2026-09-21 14:31:05
Hey friends!
I hope you're chasin' the clouds away for the 21st night of September! This week was a whirlwind and I'm excited for some real-life time with my team this week, and some good learnin' in this issue. Let's go!
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Better Icon and Label Alignment
Custom Glow Rings Inside of Elements
Functional Programming Jargon, Mapped and Explained
'Ask for what you want' is a key skill for the 21st century
Y'all... I am not fit. I should exercise more. I say this because the thing that has really flooded our household this week is the latest edition of the show Physical 100 on Netflix, based in Mexico! It's incredible. In the show, they get 100 strong people in a competition, who all come from various disciplines (crossfit, running, soccer, MMA, Hyrox, bodybuilding, parkour, dancing, and so on). They do all kinds of physical challenges (and get eliminated over time) until there's one person standing.
My young kiddos are obsessed with it. My 3-year-old keeps picking up her 1-year-old brother, shouting that she's so strong and can help the TV people lift the gigantic 1900kg rock. It's been fun shouting at the TV and being entertained together, and I recommend it!
...and it'll make you feel like you need to go to the gym.
Hi there! SerpApi here.
We make it easy to retrieve real-time search data from Google and 100+ other search engines through one simple API. Whether you're building an AI agent, a search-powered application, or a data pipeline, SerpApi delivers structured results without the hassle of maintaining your own scraping infrastructure.
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Last week, I had you return the longest word with letters in alphabetical order! Hooray John, Amine, Lucien, Goodluck, Stephen, Dani, Darryl, Paul, Chris and Shaw on CodePen School, Micah, Ten, Ross, Trevor, Debopam, Rhett, Vasanth, Alex, Christian, Andrew, Greg, Ricardo, and the lovely devs in the Ruby Users Forum!
This week's question:
Given a year and month, return an array containing every date in that month that falls on a Sunday. Return each date in YYYY-MM-DD format.
Examples:
> getSundays(2026, 9)
> [ '2026-09-06', '2026-09-13', '2026-09-20', '2026-09-27' ]
> getSundays(2024, 2)
> [ '2024-02-04', '2024-02-11', '2024-02-18', '2024-02-25' ]
(you can submit your answers by replying to this email with a link to your solution, or share on Bluesky, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Mastodon)
Ocean Photographer of the Year Winners Gallery
Your corner of the internet
Meet the First New Cat Species Discovered in 100 Years
What's In the Bone: The Deep History of a Domino Set
What creature is smarter than a talking parrot?
A spelling bee!
That's all for now, folks! Have a great week. Be safe, make good choices, and give your brain a break!
Special thanks to Ben, Kinetic Labs, and Marta for supporting my Patreon and this newsletter!
cassidoo
website | blog | github | bluesky | youtube | twitch | twitter | patreon | codepen | mastodon
2026-09-14 13:24:24
Hey friends!
I hope you had a great week! Short weeks for me are always the MOST busy and I'm definitely catching up on all the things, it feels like, but it's been a fun one. Let's learn!
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Why Your Website Should Never Stop Changing
Nobody pays for open source. We can force them to.
WebMCP is here (and you should care) (video)
React 19.3
I joined The Neuron this week on a livestream to talk about GitHub for beginners! I haven't done a complete "this is what GitHub is and git and open source and a pull request" (and so on) in a long time so it was fun answering questions and seeing people get excited about what they can build.
Hi All! SerpApi here.
We provide APIs for accessing real-time, structured data from Google and 100+ other search engines. The data is available in Markdown or JSON. From web search and AI results to maps, shopping, flights, hotels, and more, SerpApi makes it easy to add reliable search data to AI agents and traditional applications without building or maintaining your own scrapers.
Try SerpApi for free in our Playground!
Last week, I had you solve a backpack lock! Y'all did it just in time for school Nico, Ten, Christian, Paul, Andrew, Micah, Depopam, Ricardo, Alex, Nick, Josh, Dani, Rhett, Amine, Greg, and the devs in the Ruby Users Forum!
This week's question:
Given a sentence, return the longest word whose letters appear in alphabetical order.
Examples:
> longestSorted("The autumn leaves almost glow.")
> "almost"
> longestSorted("A cool sheep sleeps.")
> ""
(you can submit your answers by replying to this email with a link to your solution, or share on Bluesky, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Mastodon)
Building a Wall Lamp From Scratch
Ori kōbō Zensai Le Chiffre with GMK Botanical
How The Heck Do Record Players Work?
