Personal website of Hassan Habib — engineering leadership, The Standard, open source, books, talks, and community.https://www.hassanhabib.com/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/robots-monkeys/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/robots-monkeys/The title is intentionally provocative.When I say Robots & Monkeys, I am not talking about robots taking over the world in some predictable science-fiction fashion. I am talking about something much quieter and, in many…Sat, 08 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/double-agent/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/double-agent/Agentic coding assistants are becoming the double agents of software engineering.On one side, they are loyal allies. They help you move faster, ship sooner, explore ideas quicker, and get unstuck in places where you…Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/purpose-in-the-age-of-intelligence/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/purpose-in-the-age-of-intelligence/AI is a sharp knife. It can be used for harm, or it can be used for benefit. That is the nature of all tools. They may imply a purpose, but they are not purposeful on their own.The question has never been whether AI is…Sun, 03 May 2026 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/mastering-the-art-of-code-reviews-a-veterans-guide/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/mastering-the-art-of-code-reviews-a-veterans-guide/Whether you’re an engineering lead, a mid-level developer, or just starting out code reviews are a constant companion in your software journey. They’re critical for quality assurance, knowledge sharing, and system…Mon, 26 May 2025 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/engineering-business-101/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/engineering-business-101/Few days ago I had an interesting conversation with The Standard Community about evolution of engineering. We discussed the possibility of engineers evolving from an employee to an employer. A point where software…Sat, 18 Feb 2023 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/modern-strategies-in-systems-modernization/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/modern-strategies-in-systems-modernization/Every so often I get asked the question of modernization and standardization. Especially from passionate engineers who just joined new teams and want to make a true meaningful change. Here’s how the scenario goes: I…Sun, 12 Feb 2023 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/jobs-careers-and-crafts/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/jobs-careers-and-crafts/Every action we take in our daily lives goes towards either our survival, evolution, or fulfillment. Sometimes it’s the opposite of these, which is destruction, devolution, or torment. For instance, the mass majority of…Sun, 29 Jan 2023 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/maximum-engineering/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/maximum-engineering/Our time on this earth is limited. We experience this time on earth through spiritual, mental, and physical aspects. Even during our asleep we are benefiting in the least physically from resting and healing. Maximizing…Wed, 28 Dec 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/principles-patterns-and-tools/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/principles-patterns-and-tools/In the engineering industry, there are three things that govern the engineering process for every product everywhere. Whether you work on a smaller, mid-sized or enterprise systems you will inevitably run into one or…Sat, 24 Dec 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/brief-thoughts-on-social-media/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/brief-thoughts-on-social-media/Social media plays a big role in our lives today. We use social media to connect with friends, family, and colleagues, we use it to learn the news and we simply use it for entertainment often times. It’s fair to say…Thu, 01 Dec 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/engineering-time/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/engineering-time/Every so often, I get asked the question of how I can accomplish so many different things every day. People ask me how I can blog, stream videos, write books, develop software, have a day job, run my own business on top…Sun, 06 Nov 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/stages-of-growth-for-software-engineers/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/stages-of-growth-for-software-engineers/As a mentor for several engineers out there – I always get the question about growth. Growth is something engineers chase in their minds all the time. Am I learning? Am I getting better? Where do I start? What’s the…Sat, 10 Sep 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-junior-engineer/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-junior-engineer/You can determine the state and longevity of any industry based on several factors. Some economical, and some cultural — but one of the most important factors for the survival of any industry is youth adaptation. An…Mon, 29 Aug 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/brief-history-of-the-future-of-mixed-reality/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/brief-history-of-the-future-of-mixed-reality/The tech industry has been growing in exponential rates since its beginning somewhere around the 18th century. Computation went from being a lab experimentation into a handheld super computing device in the pockets of…Mon, 22 Aug 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-negative-outcomes-of-building-chaotic-systems/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-negative-outcomes-of-building-chaotic-systems/In the past I spoke a little about building chaotic systems that gets released to unsuspecting customers which inevitably and negatively impacts their lives. In this article, I’m going to outline in detail the negative…Sat, 06 Aug 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/visionaries-leaders-and-believers/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/visionaries-leaders-and-believers/In the tech industry, organizational patterns emerge from certain structures that can be easily observed and analyzed. This industry operates as a living, breathing organism. It evolves, mutates, and adapts to the…Sat, 30 Jul 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/modern-patterns-in-software-delivery/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/modern-patterns-in-software-delivery/When developing and designing systems, it’s of utmost importance to understand the types of patterns software engineers follows to deliver their product. Whether the software being delivered is as simple as a new…Sat, 11 Jun 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/impactful-engineering-part-1/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/impactful-engineering-part-1/Ever so often, I get asked a question around making an impact. Whether someone wants to make an impact in their own lives, their communities, or organizations. In the tech industry specifically, software engineers’…Sun, 29 May 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-fundamentals-of-business-priorities/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-fundamentals-of-business-priorities/Establishing a purpose-driven business requires a systematic intentional focus on three important aspects. People, Knowledge and Business. Businesses that focus on some of these aspects and excludes some become a…Sun, 15 May 2022 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/open-source/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/open-source/The software industry is almost 100 years old. It has proven itself to be one of the most unpredictable, evolving, and fast-paced industries around the world. That’s due to the fact that the industry is being driven by…Sun, 19 Sep 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/on-the-topic-of-life/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/on-the-topic-of-life/Understanding one’s place in the universe and seeking the meaning of one’s existence is one of the oldest questions in the history of man. A question everyone asks themselves at some point in their life. Why am I here?