Robert Heaton

Archive

• diceomatic: a DSL for making children's dice games
  11 Jun 2025
• MinorMiner: we turn your kid's maths homework into Bitcoin
  14 May 2025
• It's not cheating if you write the video game solver yourself
  11 Mar 2025
• Come and work with me on Anthropic's Frontier Red Team
  03 Feb 2025
• PyMyFlySpy: track your flight using its headrest data
  04 Dec 2024
• Generating infinite, age-appropriate Cat Crimes puzzles
  02 Sep 2024
• PySkyWiFi: completely free, unbelievably stupid wi-fi on long-haul flights
  09 Jul 2024
• I've written a book about being a dad; now I want to get it published
  25 Mar 2024
• Thousands of elderly twins assure me that my kids will be alright
  18 Oct 2023
• Hello Deep Learning
  13 Oct 2023
• How to pass a coding interview with me
  30 Aug 2023
• I thought I knew what I was doing this time: how our second son was born
  04 Apr 2023
• Gamebert: a Game Boy emulator built by Robert
  07 Feb 2023
• How sad should I be about ChatGPT?
  14 Dec 2022
• Gameboy Doctor: debug and fix your gameboy emulator
  03 Dec 2022
• How to date a recording using background electrical noise
  25 Oct 2022
• Love the details
  26 Sep 2022
• I love him more and more every day on average
  12 Sep 2022
• Soon he’ll be three and soon he’ll be twenty-one
  14 Jun 2022
• I'm a security engineer and I still almost got scammed
  20 Apr 2022
• We're responsible for the Christmas magic now
  15 Mar 2022
• Off-The-Record Messaging part 4: key insights
  15 Feb 2022
• Off-The-Record Messaging part 3: how OTR works
  15 Feb 2022
• Off-The-Record Messaging part 2: deniability and forward secrecy
  15 Feb 2022
• Off-The-Record Messaging part 1: the problem with PGP
  15 Feb 2022
• I wouldn't call my friends strong male role models but they'll have to do
  07 Dec 2021
• How to write better sentences: 6 examples
  30 Nov 2021
• Height: 2ft 10 inches. Occupation: baby
  14 Sep 2021
• Vulnerability in Bumble dating app reveals any user's exact location
  25 Aug 2021
• Another family without a backstory
  20 Apr 2021
• Reliable osquery deployment for the paranoid
  16 Feb 2021
• Deleting Facebook
  08 Feb 2021
• Don't worry son, all your friends are weirdos too
  06 Jan 2021
• Buying a first home
  25 Nov 2020
• It can’t be for nothing: notes from The Last of Us Part 2
  02 Nov 2020
• Another RCE vulnerability in KensingtonWorks
  29 Sep 2020
• I got married and had kids so you don't have to
  22 Sep 2020
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners #7: Auto-project-builder
  12 Aug 2020
• What is an advanced beginner?
  05 Aug 2020
• PFAB #19: Working with raw bytes
  26 Jul 2020
• Preventing impossible game levels using cryptography
  22 Jul 2020
• PFAB #18: Adventures in shrinking serialized data
  13 Jul 2020
• PFAB #17: pre-computation sounds like cheating but isn't
  27 Jun 2020
• Remote code execution vulnerability in KensingtonWorks mouse manager
  24 Jun 2020
• PFAB #16: How to make your code faster and why you often shouldn't bother
  14 Jun 2020
• A blogging style guide vol. 2
  26 May 2020
• PFAB #15: Don't overwork your functions
  17 May 2020
• Parenthood #7: the coronavirus and happy birthday edition
  13 May 2020
• PFAB #14: Evil `eval`
  03 May 2020
• How does a TCP Reset Attack work?
