Alex Zenla 🏳️‍⚧️

hah nice, i just might do this then!

look I did just make fun of Xooglerware but I am also guilty of such crimes

this is what my cooked brain has come up with, I have too many conference talks to write to do this but I think that's my next sprout experiment

okay so hear me out

people love to do fancy iPXE stuff but what if your bootloader configuration was starlark and the config itself was verified

then also imagine you could not only boot from a starlark config but you could also emulate the bootlloader in userspace and test your boot config

starlark + bootloader = fun?

When life kinda sucks, just know there is a possibility your moment is just waiting to happen 😊

I never really expected to share this passion because well, prior to my current life I didn’t really fit in very well with others. So this image represents a bucket list item for me… sharing one of my passions with others :)

I’ve had a love for theme parks since childhood but I never had anyone to share that with… and it was a dream to one day share that with others. I never thought I’d get a chance to do it with 20+ people in this way, but it was a longing to nevertheless share it. That came true this week :)

I was the weird kid that never related to anyone my age, had interests nobody really shared, with an identity that really put me in the out group. Even as an adult I was pretty content with just never really getting to share my interests with others, because I didn’t feel deserving of others time.

A photo of the Edera team at Disneyland, I’m third from the right on the bottom row.

There are times in life where you really step back and think about all the things that lead you to a moment. I’ll tell you about this one in this photo.

12 rides in 7 hours

A photo of a stormtrooper talking to someone

Disneyland today :)

yep agreed, websockets are underrated

post inspired by a Hacker News comment once which basically said that any Google Open Source project's preferred method to compile is usually to become a Googler first to access a trove of internal tools, but if that isn't practical than there are some possible workarounds

Xooglerware: a genre of software built by former Googlers.

Key traits: Uses Bazel & protobuf (but strangely most protobuf v2), written in either Go or Java, uses 17TB of memory, burns three forests due to a clever algorithm, requires you to know the author as a friend to one-shot compilation

it’s insanity. i want off the wild ride

rumor is they reversed it, i did pre check 3 hours ago no problem

Todd in the Shadows is really about to make me want to listen to a country song, I’m not ready to go back to that era of my life

Fell asleep to I Love My Computer by Ninajirachi, highly recommend. Also soon I will be at Disneyland :D

I'm going to attempt to explain in plain words why all of your problems are likely far below the layer you think they are... and how you can solve them with a little bit of spite-driven development :)

QCon London 2026 | Building on Bedrock: A Security Philosophy from Bootloader to Runtime Get practical inspiration and best practices on emerging software trends directly from senior software developers at early adopter companies.

Working on my conference talk for @qconferences.com London 2026 and I can't even begin to tell you how excited I am about the subject matter!
qconlondon.com/presentation...

We're not fighting over policy or political party.

We're fighting over whether we are going to be a civilization rooted in empathy and kindness — or one rooted in cruelty and rage.

What you choose to arm yourself with, love or hate, exposes which side you're fighting on.

Where in America is Carmen Sandiego?: The Great Amtrak Train Adventure

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Where_i...

I suppose it's just like anything else, just a higher stakes version. I've been watching the MIT aviation courses that are freely available and it's incredibly helpful.

Would love to sometime! Thank you! That part does make me nervous. I'm not one to collapse under pressure but I do watch a lot of aviation media and I'm amazed at how well people can keep composure under pressure, and it feels a bit superhuman to me :P

It's a lot of work though! And who knows, I may end up not liking it if I start it, even if I really like learning about aviation concepts :P

Hah nice! With a startup it feels laughable I will ever have the time to pour into it, but I do have a genuine desire to do so at some point. It was suggested to me that getting a student pilot certificate is a good first step because it's a real physical thing that allows you to start the process

aviation nerd is when you apply to become a pilot purely so you can have the little certificate to say you are a student pilot (this might also be the start of my flying career, who knows)

I can’t wait for the new trains, it looks so awesome!

Photo of a mountain in Oregon

Photo of some snow on the tracks

More photos :) As you can imagine, it's hard to take photos on a moving train. Even with a room to myself it was hard to control glare through the windows!