8 Protocols (Page 2)

Welcome to 8 Protocols

I’m Alvis Ng, a technical lead based in Malaysia.

I write about the systems that shape how we build—from software architecture and AI to product strategy, team culture, and the human mind behind the code.

At 8 Protocols, I share principles, stories, and experiments that keep work sharp and human. Sometimes that means untangling a stubborn frontend structure. Sometimes it’s questioning a “best practice” that everyone treats as gospel. Sometimes it’s about faith, psychology, and the quiet forces that shape why we work the way we do.

I write to keep asking better questions: about craft, about meaning, and about how we balance precision with purpose.

I share these notes and stories at least three times a month. Long enough to stay with you. Short enough for a cup of coffee.

Prompt Engineering and the Illusion of Instruction

We think we’re giving orders. We’re steering a next-token engine. Prompts work when they mirror patterns the model has seen. Tiny phrasing changes flip outcomes. Guide with short roles, small examples, and simple formats. Verify. Cooperation, not command.

What Makes a Senior Developer Senior?

Seniority isn’t a title. It’s how you work when it counts: choose the boring tool when it wins, ship with guardrails, teach without theater, cut complexity, and own outcomes after merge. Tradeoffs over tricks. Clarity over clever. Spotlight traded for team lift.

Sorting Words, Clustering Thoughts

We sort words without thinking. Machines can't. They learn to draw boundaries and find themes: spam or not, tickets by topic. Use labels when you need decisions and clusters when you need discovery. Start there. Patterns come first, meaning follows.

Inside the Clockwork of an AI’s Mind

Ask a question, get a fluent answer. Under the hood, no insight, just a fast loop picking the next token, guided by attention and a tiny memory. See the gears, not a ghost. When you learn the strings, you know when to trust it and when to steer.

Chopping Language, Weaving Meaning

Language models don’t read like we do. They slice text into tokens and map them to vectors. Meaning becomes pattern, not understanding. Learn the quirks of tokenization and embeddings to write tighter prompts, spot bias, and know what gets lost.

The Erosion of Virtue

Speed is prized; thoughtfulness gets labeled “overthinking.” But 深思熟虑, think deeply and act with care, is not delay. It is judgment. Pause for choices that matter. Ask who benefits from the rush. Measure twice, cut once. Finish better, regret less.

From Bag-of-Words to GPT

We moved from counting words to modeling meaning. LLMs write, code, and summarize, but they also hallucinate and echo bias. Use them as partners, not oracles. Keep your hand on the wheel. In a world where language is cheap, make your thinking rare.

The Algorithmic Throne and the Cacophony of Democracy

How our faith in perfect algorithms threatens real self-correction, and why democracy survives by making room for noise.

Jul 12

We Got the Speed We Begged For. Now We Hate the Results

AI isn’t soulless. It mirrors us. We asked for speed and got it, then blamed the tool when craft felt thin. The tool is not the skill. The driver is. Bring taste, patience, and judgment, and the work lives. Want meaning? Pay the price in effort. The rest is on us.

Jul 12, 2025

9 min read

Jul 08

The Illusion of 100% Test Coverage

I've watched teams chase 100% and still ship bugs. Coverage proves code ran, not that it worked. Real safety comes from assertions that bite, weird inputs, mutation tests, and tough reviews. Treat coverage as a flashlight, not a finish line.

Jul 8, 2025

8 min read

Jul 05

Why Software Development Gets Harder in Teams

Teams don’t stall from code alone. They stall when dominance grows, speed turns to sugar, and harmony goes quiet. The fix is candor, shared ownership, and steady refactors before the floor gives way.

Jul 5, 2025

7 min read

Jun 29

The Tyranny of Tiny Modules

Modularity is not a numbers game. A 300-line component with a clean flow beats ten shallow ones across folders. Barrels bloat bundles and hide cycles. Write for brains, not style cops: minimize hops, keep related logic close, abstract when it’s earned.

Jun 29, 2025

15 min read

Jun 22

Stories that Bind Millions

Humans rule by shared stories, not strength. Myths turn strangers into allies, money into trust, brands into tribes. When fiction outruns fact, harm follows. Learn narrative literacy: test tales, ask who benefits, and rewrite the script when truth and compassion demand it.

Jun 22, 2025

6 min read

Jun 22

Cutting Redundant Data Fetches with React’s `cache` in React 19

React 19’s cache memoizes server calls per request. Wrap a fetch or DB query, call it from multiple server components, and React runs it once. Fewer duplicate hits, faster pages, consistent data. The cache clears after render. Use it in Next.js 15 with RSC.

Jun 22, 2025

7 min read

Jun 20

What Is Information?

Information’s main job isn’t to mirror reality. It binds people into action. A pigeon note, a shutter flash, a meme: if we share the code, they move us. Test every message twice: what does it connect, and how well does it map the world?

Jun 20, 2025

4 min read

Jun 15

The Nights My 7-Year-Old Debugged Me

Great code often looks like novice code that simply works. Do not drown juniors in rules. Let them ship, then refactor side by side. Teach the why after the pain shows up. Mentorship over policing. Progress over perfection.

Jun 15, 2025

5 min read

Jun 12

The Small Group That Holds You Back

You are not performing for the world. You are performing for five loud voices in your head. Most people are not watching. Choose your advisors on purpose, expect to be misunderstood, and ship anyway. The only approval you need to live with is your own.

Jun 12, 2025

10 min read

Jun 11

The Real Bug Is in Your Brain

The hardest bugs are not in your repo but in your reasoning. Confirmation, optimism, anchoring, availability, and Dunning-Kruger warp decisions. Fight back with disconfirming tests, independent estimates, broader hypotheses, and KISS. Debug your mind first.

Jun 11, 2025

14 min read

Jun 10

Row the Boat, Don’t Win the Argument

Teams do not need a courtroom champion. They need builders who move the boat. Trade point-scoring for impact. Ask what problem we are solving, pick battles that matter, invite dissent, and share credit. Do not aim to be right. Aim to be valuable.

Jun 10, 2025

14 min read

Jun 10

TypeScript Soup: Taming an Unruly API

One tiny helper, big payoff. Use template literal types to infer base fields from `nameFr` style keys, then `getLocalized(locale, obj, fields)` returns exactly what you asked for. No copy-paste, no string concat, typos blocked, locales centralized, fallbacks handled.

Jun 10, 2025

3 min read

Subscribe to our newsletter.

Become a subscriber receive the latest updates in your inbox.

Welcome to 8 Protocols

Featured stories · Code, culture, clarity