  27 Apr 2020
• PFAB #13: When code is too clever to be clean
  19 Apr 2020
• Hundreds of companies assert usage rights over all ideas sent through their services
  13 Apr 2020
• Systems design for advanced beginners
  06 Apr 2020
• How to make yourself happier by making your iPhone worse
  18 Mar 2020
• Smile by Papa (Gary Computer Remix)
  13 Mar 2020
• PFAB #11: Separating logic and data
  07 Mar 2020
• Interview on the Cyberwire podcast about Wacom data collection
  06 Mar 2020
• Parenthood #6: Re-rolling the dice
  02 Mar 2020
• Online tracking is about finding excuses to send HTTP requests
  25 Feb 2020
• PFAB #10: First-class functions and dependency injection
  23 Feb 2020
• Don't let "Magic Enhancer for YouTube" slurp up your browsing history
  18 Feb 2020
• PFAB #9: Batch vs Stream processing
  08 Feb 2020
• Send me your privacy abuse tipoffs
  07 Feb 2020
• Wacom drawing tablets track the name of every application that you open
  05 Feb 2020
• PFAB #8: Input validation - tradeoffs between convenience and surprise
  26 Jan 2020
• How to set up The Hive on AWS ElasticSearch
  14 Jan 2020
• Parenthood #5: Great cement ideas that will make your partner happy
  06 Jan 2020
• PFAB#7: How to write a library
  04 Jan 2020
• 2019 review
  01 Jan 2020
• PFAB#6: Real-world debugging practice
  28 Dec 2019
• PFAB#5: How to make your programs shorter
  21 Dec 2019
• PFAB#4: Exception handling and coping with failure
  14 Dec 2019
• PFAB#3: How to rigorously analyze your journey to work
  07 Dec 2019
• Why I have office hours and why you should too
  05 Dec 2019
• PFAB#2: How to structure your programs
  30 Nov 2019
• How to man-in-the-middle proxy your IOT devices
  21 Nov 2019
• PFAB#1: Define your boundaries
  11 Nov 2019
• Programming Feedback for Advanced Beginners #0
  08 Nov 2019
• I will give you feedback on your code
  08 Nov 2019
• Parenthood #4: Untitled Potato Portrait
  10 Oct 2019
• How to come up with blog post ideas
  24 Sep 2019
• HP printers try to send data back to HP about your devices and what you print
  15 Sep 2019
• Parenthood #3: Oscar Heaton, Quarterly Baby Review
  25 Aug 2019
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners #6: User Logins
  12 Aug 2019
• Real-World Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners
  11 Aug 2019
• Peeking through stock option exercise windows
  06 Aug 2019
• Programming Videos for Advanced Beginners #1: Battleships
  27 Jul 2019
• Maximizing profits and evaluating success as a Craigslist seller
  23 Jul 2019
• How to write an afl wrapper for any language
  08 Jul 2019
• Port scans and industrial fans: 1 month of parenthood
  30 Jun 2019
• I was 7 words away from being spear-phished
  24 Jun 2019
• Childbirth: a father's-eye view
  17 Jun 2019
• Endless Summer by The Midnight: a brief analysis
  01 May 2019
• Skeptical advice for programming jobseekers
  28 Apr 2019
• Synth1: an unofficial manual
  21 Apr 2019
• Open Source for Advanced Beginners #1: bashplotlib
  14 Apr 2019
• Open Source for Advanced Beginners
  13 Apr 2019
• How does Tor work?
  06 Apr 2019
• The Robot Reserve Army of Labor
  31 Mar 2019
• What beginner's mind is really like
  25 Mar 2019
• ROBERT: prove that your randomized trial really was random
  17 Mar 2019
• How to get to Silver in Rocket League 1v1s
  07 Mar 2019
• Making peace with Simpson's Paradox
  24 Feb 2019
• Introducing Afl-Ruby: fuzz your Ruby programs using afl
  16 Feb 2019
• It was all so easy: a story about privacy
  06 Feb 2019
• Third-party dream cookies
  27 Jan 2019
• A brief history of wi-fi privacy vulnerabilities
  15 Jan 2019
• The Wavefunction Collapse Algorithm explained very clearly
  17 Dec 2018
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners
  08 Dec 2018
• A blogging style guide
  06 Dec 2018
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners #5: Snake
  02 Dec 2018
• HTTPS in the real world
  28 Nov 2018
• The therapeutic properties and applications of Dark Souls
  23 Nov 2018
• Reproducible beliefs
  17 Nov 2018
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners #4: Photomosaics
  03 Nov 2018
• I Might Be Spartacus: a differential privacy marketplace
  28 Oct 2018
• /office-hours
  22 Oct 2018
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners #3b: Tic-Tac-Toe AI
  09 Oct 2018
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners #3a: Tic-Tac-Toe AI
  09 Oct 2018
• Lessons from my first 20 office hours
  02 Oct 2018
• What playing The Witness will teach my kid about problem solving
  07 Sep 2018
• How to build a TCP proxy #4: Fake Certificate Authority
  31 Aug 2018
• How to build a TCP proxy #3: Proxy Server
  31 Aug 2018
• How to build a TCP proxy #2: Fake DNS Server
  31 Aug 2018
• How to build a TCP proxy #1: Intro
  31 Aug 2018
• I'm giving feedback on blog posts
  27 Aug 2018
• Talk: Traits of Successful Software Developers
  21 Aug 2018
• How I kicked my email compulsion
  20 Aug 2018
• "Stylish" is back, and you still shouldn't use it
  16 Aug 2018
• What does a 0.01 increase in the Gini Coefficient actually look like?
  15 Aug 2018
• She wanted to do something better
  28 Jul 2018
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners #2: Game of Life
  20 Jul 2018
• I'm doing Office Hours
  17 Jul 2018
• How Tinder keeps your exact location (a bit) private
  09 Jul 2018
• I went to Skyrim, once
  04 Jul 2018
• "Stylish" browser extension steals all your internet history
  02 Jul 2018
• How to read
  25 Jun 2018
• Programming Projects for Advanced Beginners #1: ASCII art
  12 Jun 2018
• Why economists need bureaucracy
  05 Jun 2018
• Making YouTube less bad for you using CSS
  07 May 2018
• Re: All those regrettable posts that you thought were gone
  01 May 2018
• Let's grow the Richmond: SB827
  08 Mar 2018
• Another 10 somewhat advanced Magic: The Gathering plays
  09 Dec 2017
• Identity Graphs: how online trackers follow you across devices
  24 Nov 2017
• Cookie Syncing: how online trackers talk about you behind your back
  21 Nov 2017
• How does online tracking actually work?
