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SQL Injection court πŸ§‘β€βš–οΈ, configure git properly βš™οΈ, how freelance devs get clients πŸ’Ό

TLDR Web Dev <dan@tldrnewsletter.com>

February 26, 12:11 pm

TLDR WebDev
A bill is being considered by the Illinois General Assembly to address whether public bodies can hide information from FOIA requests β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ  β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ β€Œ 

TLDR

 TLDR Web Dev 2025-02-26

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Articles & Tutorials

How Core Git Developers Configure Git (17 minute read)

The series of Git configuration settings in this article are categorized into "Clearly Makes Git Better," "Why the Hell Not?" and "A Matter of Taste" - explanations and code snippets are provided to enable each of them. Examples include improving branch and tag listing, setting a default branch name, using a better diff algorithm, and enhancing push/fetch behavior. There are also settings for autocorrect prompting, committing with diffs, reusing recorded resolutions, and nicer rebase configurations.
How We Migrated 160,000 Lines of JavaScript to TypeScriptβ€”With Zero Downtime (6 minute read)

WorkMade successfully migrated a 160,000-line JavaScript banking application to TypeScript with zero downtime over six weeks by using a separate migration branch, periodic rebasing, and incremental typing. It tested the TypeScript version in a staging environment with uptime monitoring and mirrored the production environment before pushing the changes to production.
Why You Should Not Parse Localized Strings (7 minute read)

Parsing localized strings is problematic because the interpretation of numbers and dates varies a lot across locales, leading to ambiguity and errors. User device language may not reflect their intended input, and multiple valid string formats can represent the same data. Locale data also changes over time, leading to inconsistent results. Instead of parsing, use dedicated input mechanisms or standard interchange formats to handle user input and data exchange, respectively.
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Opinions & Advice

If it is worth keeping, save it in Markdown (7 minute read)

Digital content is prone to loss due to link rot, platform changes, and even self-hosting failures. Valuable content should be preserved in durable, easily accessible formats like plaintext Markdown so it can last forever.
freelancing: How I got clients, part 1 (7 minute read)

This developer became a successful freelancer by creating a well-structured and quantified resume, preparing a quick verbal presentation, understanding optimal timing for job searching based on fiscal years, and using tools like Calendly and Briskine for scheduling and efficient communication. In the resume, he addressed the needs of potential clients and emphasized relevant experience for those needs.
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Launches & Tools

7pace for Jira: Actually-Easy Time Tracking and Time Sheets (Sponsor)

Teams worldwide use 7pace as their single source of truth for time data. Track and manage time on Jira issues, calendars, or timesheets in seconds. Add or edit time using drag-and-drop, duplicate worklogs, and get time-tracking insights. Add context such as billable activities with custom fields. Try free on the Atlassian marketplace
React Native Boost (GitHub Repo)

React Native Boost is a Babel plugin to automatically optimize React Native applications through source code analysis. It identifies and implements safe micro-optimizations by replacing React Native's View and Text implementations with their native versions.
GoatDB (GitHub Repo)

GoatDB is a real-time, version-controlled NoDB designed for Deno and React ideal for prototyping and lightweight deployments without complex backends. It has features like client-side operation, resilience, real-time collaboration, and edge-native processing. GoatDB uses React hooks for state management and provides easy server setup with automatic sync.
Xonsh (Website)

Xonsh is a cross-platform, Python-powered shell that blends Python 3.6+ syntax with familiar shell commands.
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Miscellaneous

I Went To SQL Injection Court (15 minute read)

A bill (SB0226) is being considered by the Illinois General Assembly to address whether public bodies can hide information from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests by storing it in databases. This bill was prompted by Matt Chapman's FOIA request for the City of Chicago's parking ticket database (CANVAS) schema, which was denied due to security concerns. Chapman sued, bringing in the author of this article as an expert witness to argue that releasing the schema wouldn't jeopardize the system, but despite winning at trial and appellate court, the Illinois Supreme Court ultimately sided with the city, defining a schema as a file layout, which is exempt.
The Deep Research problem (9 minute read)

OpenAI's Deep Research is designed to make research and analysis easier, but it often falls short of expectations due to inaccuracies and unreliable data sourcing. For example, a sample report on smartphone adoption rates contained flawed data from sources like Statcounter and Statista, leading to incorrect conclusions. The core issue lies in asking a probabilistic model a question that requires deterministic accuracy.
A peek into a possible future of Python in the browser (10 minute read)

Python-like code will be able to be run efficiently in web browsers. SPy is a research project that aims to create a "Python-friendly" language that compiles to native binaries or WebAssembly. It was used to accelerate a generative art demo in PyScript by pre-compiling code, achieving a 100x performance improvement.
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Quick Links

Hard problems that reduce to document ranking (3 minute read)

Complex problems, particularly in offensive security such as N-day vulnerability analysis, can be solved by reframing them as document ranking problems and using LLMs for listwise document ranking.
Chicory (Website)

Chicory is a pure Java, easy-to-integrate, secure JVM-native WebAssembly runtime that allows applications to use plugins within a sandboxed environment.
Boost Your Website Speed (10 minute read)

A slow-loading website can hurt user experience, reduce search engine rankings, and decrease conversions.
Ask HN: Former devs who can't get a job, what did you end up doing for work? (Hacker News Thread)

Former developers talk about what they're up to now, from working as electricians to retiring.

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Thanks for reading,
Priyam Mohanty, Jenny Xu & Ceora Ford


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