Systems architect and builder
Architecture is a practice, not a diagram.
This is where I think in public: essays on building and architecting systems, written from the work rather than above it. Architecture, delivery, AI, and transformation — where the discipline holds, where it breaks, and what it costs. The longer arguments run as multi-part series.
Start with the writing, or follow a series end to end.
I publish active project work at Plainsight Systems: code, demos, and write-ups from building things to understand how they work.
Latest essay
October 18, 2026 · 23 min read
Buffers and shapes
Give our data rows and columns, make ownership explicit, and add matrices on the GPU.
Read essayRecent writing
All 22 essays →15 min read
Let's Build a Transformer! · Part 1
The cradle
Find a GPU, run our first C# kernel, and check every result before building on it.
7 min read
Let's Build a Transformer! · Part 0Prologue: Getting the cradle ready
Set up the tools, build the starting program, and check the dependencies we’ll use in the first lesson.
13 min read
Transformation Under Scale · Part 5Transformation Under Scale — Part V: Derive the Roadmap
A transformation roadmap is not drawn from preference. It is the operating model laid out in time: the dependencies between capabilities are facts about how the business works, the …
6 min readThe Case for Craft
Moving from writing the code to directing the people who write it does not cost you the craft. The craft was never the keyboard. It is the model you reason with, and it only decays …
9 min read
Transformation Under Scale · Part 4Transformation Under Scale — Part IV: Write Authority
A capability's boundary is the set of facts it alone writes. Draw the line by write authority, then move the pen from the legacy system to the target one, one boundary at a time, …