…Sat, 21 Aug 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/legacy-code/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/legacy-code/What makes any source code a legacy code? A question that occurs every now and then in the software industry. It usually and commonly refers to an older piece of software/code that is no longer supported or maintained.…Mon, 02 Aug 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-meat-factory/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-meat-factory/There are points in time where some of us begin to have a realization that while everything around them is moving forward, they are staying still. They wake up in the morning, do their work, come back to watch tv, spend…Sun, 04 Jul 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/theres-no-plan/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/theres-no-plan/I have great respect for engineers who apply their minds into what they develop. In general, each and every one of us tries to solve a problem a bit differently than the rest. Some of us have quite an interesting…Mon, 21 Jun 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/coders-programmers-developers-engineers/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/coders-programmers-developers-engineers/Growth is the most common characteristic of life. It’s in everything around us. From the smallest organisms to the forever expanding universe around us. Everything aims for growth in one direction or another. Some of it…Tue, 01 Jun 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-tri-nature-of-everything-part-1/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-tri-nature-of-everything-part-1/Software engineering is a modern methodology used to represent a system, any system, in terms of models and actions. Computer scientists define the core principle of software engineering as “Modeling & Simulation”.…Sun, 09 May 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/meatware/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/meatware/In previous articles, I touched very briefly on the fact that engineering can be a social activity. A bridge that engineers could use to connect to the rest of the world then use it to make the world a better place by…Sun, 11 Apr 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/decentralizing-social-networks/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/decentralizing-social-networks/Social networks as part of the technological revolution that happened in the last few decades have been more and more involved into our lives on daily basis. We use social networks today for almost everything. We…Mon, 18 Jan 2021 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/engineers-first-customer-first-approach/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/engineers-first-customer-first-approach/What makes a successful product? Is it the ability to pinpoint a market-need or maybe even create one? Is it the ability to find a path to a better product than what the market already offers? Or is it about…Mon, 21 Dec 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/time-travel-ish/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/time-travel-ish/If you take a closer look at our day to day lives, you will notice that our lives are nothing but a collection of choices and decisions. We chose to act, chose not to act, we chose to think a thought and share that…Mon, 30 Nov 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/purposeful-engineering/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/purposeful-engineering/Having software engineering experience without a true purpose behind it is like owning the smartest car, but without a destination. You keep going and going until you run out of energy, but still end up getting nowhere.…Sun, 22 Nov 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/reusable-modularity/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/reusable-modularity/In the software industry, there are two popular schools of thought amongst many others when it comes to designing software. A group of engineers will lean towards stateless modularity. They will build each component of…Sun, 25 Oct 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/employees-engineers/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/employees-engineers/In every profession in our modern world, there are two distinguishable types of individuals that surface to the top and drive any industry into one direction or another. Few weeks ago, I had an interesting discussion…Mon, 19 Oct 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/pure-coding/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/pure-coding/In any software development process, there are multiple activities that are involved in the process of creating software. For instance, there are design sessions, architecture, development, testing and deployment…Mon, 20 Jul 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/unbiased-compilers/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/unbiased-compilers/A line of code written by a junior engineer is just as effective as a line of code written by the most senior engineer out there. To the compiler, it either runs or not. Regardless of who typed it in, who designed it…Fri, 03 Jul 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/sandcastles/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/sandcastles/Sandcastles are models of castles, built out of sand usually by children. This is how Oxford dictionary defines them. In the software industry, some software might be just like sandcastles, very beautiful on the…Mon, 22 Jun 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-tribe/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-tribe/In the software industry, the term tribal doesn’t really reflect a good organizational structure, for instance, the term tribal knowledge, means that a given software is poorly documented and its details are basically…Sun, 10 May 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/code-rub/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/code-rub/In every software project I’ve ever been involved in, there was always this issue with code maintenance. Newer practices, language versions or frameworks are released, and a year-old project become a legacy so fast due…Sun, 09 Feb 2020 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/systematic-innovation/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/systematic-innovation/Innovation at its purest form is to break out of the regular and settle for no other than the extraordinary. Innovation is the reason why we can talk to virtually anyone in the world today and get a response back in…Mon, 04 Nov 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/entrepreneurial-innovative-engineering-part-4/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/entrepreneurial-innovative-engineering-part-4/The most important factor at every new product’s inception is for the people developing that product to believe in it. You have to believe that your product can do better than any alternative and will offer a unique…Sat, 31 Aug 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/entrepreneurial-innovative-engineering-part-3/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/entrepreneurial-innovative-engineering-part-3/Behind every great product there’s a team of people