Shorter is longer than longer (video)
I had a quiet game of tennis today.
There was no racket!
That's all for now, folks! Have a great week. Be safe, make good choices, and find some time to chill!
Special thanks to Ben, Kinetic Labs, and Marta for supporting my Patreon and this newsletter!
cassidoo
website | blog | github | bluesky | youtube | twitch | twitter | patreon | codepen | mastodon
2026-09-07 12:25:52
Hey friends!
Happy September! I will now be asleep until the end of the month. Heh. Let's learn!
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Low-Poly Neon Village
The best dark mode toggle is probably none
htmx 4.0.0 has been released!
The Depths of JavaScript: Minesweeper in 247 Bytes
I'm writing this after a fun family wedding! I spent most of the time chasing my kiddos and having a great time seeing family I hadn't seen in a while! It's been so nice having this time (yay long weekends) to be with people I care about.
I've shared a bunch of articles recently about the importance of relationships and friendships and how good it is for our brains and well-being. I really believe it! Having times like today where I can just sit and hang out with my sister and dance with cousins makes me feel grateful to have such wonderful people in my life.
And now... I will be closing my laptop to go cuddle my very tired babies.
When you spend most of your day online, sometimes it's good to use something physical.
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Each piece is handmade in Chicago with the most sustainable leather sources from Tuscany. Our leather journals are designed to accompany you through the ideation process, from scattered thoughts to ideas worth building!
Some of the best ideas begin away from the screen. Write them down in something made to last.
Explore the collection or follow us on Instagram.
Last week, I had you climb stairs one or two steps at a time! Some of y'all found the secret little Fibonacci sequence in there, heh. Nice work Paul, Andrew, Amine, Alex, Rhett, Ten, Ricardo, Christian, and the cool cats in the Ruby Users Forum!
This week's question:
You have a backpack lock's starting position, and the code to unlock it, represented as two strings of integers. In one move, you may rotate any single digit one step up or down, with 0 and 9 considered adjacent. Return the minimum number of moves needed to transform the starting code into the unlock code.
Example:
minMoves("8051", "1199")
> 10
minMoves("000", "555")
> 15
minMoves("109", "990")
> 4
(you can submit your answers by replying to this email with a link to your solution, or share on Bluesky, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Mastodon)
Why People Quit Blogging
Cycle8 keyboard with DCS Solar Green
I built that radio bike from mario kart world (video)
Toy Story 3: Mistakes Made, Lessons Learned (video)
Why is the ocean always blue?
Because the shore never waves back!
That's all for now, folks! Have a great week. Be safe, make good choices, and get rid of stuff you're not using!
Special thanks to Ben, Kinetic Labs, and Marta for supporting my Patreon and this newsletter!
cassidoo
website | blog | github | bluesky | youtube | twitch | twitter | patreon | codepen | mastodon
2026-08-31 13:01:34
Hey friends!
I hope you had a good week. We made it to the end of August! I admit I was pretty bummed about the passing of some beloved celebs this week, but besides that, we made it through. Let's learn!
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Modernist Tiles with CSS Grid
CSS Navigation Matching, Early Days
Music theory for programmers
Async Solid - Write Sync, Run Async
I randomly stumbled upon the hobby called begleri, which is fidget toy that's basically two beads on a string.
Like any totally normal human, I did an incredibly deep dive into the history of begleri, a progression skill tree for learning how to do it, and made more than a dozen from some paracord and marbles. It's been really fun both to make them and fiddle around with them at my desk! I'm not skilled at it at ALL compared to some people but for less than 10 bucks (...and some hours), I've had a great time so far.
This week's anonymous sponsor would like to feature Dolly Parton's Imagination Library!
Dolly Parton's Imagination Library is a book gifting program that mails free, high-quality books to children from birth to age five, no matter their family's income.
You can donate to the Library here, and subscribe to their mailing list here.
Last week, I had you partition an array! Good work Miguel, Nico, Stephen, Greg, Alex, Amine, Andrew, Rhett, Ricardo, Jason, Ten, Christian, Michael, Thulasi, and the fine folks in the Ruby Users Forum (who had a great discussion on the question this week)!
This week's question:
Given an integer n representing the number of steps in a staircase, return the number of distinct ways you can reach the top if you can climb either 1 or 2 steps at a time.
Example:
climbStairs(2)
> 2
climbStairs(4)
> 5
climbStairs(10)
> 89
(you can submit your answers by replying to this email with a link to your solution, or share on Bluesky, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Mastodon)
Hanging out with friends is good for your mental health.
