For the past year, this website's podcast companion has been running on a text-to-speech model called XTTS-v2. It's not horrible. And those who have heard my voice before might notice some similarities. But it's far from a pleasant listenning experience. But the world of text-to-speech (TTS) has been gradually moving …
For the past years Vitto and I have used Tricount to track our shared expenses. The app is actually pretty good, but there’s one small thing that annoys me quite a bit. Even though we spoke English to each other for the first month, we’ve since spoken a …
For a short summer break, Vitto challenged me to visit Iceland with her. As someone that is used to going south for the summer - this sounded stupid at first, but I was incredibly surprised. For 6 days, we were pretty much in another planet. Here are some notes and tips …
Tanda Runner is a web app that shows me the things I care most about when preparing my next marathon. I've also added a running coach/agent designed to give me actionable feedback about my training. Some of that feedback is probably hallucinatory - I'll get to it in a bit …
I'm lucky enough to work with some pretty talented folks. During a recent offsite, one of them gave a completely improvised talk. He had just gotten back home from holidays - so naturally, they didn't really have time to prepare anything. But what they said resonated. It was about improvisation. How …
I'm a sucker for side projects. There's nothing quite like building something to learn about it. Over the last 5+ years I've accumulated a little over 15 small web apps and websites. Almost all of them are hosted on a small Hetzner server and deployed using a mix of ssh …
There I was. Ready to click the big blue purchase button. 350 Euro, for a keyboard (!) Asking Vitto multiple times: is this really worth it? Should I go for it? I mean, that's a whole lot of dinners. After much hesitation, I did it. All black, with blank key caps …
Conversas de café. Literally translated, means "coffee shop conversations". An upcoming election, the weather next week, a corruption scandal, a new policy. Just some examples of Conversas de café. As an expat living in Denmark for the past 7 years (without speaking the language), that's perhaps one of the things …
Step-by-step instructions to do it yourself If you ever read this blog, you probably already know by now. For the past couple of months, I've been trying to create my very own Large Language Model. OpenAI's models have had a significant impact on my productivity. But something still bothers me …
ChatGPT is now part of our daily lives. A quick question, an extra input, some quick feedback, I always reach for it. AGI or not AGI, I certainly can't deny the impact it has had on our lives. It's pretty incredible! But that small voice just won't go away. "Where …
A couple of years ago, I decided to remove all my photos from Instagram. I wanted something for myself. Something that suited what I needed. The result was /photos. I wrote about it when I built it too. Here's a snippet from that post: [...] Uploading is by no means as …
One of my favorite Portuguese columnists has this weird thing about his column. Maybe it's more common than I thought. For every piece he publishes, he also publishes a podcast version along with it. Now, either Publico has 27th century text-to-speech (TTS) technology, or he's actually reading them. I don't …
A couple of days ago, someone shared this John Oliver video with me. In it, he shows all the ways McKinsey is a terrible organization. Not a minute in and I was already thinking about that management consulting blog post I always wanted to write. When I talk with people …
Search is one of the most important breakthroughs of the internet. Some are saying a list of blue links is not enough - and that AI will overthrow search. I don't know if we're about to witness a revolution. But as with most things - there's only one way to know - to …
Last Friday, Kostas and I found ourselves discussing AI over beers again. He was telling me how he thinks everyone else is decades away from OpenAI - and that they likely won't catch up soon. I disagreed. In fact, I think open source is quickly catching up, and getting closer by …
Get rid of all applications that don't have a cover letter I remember it like it was yesterday. As I was leaving one of the first companies I've ever worked for, my manager asked me to hire my replacement. Drowning in hundreds of applications for the position, I still recall …
While most people in Europe use WhatsApp, my group of friends and I use Telegram. For years now we've used things like Combot to see who's more silent than usual, and MissRose to give our monthly elected group admins moderation rights. Yeah, we take friendship that seriously. But now we …
View Code They say that the best way to learn about something is to build it yourself. Everyone talks about OpenAI this, and OpenAI that. How about we fine tune a Large Language Model ourselves? If you heard about this models before, but are still curious about how all of …
7 years. That's how long I've lived in Denmark for. I love it, but Portugal is still close to my heart. As an emigrant, it's always hard to stay connected to what's going on in Portugal. What are people talking about? What's in the news? What worries people? What is …
A couple of months ago nobody asked me about my work. Something related to computers and AI. Fast forward to today, even my uncle asks me about ChatGPT. The hype is real. Only time will tell if the hype will materialize. But while the world wonders, work goes on. In …
Large language models (LLM) are really dumb. I mean, how can you fail when the question is as simple as "What is 23 times 18"? Even though they're making most headlines, at the end of the day, these models are, predicting the next token based on the previous ones. If …
There's nothing quite like starting a new project. A greenfield, filled with possibilities. It's a privilege many don't come across. A lot of us, get thrown into projects with a lot of legacy code. But sometimes, we start from scratch. This is the time. The time to make all the …
It's that time of the year again. The family is getting together and celebrating. Grandma is cooking something amazing for dinner. I'm trying to solve Advent of Code puzzles. This year, I decided to do something different. Instead of solving the puzzles in Python, I decided that I would try …
Machine learning is everywhere. The state-of-the art of the field is advancing at an astronomical pace. Machine learning is everywhere. The state-of-the art of the field is advancing at an astronomical pace. GPT-3GPT-3 can answer significantly complex questions, can answer significantly complex questions, Stable DiffusionStable Diffusion can generate incredible images from just words, and the list goes on. It’s nothing short of amazing. can generate incredible images from just words, and the list goes on. It’s nothing short of amazing. But while the state of the art is being pushed daily, the long tail...But while the state of the art is being pushed daily, the long tail...
