Career Articles

34 posts

• The Vibe Ceiling: A Decision Framework for When to Stop Trusting AI-Generated Code 4/6/2026 METR found that experienced developers are 19% slower with AI on their own mature codebases, but feel 20% faster. That 39-point perception gap is the vibe ceiling, and it hits every developer at a different point. Here is a practical framework for knowing exactly where yours is.
• AI Code Review Is the New Bottleneck: Why Faster Code Is Not Reaching Production Faster 4/4/2026 AI tools helped developers merge 98% more pull requests. PR review time increased 91%. Pull request size ballooned 154%. The bottleneck did not disappear. It moved. Here is why code review became the choke point in AI-accelerated teams and what to actually do about it.
• The Developer Freelancing Playbook: How to Land Clients, Set Rates, and Build a Business That Lasts in 2026 3/31/2026 Freelance developer rates range from $40 to $200 per hour in 2026, but most developers who try freelancing quit within six months. Not because the work dries up, but because they treat freelancing like a job instead of a business. Here is the playbook I wish someone had given me before I took the leap.
• Open Source as a Growth Engine: How Developers Are Using GitHub to Build Profitable Businesses in 2026 3/31/2026 Open source is quietly becoming the best free marketing channel for bootstrapped founders. Your GitHub repo is a landing page, trust signal, and distribution engine rolled into one. Here is the playbook for turning open source contributions into paying customers, based on what is actually working in 2026.
• Return to Office Is Not a Productivity Strategy: What Actually Makes Developers Effective in 2026 3/30/2026 Fifty-four percent of Fortune 100 companies now require full-time office attendance, up from 5% in 2023. Yet 80% of those companies have already lost talent because of it. The RTO debate for developers has never been about location. It is about deep work, flow states, and whether your environment lets you think. Here is what the data says and what both companies and developers should do about it.
• The Developer Talent Paradox: Why AI Is Making the Shortage Worse, Not Better 3/28/2026 AI was supposed to solve the developer shortage. Instead, 87.5% of tech leaders now describe hiring engineers as brutal. Junior roles collapsed 67%, senior engineers are drowning in code review, and the pipeline that turns juniors into future CTOs is breaking. Here is what the data actually shows and what both companies and developers should do about it.
• From Side Project to First Dollar: The Realistic Path Most Developers Never Take 3/25/2026 Most developers have three to five abandoned side projects sitting in private repos. Not because the ideas were bad, but because nobody ever treated them like products. Here is the gap between building something and making money from it, and how to close it without quitting your job or burning out.
• Learning to Code in 2026: What Actually Matters When AI Writes Code for You 3/24/2026 AI can write functional code in seconds. The "computer programmer" job title is declining by 27 percent. Every tech influencer has an opinion on whether coding is dead. Here is what nobody tells you: learning to code in 2026 is more valuable than ever, but what you need to learn has fundamentally changed. The path that worked five years ago will waste your time today.
• Technical Interviews in 2026: The Rules Changed and Nobody Sent a Memo 3/24/2026 Meta now lets candidates use AI in coding interviews. Google factors AI usage into performance reviews. The interview format that defined developer hiring for two decades is being rewritten in real time. Here is what the new version looks like, what companies are actually evaluating now, and how to prepare for interviews that test a completely different set of skills.
• The AI Productivity Paradox: Why Developers Who Ship More Code Are Not Actually More Productive 3/23/2026 A controlled study found developers using AI tools took 19 percent longer to complete tasks while believing they were 20 percent faster. Teams with high AI adoption merge 98 percent more pull requests but PR review time increases 91 percent. The numbers do not add up, and understanding why is the difference between using AI well and just using AI.
• AI Brain Fry Is Real: Why the Most Productive Developers Are Burning Out First 3/19/2026 A BCG study of 1,488 workers found that using more than three AI tools tanks productivity instead of boosting it. The developers who adopted AI the hardest are now experiencing the highest burnout rates. I have been feeling it too, and the research finally explains why.
• AI Washing Is Real: The Layoff Lie and the Junior Developer Crisis Nobody Wants to Fix 3/18/2026 Companies are blaming AI for layoffs that have nothing to do with AI. Sam Altman himself confirmed it. Meanwhile, junior developer hiring has collapsed by 73 percent. These two problems are connected, and the industry is ignoring both of them.
• Rust in 2026: Why Nearly Half of All Companies Now Use It in Production 3/17/2026 Rust has gone from a systems programming curiosity to a language used in production by nearly half of all software companies. Here is what drove that adoption, what the real experience of using Rust in production looks like, and whether you should learn it now.
• Physical AI Is the Next Gold Rush and Everyone Wants In 3/16/2026 Humanoid robots and physical AI are attracting billions in funding in 2026, with companies like Figure AI, Neura Robotics, and Boston Dynamics pushing the technology toward real commercial deployment. Here is what is actually happening and what the next few years look like.
• What Happened When Anthropic Told the Pentagon No 3/13/2026 In February 2026, the Pentagon demanded Anthropic remove all restrictions from Claude, including for autonomous weapons and mass surveillance. Anthropic refused. What followed is one of the most revealing moments in AI history so far.