The World Atlas of Sausages
Can bowling fix loneliness? (video)
V4N4G0N r1 keyboard with Olivia++ keycaps
Why couldn’t the pasta get into its apartment?
Gnoccis!
That's all for now, folks! Have a great week. Be safe, make good choices, and keep your chin up!
Special thanks to Ben, Kinetic Labs, and Marta for supporting my Patreon and this newsletter!
cassidoo
website | blog | github | bluesky | youtube | twitch | twitter | patreon | codepen | mastodon
2026-08-24 15:19:34
Hey friends!
I hope you had a great week! Mine was fun, and I enjoyed some good weather outside. Let's learn!
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HTML Can Do That
Introducing Dashboard Touch, a build-your-own version of Touch ID
Introducing oj: a Rust build tool that speaks Vite
Death to px, long live ch!
This week my family got super into the YouTube channel Quantum Makers. It's so interesting!
We're not big on "screen time" for the kiddos, and this channel has a really good balance of being just interesting enough that we can keep it on and be entertained, and just boring enough that our toddlers don't turn into zombies watching the screen and will play with it in the background.
We really enjoyed this video of someone building a farmhouse, and this one of someone building a mini villa!
No sponsor this week! Go forth and be free of capitalism for a spell.
And please share this with your friends!
Last week, I had you pack rectangles! Y'all did a packing good job Ten, Paul, David, Thulasi, Christian, Ricardo, Amine, and the cool cats in the Ruby Users Forum!
This week's question:
Given an array of integers, return a new array where odd numbers come first, even numbers come next, and zeros appear at the end. The relative order of elements within each group must be preserved.
Example:
partitionArray([0, 3, 2, 1, 4, 0, 7])
[3, 1, 7, 2, 4, 0, 0]
(you can submit your answers by replying to this email with a link to your solution, or share on Bluesky, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Mastodon)
The Golden Rule for Becoming a Better Writer
Scientists Release Biggest 2D Map of the Universe
When You Really Think About It, Everything Makes You Poop (by Taylor Farms)
Duo40 keyboard with DSS Neon Lights
When I first met my spouse, they were dressed head to toe in muslin, and smelled of beeswax and honey.
I thought... "that's a keeper!"
That's all for now, folks! Have a great week. Be safe, make good choices, and take a walk around your neighborhood!
Special thanks to Ben, Kinetic Labs, and Marta for supporting my Patreon and this newsletter!
cassidoo
website | blog | github | bluesky | youtube | twitch | twitter | patreon | codepen | mastodon
2026-08-17 12:41:37
Hola friends!
I hope you had a good week! Mine was PACKED with RenderATL and work, and I'm admittedly now playing catch-up. But, all good things. Onwards!
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Keeping type consistent in changing conditions
Making Referential Stability a Type
Improved CSS Text-Stroke
AI is removing the middle class of software engineering
A Pragmatic Guide to Browser Support (video)
I was emceeing RenderATL this week! It was a really cool event. I was busy hosting The Commits Awards as well as the main stage itself and I am too pooped to pop now that it's all done. But, it was still really great seeing coworkers and friends in person and witnessing the thousands of developers learning and connecting with each other in Atlanta.
Also, I cut a new release of my task app, todometer! Check it out if you want something simple that works.
No sponsor this week! Go forth and be free of capitalism for a spell.
And please share this with your friends!
Last week, I had you trim strings! Tralala good work Austin, Ten, Ross, Andrew, Ricardo, Christian, Amine, Stephen, Danny, Omer, and Andrew!
This week's question:
Given the dimensions of a large rectangle n x m and a second rectangle a x b, return the maximum number of second rectangles that can be packed into the larger one without overlapping. You may rotate the smaller rectangle 90 degrees.
Example:
> packRectangles(10, 10, 3, 4)
> 6
> packRectangles(10, 6, 2, 3)
> 10
> packRectangles(10, 6, 11, 2)
> 0
(you can submit your answers by replying to this email with a link to your solution, or share on Bluesky, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Mastodon)
Seven books I keep close because I love them
Oblique Pink keyboard with GMK Darling MTNU
I have acquired my dream 3DS
What should you blog about?
How do you console a depressed English teacher?
there, they're, their...
That's all for now, folks! Have a great week. Be safe, make good choices, and have a solo dance party!
Special thanks to Ben, Kinetic Labs, and Marta for supporting my Patreon and this newsletter!
cassidoo
website | blog | github | bluesky | youtube | twitch | twitter | patreon | codepen | mastodon
