Series

13 SERIES

Most of what I write here runs longer than one post. A series is a set of notes meant to be read in order, where each one builds on the configuration or the argument in the note before it. This page lists them, largest first.

Each series page has its own introduction and lists notes in publication order rather than newest first, since the first note is usually where to start. The current work is in MCP Studies, Advanced Platform Development, MCP Without the SDK, and MCP by Design. The rest goes back to 2018 and stays up because the gap between what I wrote then and what I would deploy now is worth reading.

Series
×28

Advanced Platform Development

Rebuilding a complete self-hosted data platform from FOSS on Kubernetes, one working component at a time.
2026
×27

Kubernetes

Working notes on building and running Kubernetes clusters by hand, from 2018 through 2026.
2018–2026
×20

MCP Without the SDK

The Model Context Protocol taken apart one JSON message at a time, written by hand in Go.
2026
×12

Linear Algebra Crash Course

Twelve parts of linear algebra for programmers who need it for machine learning and never took the course.
2018–2020
×10

Linear Algebra in Go

Implementing linear algebra in Go with gonum: vectors through SVD, PCA, a regression library, and the math under a neural network.
2020–2022
×9

MCP by Design

Building MCP servers that survive contact with real agents: language choice, composition, steering, knowledge, testing, and agent-authored automations.
2026
×5

AI on a Leash

Mechanical verification for AI-written code: strict linting, coverage gates, mutation testing, and a pre-commit gate that refuses the commit.
2026
×5

Apache NiFi

Running Apache NiFi in production on Kubernetes: deployment, securing flows, JOLT transformations, and dynamic HTTP listeners.
2022–2023
×5

MCP Studies

Measured studies of MCP agent behavior: knowledge-layer ablation, stored-knowledge use, the measurement harness, knowledge pollution, and cross-reference document completion.
2026
×3

AI

Early 2026 notes on composable MCP servers over a data platform, and what the protocol gets wrong.
2026
×3

Blockchain

A conceptual overview, a private Ethereum chain on Kubernetes, and reading that chain through Ethstats. Written in 2018.
2018
×3

Data Science

The working minimum of the Python data stack: NumPy, Pandas, Matplotlib, and Seaborn.
2018
×3

Vector Search Without the Vector Database

Semantic search over a data catalog using Postgres, pgvector, and CPU-only Ollama, with no vector database anywhere.
2026