are hard for many reasons.

Hello from Vietnam! Kind of.

Turning down the external noise to clear the noise inside.

Can the open access movement learn from open source?

I am back writing my newsletter after a three-month hiatus.

ISRO just landed a spacecraft on the frickin moon.

Why do you always hear, “You haven’t changed at all!”?

Long time no see.

Long time no see.

Long time no see.

I’m sorting through the mess to plan my travels for next month.

I’m at Kubernetes Community Days Mumbai to talk about the Gateway API.

Obsessed about obsessions.

Why am I at an airport again?

Continuing the theme.

I gave my talk today!

Day two means party time!

FOSSASIA Summit started today!

This might be a theme here.

Narrowing what drives me and my future plans.

Wikipedia is an unpredictable rabbit hole.

How do I go about writing this article?

New diagrams and a binge-worthy blog.

IDK if this is good or bad.

/stats is here. Check it out.

Tweets.

My new-found love for charts.

Photos from the Bahrain Grand Prix.

Have you learned to write prompts yet?

Guess where I’m writing this from?

Virtue signaling is a global problem.

Doing Kerala things.

It is good to pause once in a while.

Hike at Windsor Nature Park and work at library@harbourfront.

It feels greener than Kerala.

I went to the dentist today.

I’m in Singapore for a week!

Happy Rejekts proposal submission day!

Watched two movies today.

Driven by curiosity.

No, I don’t want to day trade and get rich.

/now

Starting my travels for the year.

The boys are back together beer.

It’s a new year!

I’m moving away from using Google Analytics on this site.

A lot of stuff happened in the past week.

Travelling to Kannur. Bonus: Photos!

Don’t play sports without training.

How internet brought quite passions to life.

So, I started learning Spanish.

Based more on personal preferences than data. Let’s see how this turns out.

I have not voiced an opinion all along. But this week’s article might change that.

Write. Rewrite. Edit. Re-edit.

And the people who will listen your rants.

Fail fast.

Writing a lot of new articles and exploring new “genres” for articles.

The lack of availability of Raspberry Pis could be a case study for the global supply chain problem.

Mexico GP weekend is here and everyone wants Checo to win.

Hot take: Being able to use technology does not necessarily mean you are good at building it.

Switching tasks can unlock a different kind of efficiency.

Catching up on my reading. I’m doing poorly.

Spending the weekend working on our town’s future.

New post on Kubernetes Gateway API coming soon.

I’m back home for good. Bonus: Photos.

Speaking at Open Source India and meeting old friends. Bonus: Photos from Bangalore.

I’m in Bangalore for the week. Bonus: Photos from Pune.

I was in too many airports this week. Bonus: Photos from COCON.

Traveling around the city and the outskirts: 36,738 steps in a day with four hours to go.

Photos from the past days in Dublin.

A bit last moment, but I made it here!

Conference season September begins.

Even gods envy you. Photos only.

It is real.

How fast did we go wireless?

Photos we took today.

Working on side projects, writing, and AI images.

“I can’t believe I’ve been writing this for 200 days”, preparing for conferences, and reading through Linux Foundation’s DEI report.

Is it September already?

Finish side projects or start more side projects?

I’m taking the CKAD examination.

TLDR; I don’t like it. Bonus: Pictures!

Really?

Supply and demand.

Every successful blogger I follow says that the key to their success is writing regularly.

Upping my content game.

I’m live!

Work from train.

The line between incentivization and gamification of open source contributions is blurry.

New post published today. Friday is new blog day now.

I created a CLI in Go to create new posts.

Tried integrating Netlify CMS. It doesn’t do what I want it to do.

I failed miserably.

Spent the day refreshing my Kubernetes knowledge.

Keeps socializing away.

My new blog post will have diagrams. So, I added markdown to diagrams using Mermaid.js.

I wrote about how and why I moved this blog to Netlify.

I moved my Hugo blog from GitHub pages to Netlify.

Troy and Abed make a mooovie!

I forgot to set the stopwatch and I spoke for 37 minutes.

Preparing for my virtual talk at OSS LA!

Learning how Docker works and finally getting started on my side project. Posting publicly for accountability.

I learn about Redis and build a Redis clone.

I can finally start working on my side projects!

I was invited to be a guest on this week’s ClueCon Weekly!

Intense trek to reach the top of Veezhumala.

Leaving these people. Again.

Fun times in Alappuzha.

We played cricket in our nearby turf and it was fun!

Mandatory stop at the new LuLu mall when you are in Trivandrum.

Prithviraj’s new movie “Kaduva” is as bad as I thought it would be.

Cricket match, Wimbledon finals, and race at the Red Bull Ring. I play table tennis.

Home away from home.

It’s an end of an era.

I went on a rainy day ride. Rain, not for me.

I’ve been off the tracks these past weeks. Need to get back to the consistency.

Took my new motorcycle out for a ride.

We went on a road trip.

It’s been a long week, without you my friend. Bonus: Photos from PIFF 2022!

It is going to get busy this week. I have at least five open pull requests, and I’m making more. The film festival we are organizing kicks off this Friday. All my time away from work is spent there. I like busy weeks. It keeps me occupied and less distracted. I might go to the showroom tomorrow to book my new motorcycle. Like I said, busy week.

