The Engineering Notebook — page 4 of 32
Notes on building with AI, agents & the modern stack.
Deep dives on AI/ML, RAG systems, agent engineering, and senior-engineer architecture decisions — a new post every week.
Developer Tools How to Set Up gitleaks + pre-commit + CI [2026]
A terminal-first, defense-in-depth secrets workflow for 2026: staged-only hooks, CI full-history scans, baselines for legacy repos, and sane allowlists.
Developer Tools How to Show Kubernetes Context in Starship Prompt [2026]
Build a fast Starship prompt that shows Kubernetes context/namespace safely, profiles slow modules (Git + k8s), and avoids leaking cluster names in demos.
Developer Tools How to Set Up Self Hosted DevContainers [2026] (SSH + VS Code)
A reproducible “remote dev box” on one VM: hardened SSH, fast BuildKit-cached DevContainers, and a CI check that prevents IDE/CI drift. No Codespaces required.
Developer Tools How to Redact Secrets in an AI Coding CLI Tool [2026]
Build a universal “safe AI CLI wrapper” that sits in front of any coding agent, redacts secrets, enforces basic policies, and writes JSONL audit logs you can ship to a SIEM.
AI and Machine Learning RAG Data Leakage Test Suite [2026]: CI Red-Team Setup
Build an automated red-team suite for RAG apps: canary tokens, regex + similarity detectors, multi-step prompt-injection attacks, and a CI risk score that blocks risky merges.
Developer Tools How to Reduce Rust Compile Time [2026] (sccache + mold)
A measurable 2026 playbook to reduce Rust compile time: profile with Cargo timings, fix the build graph, get real sccache hit rates, and cut link time with mold.
Developer Tools Bun vs Node Performance 2026: Cold Start, Memory, WebSockets
Cold starts and memory decide your infra bill. WebSockets decide your tail latency. Here’s how Bun and Node compare in 2026, with a reproducible harness and deployment math.
Cloud and DevOps How to Pick LLM Application Observability Metrics [2026]
Token logs are table stakes. Here’s the minimum set of LLM application observability metrics for tools, RAG, caching, refusals, and privacy-safe logging that actually debugs production incidents.
Cloud and DevOps 7-Step Plan: eBPF Observability Without Sidecars on Kubernetes
A pragmatic migration plan for Kubernetes teams moving from Envoy sidecars to node-level eBPF observability, with P99 validation and telemetry cost controls baked in.
![github pull request review laptop screen — illustration for article on Stacked PRs on GitHub [2026]:](https://img.kunalganglani.com/images/vzekdneq/production/3aec89cec8e78cab8275c7d1c8ceda0785938355-1200x675.webp?auto=format&fit=max&q=75&w=600)
Developer Tools Stacked PRs on GitHub [2026]: A Copy-Paste Workflow
A GitHub-native stacked PR workflow you can copy today: branch naming, dependent PR chains, reviewer hygiene, CI strategy, and a restack playbook when bases move.
![nvidia gpu graphics card close-up — illustration for article on Local LLM Break-Even Math [2026]: Power,](https://img.kunalganglani.com/images/vzekdneq/production/76beafb78b6f19b7ed6235232857078a023801c2-1200x675.webp?auto=format&fit=max&q=75&w=600)
AI and Machine Learning Local LLM Break-Even Math [2026]: Power, Idle, Depreciation
Most “GPU price ÷ tokens” break-even math is wrong. Here’s a spreadsheetable local LLM total-cost model that includes idle power, utilization, depreciation, failures, and opportunity cost.
Developer Tools OpenAI Codex Desktop Linux Install Guide [2026]: Sandbox + Data Egress
A Linux-first install + hardening checklist for Codex Desktop: verify downloads, sandbox the app, isolate SSH keys, route egress through a proxy, and prove what data leaves your machine.