/categories/engineering/Recent content in Engineering on Move into the FutureHugo -- gohugo.ioCopyright © 2016-2026 Jim Chng. All Rights Reserved.Sat, 10 May 2025 10:00:00 +0800/blog/2025/05/taming-hierarchical-data-mastering-sql-recursive-ctes-for-advanced-tag-management/Sat, 10 May 2025 10:00:00 +0800/blog/2025/05/taming-hierarchical-data-mastering-sql-recursive-ctes-for-advanced-tag-management/Hierarchical data structures are everywhere in modern applications, from e-commerce categories to knowledge bases. This comprehensive guide demonstrates how SQL’s recursive Common Table Expressions (CTEs) elegantly solve the challenges of nested taxonomies without complex application code. Learn how to build a complete tag hierarchy system, navigate parent-child relationships efficiently, generate breadcrumb trails, prevent cyclic references, and implement powerful content filtering—all with clean, maintainable SQL queries that scale with your data’s complexity.

]]>/blog/2025/02/refining-typescripts-opaque-types-for-enhanced-type-safety/Sat, 01 Feb 2025 10:00:00 +0800/blog/2025/02/refining-typescripts-opaque-types-for-enhanced-type-safety/<p>An exploration of opaque types in TypeScript and a refined implementation that provides stronger guarantees for handling sensitive information.</p>/blog/2025/01/supercharging-python-automation-with-nox-beyond-basic-usage/Wed, 15 Jan 2025 09:00:00 +0800/blog/2025/01/supercharging-python-automation-with-nox-beyond-basic-usage/<p>A deep dive into extending Nox&rsquo;s capabilities with custom decorators and classes, turning it into a comprehensive automation solution that can replace Makefiles and shell scripts.</p>/blog/2025/01/compile-time-hex-string-validation-in-rust-using-const-evaluation/Sun, 12 Jan 2025 10:00:00 +0800/blog/2025/01/compile-time-hex-string-validation-in-rust-using-const-evaluation/<p>A deep dive into using Rust&rsquo;s const evaluation features to validate hex strings at compile time, ensuring both correctness and zero runtime overhead.</p>/blog/2025/01/all-decorators-systematically-decorating-python-class-methods/Thu, 09 Jan 2025 18:17:24 +0100/blog/2025/01/all-decorators-systematically-decorating-python-class-methods/<p>A deep dive into systematically decorating all methods of a Python class, exploring challenges and solutions using the Descriptor protocol.</p>/blog/2024/03/template-metaprogramming-a-tale-of-two-languages-c-and-rust/Sat, 16 Mar 2024 09:00:00 +0800/blog/2024/03/template-metaprogramming-a-tale-of-two-languages-c-and-rust/I&rsquo;ve been on quite the adventure lately. The transition from memory-safe languages to C++ is like going from driving an automatic car with all the safety features to suddenly piloting a manual sports car with no guardrails – exhilarating but terrifying. My recent fascination with metaprogramming began after I wrote about Rust&rsquo;s procedural macros. There&rsquo;s something magical about code that writes other code, and I wanted to explore this concept in both C++ and Rust./blog/2023/02/crafting-pydantic-compatible-custom-python-datatypes-in-rust-with-pyo3/Tue, 28 Feb 2023 22:31:27 +0800/blog/2023/02/crafting-pydantic-compatible-custom-python-datatypes-in-rust-with-pyo3/<p>Rust-implemented custom python datatype that is also pydantic-compatible.</p>