Hi, I’m Jimmy Hartzell! By profession, I am a systems programmer (with a focus in Rust). By hobby, I am a fiction writer. And by neurotype, I have ADHD (which really needs a one-word noun in favour of “person with ADHD”).

This is my personal blog! It has technical and non-technical articles!

Read more about me, or also feel free to buy me a coffee or admonish me privately with admonymous. Subscribe via newsletter or via RSS (or RSS for just technical posts). The code on this website is available under the MIT license.

I do not consent to AI “training” on this website. I believe that my consent should be legally required under a fair interpretation of existing law, and certainly under any future AI regulations.

Featured Articles, Series, and Tags#

Fiction:

• Are you sure?, a flash fiction piece
• The Letter from the Trees, a short documentary first contact Sci Fi story
• The Curse of Coffee, a short urban fantasy story

Programming and Computers:

• C++ Move Semantics Considered Harmful (Rust is better), on how C++’s move semantics are not only clumsy, but cause serious negative consequences for the design of smart pointers and handles
• My Reaction to Dr. Stroustrup’s Recent Memory Safety Comments, in which I wade into the debate about government endorsement of memory safe programming languages
• What do bits mean? (blog series), on what the 0’s and 1’s in computers mean, how computers use them to store various kinds of information, and why.
• Rust is Beyond OOP (blog series), on how Rust does not support traditional pillars of object-oriented programming, which I argue is a good thing
• Rust vs C++ (blog series), on how Rust is generally better than C++, including detailed reasons why I have this opinion, beyond just memory safety
• Rust: A Better C++ Than C++ (e-book), the previous blog series compacted into MDBook format and set up as a garden.
• What is an operating system? (blog series), in which I talk about what an operating system is and how they work

ADHD and organization:

• Write Everything Down (blog series), on my personal organization philosophy and system
• Complexities of Defining ADHD, on philosophical difficulties with defining ADHD and other forms of neurodivergence

Gardens#

Inspired by “The Garden and the Stream: A Technopastoral”, I have a few pages that are intended to grow over time, more like Wikipedia than Twitter, more like old-style webpages than a blog, more like books than newspapers or magazines, designed to be read in a slow trickle by people coming across my website, rather than booming across the Internet and then being nearly forgotten. I intend to increase how many of these I have over time.

Programming:

• Rust vs. C++ Comparison: an MDBook
• Recommended Programming Reading
• Rust Opinions
• C++ Network Programming: Study Questions and Practice/Learning Projects

Not programming:

• About Me
• Résumé (as PDF)
• Reading Log: Books I’ve Read
• Humorous Thoughts
• Political views