• I Started Learning AI Engineering Two Days Ago. Here Is My Honest Take. 3/13/2026 Two days into learning AI engineering, I already have opinions. The demand is real, the path is clearer than I expected, and some of what gets marketed as "AI engineering" is genuinely confusing. Here is what I found.
• Agentic Coding in 2026: The Developer Role Is Changing Whether You Like It or Not 3/12/2026 Forty-six percent of code written by active developers now comes from AI. The shift from autocomplete to autonomous agents is not a future trend, it is the current reality. Here is what that actually looks like in practice and what it means for how you work.
• How to Negotiate Salary as a Developer (And What I Wish I Knew Earlier) 2/23/2026 I left tens of thousands of euros on the table in my first few years as a developer. Not because companies were dishonest, but because I did not negotiate. I accepted the first number offered, felt grateful for the offer, and moved on. Here is everything I learned about negotiating developer salaries -- the hard way...
• The Strange Reality of Hiring Right Now 12/11/2025 This week I had an interview that seemed promising. The interviewer told me there were strong chances I could get hired before Christmas. The recruiter had already sent my profile to the client, the client liked me enough to schedule the interview qu...
• Why Every Developer Should Learn Algorithms and Data Structures 1/2/2025 In the world of software development, algorithms and data structures are the backbone of efficient programming. While many developers focus on learning the latest frameworks or languages, mastering algorithms and data structures can give you a deeper...
• Blue light glasses. My experience 2/25/2024 Hello everyone! My name is Alex Cloudstar Today I want to tell you about one of the lessons I learned during my career as a software engineer. Health is above all else, which is why I try to maintain it as much as possible, while also maintaining my ...
• A day in the life of a programmer. New challenges or a routine? 2/22/2024 Hello everyone! My name is Alex Cloudstar Today I want to tell you about a day in my life as a senior programmer with 5 years of experience. I’m sure that many of you are curious if programmers really only work 3 hours a day, if we sit non-stop at th...
• A Software Developer’s Struggles in the 8-Hour Office Marathon 1/20/2024 Hello Everyone! My Name is Alex Cloudstar I want to share with you today one of the problems that aren’t really specified in any JDs. In the ever-evolving landscape of technology, software developers find themselves at the forefront of innovation, ti...
• From Novice to Ninja: The Art of Skillful Software Development in a Dynamic World 1/13/2024 Staying Ahead in the Fast-Paced World of Software Development In the fast-paced world of software development, staying ahead of the curve is not just a competitive advantage but a necessity for professional growth. As technology evolves at an unp...
• Senior Developer’s Crystal Ball: Tech Predictions for 2024 1/6/2024 Hey there, fellow tech enthusiasts! My name is Alex Cloudstar and today I want to share with you some insides of mine. As a seasoned developer who’s seen the ebb and flow of the digital tide, let’s dive into the swirling vortex of what the future mig...
• Why JavaScript Is My One and Only: A Senior Developer’s Perspective 12/16/2023 Hello everyone! Today I want to share with you the answer to the never-ending question Why do I work with JavaScript? As a senior software developer with years of experience in the ever-evolving landscape of programming languages, one language stands...
• Embracing the Advent of Code: A Primeagen Tradition 12/7/2023 About Vimeagen Vimeagen stands tall in the realm of tech innovation, an organization revered for its groundbreaking contributions to the coding community. Founded on the principles of creativity, collaboration, and cutting-edge technology, Vimeagen h...
• To Remote or Not to Remote: Chronicles of a Developer’s Journey 12/2/2023 Hello everyone! My name is Alex Cloudstar and today I will tell you my experience regarding going to the office or working remote. Ah, remote work -- the realm where sweatpants reign supreme. I’ve been dancing in this domain long before the pandemic mad...
• The book that changed my life 11/27/2023 Hello, fellow knowledge seekers! My name is Alex Cloudstar and today I want to talk about a book that changed the way I think, so therefore it changed my life. Are you ready to shake up your learning game and take on the world of ultralearning? Strap...
• How Good Are My Math Skills? 11/11/2023 Debunking Myths: Math and IT Hey there, fellow self-learners and curious minds! My name is Alex Cloudstar and I just really like to debunk myths. Here’s a common one, the relationship between maths and IT. Can you become a software developer without ...
• I’ve Been to Over 500 Interviews... and Here’s What I’ve Learned 11/4/2023 Hello everyone! My name is Alex Cloudstar, and I’ve been to over 500 interviews, and let me tell you, it’s been quite a journey. Okay, maybe not exactly 500; I obviously didn’t count them, but there could actually be more. Whether you’re a fresh grad...
• Here’s why everyone who tells you that you need a college degree to work in IT is lying. 4/25/2023 Hello everyone! My name is Alex Cloudstar and today I want to debunk something. One of the fears of those who wish to have a career in IT is that they either do not have higher education or they have a degree in a different field unrelated to technol...
• How I Earned My AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification 11/27/2022 ‘How I passed the AWS Cloud Practitioner exam with zero cloud experience, going from failed practice tests to certified in under two weeks.’
• My Story, how it all started (part 1) 11/21/2022 Introduction Hi guys! Today , I want to present my story. Before I’m going to start telling you my path and all of the obstacles I encountered, I’ll tell you a few words about me. At this very moment, when I’m writing this article, I am wor...