that share more than just common skill sets or common interest – they share “chemistry” – they figured out a way to work with each other. They say alone you can go…Sat, 20 Jul 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/entrepreneurial-innovative-engineering-part-2/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/entrepreneurial-innovative-engineering-part-2/We talked in the last article about picking up the right technology that gets you further, faster! But technology without communication skills is completely useless. If you cannot communicate the most complex technical…Mon, 15 Jul 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/entrepreneurial-innovative-engineering-part-1/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/entrepreneurial-innovative-engineering-part-1/A software engineer that has an entrepreneurial sense is ten times more likely to build a market-ready software than an engineer who doesn’t. That’s simply because any commercial software out there requires more than…Sun, 07 Jul 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/innovation-engineered/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/innovation-engineered/Where do innovative ideas come from? What does it take for one to find their genuine idea and change the world? When we talk about innovators, we talk about a very special group of people who do not just conform to the…Sat, 29 Jun 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/engineered-priorities/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/engineered-priorities/Engineering is more than just the code you type on a computer or the design you envisioned for some new machinery, engineering is a intelligent style of life that helps people become more efficient, get work done faster…Sun, 16 Jun 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/pain-passion/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/pain-passion/If you’re not driven by passion, you are driven by pain. That’s just how everyone is. in their day to day lives. Some people wake up in the morning to go chase their dreams, change the world and leave their mark in…Sun, 02 Jun 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/failure-is-a-mindset/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/failure-is-a-mindset/The binary nature of the software industry reveals more clearly those who are set to achieve their goals and those who don’t have any goals at all. As I work on a daily basis with all different kinds of engineers, it…Sun, 12 May 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/chickens-half-ways-almost-theres-and-winners/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/chickens-half-ways-almost-theres-and-winners/I’ve come across this interesting quote recently by Stephen King where he says: “Talent is cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work” And this is where…Sat, 27 Apr 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-perfect-software/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-perfect-software/Don’t ever think there’s such a thing as perfect software, there’s no such a thing. There are, however, relatively satisfying experiences that slowly decline as technology advances and new tools are implemented for…Sun, 14 Apr 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-lifecycle-of-technology/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-lifecycle-of-technology/How is technology born? What makes some technologies so popular while other don’t make it past the drawing board? Why do some technologies get all the way to the top, then die far too soon, when others live on for…Wed, 10 Apr 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-software-engineering-manifesto/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-software-engineering-manifesto/These are some principles that I’ve lived by and learned working with the best engineers in the best business around the world, and from building a one client to a billion users systems from startups to big corporate…Sat, 23 Mar 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/would-you-hire-your-manager/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/would-you-hire-your-manager/Staying around in an organization long enough to get promoted into a lead position is one of the biggest mistakes some people in corporations do. Poor leads who only got into a position by staying around long enough…Thu, 28 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/foreign-code/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/foreign-code/When we start working on real software projects, it’s very likely that the team you’ll be joining will have an existing source code rather than starting a project from scratch. Every source code comes with its own set…Tue, 19 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/time-driven-engineers/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/time-driven-engineers/Through my career, I’ve come across different kinds of engineers that I’ve learned a lot from. But indirectly I have also learned from them the different patterns that directly contributes to their professional growth…Tue, 12 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/how-to-effectively-connect-to-each-other/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/how-to-effectively-connect-to-each-other/Having to work with a largely diverse group of people and travelling around the world, I have learned a lot about us as humans, especially being an extroverted person myself. I was always curious by what one could do to…Mon, 11 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/an-open-letter-to-software-engineers/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/an-open-letter-to-software-engineers/Dear Engineers, Whether you have been in the industry for a day or a decade this letter is for you. The software industry is one of the toughest industries out there from an intellectual perspective. Unfortunately, many…Fri, 08 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/cowboys-mad-scientists/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/cowboys-mad-scientists/In order to improve the software development process, it is crucial to deeply understand each and every part of it. The most important part in every software development process is of course the software engineers who…Fri, 08 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/mr-sam/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/mr-sam/Every once in a while, computer scientists come up with a new architectural model that inspires developers to build better software which has the potential to reflect positively on each respective business. Throughout…Fri, 08 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/software-doctors/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/software-doctors/How to determine if your software development business is not healthy? And what can you do about it? What do we mean by an unhealthy software business? This means the business is getting dangerously close to a point…Fri, 08 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/software-engineering-from-scratch/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/software-engineering-from-scratch/For those of you who love computers, who love programming, I would like to share something that is vital for you to know if you would like to make these passions your career. I can help you learn exactly what you need…Fri, 08 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMThttps://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-ping-pong-table/https://www.hassanhabib.com/blog/the-ping-pong-table/Tristan and Hansen are colleagues who enjoy their lunch breaks together each day as they share thoughts and have conversations about a variety of topics. Sitting in the lunch room one day, they notice a ping pong table…Fri, 08 Feb 2019 00:00:00 GMT