Test drove Honda CB300R. I’m inclined to buy it. Bonus: Pictures from Chulliyar Dam.

Azerbaijan GP is on!

Hosted an APISIX contributor workshop today.

The new Jurassic World movie sucks.

No you won’t.

Traveled 60 kms to watch Top Gun: Maverick

I can binge watch epic test cricket moments anytime, any day.

150 days of writing! I have a small video for you today.

Living in a small town has its own set of perks.

We can ride on my motorcycle.

Watched the new movie “Vikram” filled with a stellar cast.

Rewatching NPCB for the millionth time.

Neichor and Chicken Curry is the best food you can eat.

My motorcycle is older than me.

Kids be buying PS5s. Me be buying RetroPies.

Race day, IPL Final day, and rewatching an old gem.

After all this time, I learn to work with OBS. It is really amazing and I’m disappointed I didn’t use it earlier.

Can’t find a low end video game that is fun to play and won’t burn my MacBook Air.

First timer talks are always a lot of work.

In sickness and health 2.0.

Sick today.

Traveled to Kasaragod over the weekend. Bonus: Photos!

I finished the first one. Moving on to the next.

Streamin away!

I played a video game (and enjoyed it) after a long time.

Rainy days calls for nostalgia.

I missed my first in-person KubeCon.

Bought two set of strings for my bass.

Watched three seasons of Friday Night Lights without knowing anything about American football.

Talked at a meetup after months!

Talking at a meetup after months!

Wordle no more.

3D print reveal. Bonus: Photos!

The American one.

Watched the new Dr. Strange movie.

I don’t have anything interesting to share today.

Hardworking is undermined and not considered cool anymore. Don’t cancel me.

Owning your work makes you more productive.

Starting some new projects.

A large percentage of your life should be filled with things you absolutely love to do.

More talk proposals at conferences. Bonus: Photos!

Pachinko tells stories in subtitles and I submitted a couple of talk proposals.

Back with a new version.

I never knew the WeWork story until this week.

Cool new shizz!

What should I talk about next?

Refactoring the “Getting started” guide.

I’m too busy to write. Even to play Wordle!

I would not be traveling to KubeCon in Valencia. It sucks. See you next year!

One month flew by! Made some significant contributions. Bonus: Photo from my friend’s marriage!

I might very well have an opportunity to watch a Grand Prix but it costs way too much.

That’s what she said.

How fast is Lewis Hamilton?

I’m a workaholic.

Taking it slow. Photos!

Shoulda, coulda, woulda got it in two.

Organizing an international film festival every year is fun!

100 days? That’s awesome!

My three PRs from yesterday was merged. Only one remains.

I opened two more PRs today. Now I have four open PRs.

Reached Mumbai today!

I have an early morning flight to Mumbai tomorrow.

When will I read all these and close all these tabs?

I spent the whole day setting up the documents needed for a visa.

Busy days.

I’m going to KubeCon, my microphone arrived, I went to a film festival and I need to get a visa.

Doing a lot of work in rewriting the Apache APISIX documentation.

My USB hub setup seems to work. Waiting for my new microphone to arrive tomorrow. Plus, I read a lot about Singapore today.

I’m getting new equipment.

What do you do when you get new ideas?

Plans for writing.

Will Smith slapped Chris Rock and now we can’t have a peaceful dinner.

My tweet went viral.

Here we go tweetin’ again!

Attended an event just to eat good Biriyani today.

First day off since I started my new job.

Thinking from a user’s perspective to make a project better.

I start writing again!

I try to articulate what I’m working on.

Finding my bearings.

I start at API7.ai today!

ISL final watch party! Bonus: Pictures from Malampuzha Dam.

I ran 15 kms today.

Transitioning into the new job and watching Pada.

It’s official! I will be starting a new job on Monday!

Taking time off before my new job.

Success is contagious. Bonus: Photos from Kava, Malampuzha.

I’m changing jobs and stepping down from a CNCF maintainer.

Technological advancement makes our lives a lot easier. Or does it? Bonus: Photos from Meenkara Dam.

I’m speaking at the Codebar Festival today.

Too lazy to write. Working on presentation.

Lot of emails and articles to catch up on.

My talk was transcribed into an article and published in the Open Source For You Magazine. I got my author’s copy today!

Vim or Emacs? Nano.

It ain’t much, but it’s honest work.

I got tickets to watch the new Batman movie today.

Chill.

I kind of took a day off. Whoa! 60 days!

Ooh shiny!

Li’l Sebastian is probably the best minor character in the whole show.

Do you want to work for [insert large consulting company from India]?

It’s times like these time and time again.

Authenticity is always rewarded.

Quick update and a song I like.

My article is being published in a print magazine!

We are obsessed with saving time.

Is it healthy to rebel everything that came before?

50 days of writing! But what am I reading now?

You play a different game than everyone else. Understanding that is the first step.

Do you have an MBA?

I re-watched the movie Whiplash today. It is one of my favorite movies of all time.

People can’t use what they don’t understand.

Launching my newsletter next week!