  20 Nov 2017
• A zero-knowledge proof for the existence of God
  13 Nov 2017
• What's the worst word you'd say to beat your in-laws at Boggle?
  27 Oct 2017
• What is a self-hosting compiler?
  24 Oct 2017
• WeSeeYou: Democratizing De-Anonymization
  17 Oct 2017
• Tracking friends and strangers using WhatsApp
  09 Oct 2017
• Reverse engineering LogicPro synth files
  17 Jul 2017
• Confessions of an Economic Hitman - a review
  27 Feb 2017
• A small, security-adjacent bug in Instagram
  20 Feb 2017
• Notes from Rep. Jackie Speier's Town Hall
  13 Feb 2017
• A tale of love, betrayal, social engineering and Whatsapp
  22 Oct 2016
• There were millions
  21 Sep 2016
• Building a Magic: The Gathering sealed deck AI
  12 Sep 2016
• 10 somewhat advanced Magic: The Gathering plays
  03 Sep 2016
• How to make Slack less bad for you
  23 Aug 2016
• Hide the internet
  08 Aug 2016
• Randomness-Driven Recruiting
  05 Jul 2016
• A delightful piece of spam from Xfinity
  12 Jun 2016
• Writing stories is not like programming
  06 May 2016
• In context
  09 Apr 2016
• There was only time like the present
  23 Feb 2016
• I am with the police
  01 Feb 2016
• He whispered, carelessly
  21 Jan 2016
• How they solved True Detective Season 1
  22 Dec 2015
• A day at The Free Market
  30 Nov 2015
• How to value your startup stock options
  02 Nov 2015
• Why and how to make smaller pull requests
  26 Oct 2015
• American Prankster
  20 Oct 2015
• Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu - the Cultural Revolution, in space
  12 Oct 2015
• Robber Barons understand technical debt too
  21 Sep 2015
• Favorite bits from my insane, never-to-be-published novel
  08 Sep 2015
• Staying safe cycling San Francisco's Wiggle
  02 Sep 2015
• Migrating bajillions of database records at Stripe
  31 Aug 2015
• The SSL FREAK vulnerability explained
  06 Apr 2015
• Scientific debugging
  29 Mar 2015
• Something that I don't talk about much
  20 Mar 2015
• Green Waves on an arbitrary Valencia Street
  12 Dec 2014
• Fun with your friend's Facebook and Tinder sessions
  08 Dec 2014
• Why you should read Playing to Win by David Sirlin
  03 Nov 2014
• Tales from a San Francisco housing search (DELETED SCENES)
  26 Oct 2014
• Tales from a San Francisco housing search
  25 Oct 2014
• Lessons from a surprisingly successful blog
  26 Jul 2014
• Is Ruby pass-by-reference or pass-by-value?
  22 Jul 2014
• How to win friends and influence repos
  21 Jul 2014
• Getting Nothing Done: a misguided quest for productivity
  14 Jul 2014
• Why I love refactoring
  05 Jul 2014
• Code review without your glasses
  20 Jun 2014
• A beginner's guide to funemployment
  02 Jun 2014
• Jaccard Similarity and MinHash for winners
  02 May 2014
• 9 ways to get that engineer
  21 Apr 2014
• Why you should be vegetarian
  18 Apr 2014
• Downfall of a once readable blog post
  07 Apr 2014
• How does HTTPS actually work?
  27 Mar 2014
• Lessons From A Silicon Valley Job Search
  07 Mar 2014
• Is Python pass-by-reference or pass-by-value?
  09 Feb 2014
• Cookieless user tracking for douchebags
  20 Jan 2014
• Mathematicians hate civil liberties: 100 prisoners and 100 boxes
  13 Jan 2014
• The Blue-Eyed Islanders Puzzle
  06 Jan 2014
• Kanban at London's National Gallery
  05 Nov 2013
• The hidden way Bootstrap saved your life
  20 Aug 2013
• The Padding Oracle Attack
  29 Jul 2013
• How to hack a Rails app using its secret_token
  22 Jul 2013
• When you have a nail in your eye, everything looks like a nail
  15 Jul 2013
• You should be a mentor
  25 Apr 2013
• Infinite monkeys and infinite repos
  09 Apr 2013
• Check you’re wearing trousers first
  01 Apr 2013
• Take pride or f--- it
  27 Mar 2013
• How chronic pain has made me happier
  19 Mar 2013
• Coding with gumption
  11 Mar 2013
• You are not getting any better
  04 Mar 2013
• Featurewhack
  24 Feb 2013
• Nothing new under the sun
  15 Feb 2013
• How to save 1 day/year of quality Rails time
  13 Feb 2013
• Quantum Annealing, or, Do Weird Stuff
  11 Feb 2013
• Why it’s the taxpayer’s fault we’ve got no money
  05 Jan 2013