Visualizing Data with Vega-Lite

Have you ever wanted to quickly chart some data without coercing it into a spreadsheet? Perhaps you even want to do something mildly complex, like differentiate the data based on some facet that isn’t being charted, or have the ability to interact with multiple visualizations at once? Vega-Lite provides a lot more power than spreadsheets […]

macOS Catalina: Fixing Emacs After an Upgrade

Since the upgrade to macOS Catalina, I’ve had two serious annoyances with Emacs. Here’s a little insight into how I fixed them.

Two Strategies for a Successful git-bisect

It’s likely you have heard about git-bisect plenty of times before. Hopefully, it’s not a tool that you need to reach for often, since it essentially indicates that there’s something wonky or broken, and your best hope for identifying the actual problem is to look back in time. Despite this, sometimes git-bisect is the right […]

The Hazards of Transactional Test Isolation

These days, it’s standard practice to run your unit and system tests with some degree of parallelism. When doing so, it’s important to ensure that the code being tested doesn’t interfere with other running tests. Usually, this comes down to the database layer. There are a few options for accomplishing isolation at the database layer. […]

There’s a Relational Database in Your Unix CLI

Did you know that there’s a relational database hiding in your Unix shell? There really is, it turns out. A friend of mine was recently telling me about his discovery of the join command, which allows you to combine data from multiple files that contain tabular data. Let’s take a closer look.

Automatically Tracking Bicycle Commutes with iBeacon

One benefit of working at Atomic Object is our bicycle commuter reimbursement program. Although the benefit’s origin is a 2008 tax law that is no longer in effect, Atomic has decided to continue the program. The gist is that for each month that you bike to work at least 10 days, you can be reimbursed […]

Want to be a Better Consultant? Learn to Work Strategically

Looking to level up your consulting skills? One thing I’ve observed among our more senior Atoms is a mastery of approaching work strategically.

Improve Your App with CSS in JavaScript

I’m bootstrapping a web project for the first time in a while, and I was surprised to find that CSS-in-JavaScript libraries are now a thing. Despite my initial surprise, I’ve come to believe it’s actually a great idea.

Supplementing Your VPN with Little Snitch

VPNs are great for protecting your security when you’re on a network that you can’t trust completely, such as coffee shop or conference WiFi. However they don’t represent a complete solution by themselves. On macOS, Little Snitch can help you fill the gaps.

Correctly Managing Concurrency in JavaScript

More times than I can count, I’ve found myself needing better concurrency primitives in JavaScript (or TypeScript) applications. Almost anything you might need is possible using the Promise API, but promises are complex, and there are many subtleties that easily manifest bugs.

Atomic Spin

Atomic Object’s blog on everything we find fascinating.

By: Chris Farber

Author: Chris Farber