Looking at old photos is one of the greatest joys in life.

Goodbye People. Bonus: Photos and videos that will make me cry in a couple of days.

Too busy to write.

Photos from the last three days at Varkala and Punchakkari.

Hitting beaches today with the gang.

4 is par and 3 is a birdie.

I’m back on Twitter!

Mallus love their LuLus.

I know nothing.

I go back to writing code.

The winner takes it all. It is a training algorithm for neural networks.

I haven’t been much of a poetry reader.

Wordle and what I’m doing about my side projects.

I am suddenly sick.

It’s been a month since I started writing daily logs.

It wasn’t an obvious one today but I got the right letters in the third step and I had already eliminated other possible vowels that could go between the two correct letters.

Highlights from conference day.

Mini-Boom! I should have guessed it earlier.

Nothing much. Just a daily update.

How good is the “Basil meets Sanju” interview?

My vocabulary of five letter words is improving—thanks to Wordle. I have to get better at thispowerlanguage.co.uk/wordle I was reading through Gergely Orosz’s article on “What Silicon Valley ’ Gets ’ about Software Engineers that Traditional Companies Do Not” and I couldn’t help but compare it to the Indian tech industry. I have only worked at startups and whatever I know of the big Indian tech companies are from my friends and old classmates....

I have been reading more ever since I started using my Kindle again.

I want to be the only person that does what I do. As Dave Perell mentions in “Build a Personal Monopoly” a personal monopoly is a unique intersection of skills, interests, and personality traits. This year, I’m going to explore and redefine what my monopoly is and work towards building it through my blog and social media.

I finished reading “The Defining Decade” by Meg Jay. While deciding what to read next from my list of “Want to Read” books (it has 89 books now and it is not getting smaller), a random conversation with a friend led me to Haruki Murakami. I have read Murakami’s works during the initial lockdown days. I got interested in his writing through a collection of his short stories titled “The Elephant Vanishes”....

Always having a book to read helped me from falling down YouTube rabbit holes.

The Coronavirus Omicron variant is hitting hard in India and I’m in its epicenter in Trivandrum. These are uncertain times. The “new” normal is just the normal. I live in campus with close to 200 people in the same building. Isolating a case of COVID is hard both from a social and a logistic perspective. Half the people who get tested today in the district are positive. So, here we are, uncertain, hoping for things to get better....

It’s Wednesday my dudes! I was working on the slides for two of my talks and realized how minimal they were. I had made it a habit to make my slides into tools that just assists my presentation and not something that is overloaded with information. This has proven to be much effective. Human beings are bad at multitasking. You cannot focus your attention on two things—listening to the person talking and trying to read their slides....

I finished reading “The Psychology of Money”.

I start off my “work day”—when I finish my morning routine and sit in front of my computer screen—by catching up on some light reading. I usually have a backlog I go to to start me off and I also have subscriptions to my favorite bloggers via email or RSS (yes I still use an RSS reader). Most of what I read are from indie blogs I found through Twitter, Reddit, Hacker News or through aggregators like Blogging for Devs and daily....

I have two upcoming talks in the next two weeks. My firsts in 2022. And I hope to speak more at conferences this year. The first is at DevConf.cz 2022 on the 29th this month and the second is at FOSDEM 2022 on the 5th of February. Measuring Service Mesh Performance 101 This is my talk at DevConf.cz that dives into how the performance of a workload running on top of a service mesh can be benchmarked....

I finished reading “The Psychology of Money” by Morgan Housel today. It was a real page turner and I finished it in two sittings. I am just starting another book on my Kindle, “The Defining Decade: Why Your Twenties Matter and How to Make the Most of Them Now” by Meg Jay. It has been a while since I read ebooks and this should be a nice change of setting.

I have a good excuse for why I missed my writing schedule the past two days. I was in deep conversations. I love talking to a person and engaging with them completely, taking the conversation to deeper levels. I have been sleeping at ~4-5 AM everyday for the past week because of this. This has been a good change of pace to my normal life and it was much needed....

A couple of months ago, my system to track tasks broke down. The system was my own brain and depended on its ability to remember things. But it had this bug where it can only remember so many things before an incoming information pushes out “address the comments on the performance testing design spec”. I had a physical book and Evernote to complement my ability to remember things but these didn’t make me more productive or make my life any easier....

But in the end, it doesn’t even matter.

What?

People are unable to predict their personal changes. We see ourselves as finished products at any point of time. Is that the end of history?

There is no reason to risk what you have and need for what you don’t have and don’t need.

Doing hard things is hard. But you have to do it to be the best version of yourself. Everyday is a struggle but at the end of the day I’m happy I chose to do the hard things.

I used to write on blogging platforms like Medium and DEV.to. I stopped using them and started writing on my own blog recently. Here, I explore why I chose to do that and make bold predictions on the outcome of a cricket match.

What’s cooler than representing words as real-valued vectors to capture its semantic meaning?

I recently started writing on my own website. Here’s a look into my setup and the process I follow to write posts.

Learning about Blockchain, Crypto and Web3.

My goals for 2022, publicly posted for accountability.

I will blog daily. Or at least I hope to.