Spectralis devlog #27
—Hello again proggers—
Still going. Decided mid-grind to switch off JSON-based saving entirely and move to a proper binary streamed format instead — faster save/load, way less CPU overhead. Which sounds like a clean upgrade until you realize it means reading books on binary format design that were probably written before I was.
my caffeine and my reading list have diverged wildly tonight
Cat or dog? BinaryWriter
Okay let’s get into it~
—Yap—
The pivot away from JSON wasn’t planned going into tonight, it just became obviously worth it partway through the toolkit grind. Now stuck in the part of the process nobody enjoys: documentation, theory, and CS ideation before any of the actual implementation gets to happen.
—The Great Suffering—
1 — JSON’s Getting Replaced
Moving off JSON-based saving to a binary streamed format. The reasoning’s simple — faster save/load, meaningfully less CPU usage — but simple reasoning doesn’t mean simple implementation.
2 — Reading Books Older Than Me
Digging into binary streaming format theory means reading material that predates this whole project by a wide margin, some of it by a lot more than that. Foundational stuff, just not exactly light reading at this hour.
3 — Documentation And Theory Hell
Currently deep in the least glamorous part of any format redesign: reading documentation, working through theory, and CS ideation before writing a single line that actually does anything. Necessary, still miserable at 2am.
the implementation is the fun part and it’s still hours away
4 — Sun Came Up, Had A Sandwich, Kept Going
Watched the sunrise somewhere in the middle of the theory reading. Had an egg and bacon sandwich for breakfast, genuinely delicious, best part of the night so far. No sleep planned until tonight — just powering through on breakfast fuel instead.
breakfast during an all-nighter hits different
—FAQ (no one asked these but they are here)—
Q: What is a “progger”?
A: A human programmer. You. The one reading format-design theory older than their own project at 2am.
Q: Why move off JSON now, mid-grind?
A: Became clear it was the right call while working on the visualizer toolkit — better performance characteristics were worth the detour.
Q: Is this related to the toolkit from devlog #25/#26?
A: Same overall session, this is a scope addition that came up while working on it.
Q: When does actual implementation start?
A: Once the theory and documentation phase actually resolves. Not there yet.
Q: Is tonight ever going to end?
A: Not until tonight, apparently — sun’s already up and there’s no sleep planned before then.
—This is the end*—
*end for now, binary formats permitting
PAM!!!