Last Friday I presented at PyData Global. I talked about monitoring, but felt like there was more I should've said. So this article is just about that. Even though the number of models in the wild is growing, the field of monitoring is still green and full of unknowns. Almost …
1768 days. That's how long I've used the Apple Watch. Just a little under 5 years, in case you're wondering. I really love it. I don't know about "future of computing" and all that, but it's definitely a device I've fallen in love with. Last week, for the first time …
Some months ago, I built a small script to help me stay in touch with those who matter to me. The concept is fairly simple: I want to stay in touch with person p every t period of time. If t has passed, and you haven't talked to p, you …
I've deployed a good amount of ML models to production. For many, deployment to production is the last step of the process. Once that's done, work is done. This is far from true. Once your model is out there, problems will start to arise. Some predictions will be wrong. Some …
I love the Cloud. For years, I've been deploying software to it. Azure, GCP, AWS, you name it. I've used most of them. To be honest, they're the same pig, but with different lipstick (like the Danes say). Package up your app, make some CI/CD magic, select your service …
You arrive home and turn on Netflix. On the front page: hundreds of shows. They're not ordered randomly. Netflix has been perfecting the science of recommending shows for years now. Google has perfected the science of sorting search results. To this day, no one knows exactly how Google sorts their …
Disclaimer: This post was originally published in the Amplemarket blog Serving and deploying Machine Learning models is a topic that can get complicated quite fast. At Amplemarket, my team and I, like to keep things simple. Let's talk about it. Simplicity is key At Amplemarket, we’re big fans of …
I'm a bit of an iSheep. I didn't even know that term existed until a colleague used it on me a couple of years ago. But this is not an Apple vs. Windows (vs. Linux) post. I like my Mac, you might prefer your Windows or Linux machine - that's fine …
Someone once told me that my professional network is one of the most important things I'll build throughout my career. For years I've struggled to find a system that would help me stay in touch with my network. So I decided to build my own - let me show you how …
Imagine you have to classify every single job title in the world into 10 categories, how would you go about it? This is a fairly hard problem to solve. However, the European Union has actually taken it on. They named it: the ESCO project. (ESCO stands for European Skills, Competences …
In the summer of 2017 I wrote one of my very first programs: an algorithm that ranked leads. It would help our sales team to target the best potential customers in Boston and surrounding areas. We (me and my manager at the time) were making a short trip to the …
English | Português As pessoas mais velhas não gostam de ideias novas. Os nossos pais e avós não percebem a maior parte das novidades de tecnologia que estão a nossa volta. Até o meu pai às vezes diz que não confia em shopping online. Cago-me a rir. A primeira vez que …
English | Português Old people don't like new ideas. We see it everywhere around us. Our parents still don't understand most of today's tech trends. Even my dad still doesn't trust online shopping. Which I find hilarious. The rise of NFTs is the first time I really felt old when talking …
Revisiting Back in March last year, I wrote about how I was keeping sane while working from home. From then to now, a lot of things have changed. New house, new job, new habits. Not all has changed though. COVID is, and will be for some time, a reality. And …
The other day I realized: I've been programming in Python for about 4 years now. I do get paid to write code, but for some reason still don't consider myself a pro. I did learn some valuable lessons though. For those who just got started with Python, you'll hopefully take …
After more than 5 years using Instagram, I decided it's time to move out. This "turning" point for me, is when I start loosing control and influence over the platform I'm using. This happens in a multitude of ways: Loosing control of what we consume/see (a) by means of …
I'm moving places soon. I absolutely hate moving - but hey, it's like everything else in life: you push through. This time, there was a nice plot twist: someone tried to scam me online. This made things... interesting. Let's talk about it. When it sounds too good to be true it's …
Something fun happened the other day. While at dinner - I asked a co-worker if he did any sports. He answered, "Yeah, I run one mile every day, exactly the same route, around my building". The whole table started laughing. Thinking "here's Duarte running half marathons, he must think this guy …
My favorite way of learning is by reading extensively about a topic. For this, nothing better then my Kindle. But I have been growing increasingly envious of the large bookshelves of scratched and highlighted books that I see in older generations. I mean, who doesn't dream about having their own …
Transform your kindle highlights into a weekly newsletter that goes out every Friday. Get reminded of the most interesting things you've read about for Transform your kindle highlights into a weekly newsletter that goes out every Friday. Get reminded of the most interesting things you've read about for freefree.. InstructionsInstructions Plug your Kindle into your computerPlug your Kindle into your computer Find the Find the My Clippings.txtMy Clippings.txt file. (Should be somewhere in the "documents" folder of your Kindle) file. (Should be somewhere in the "documents" folder of your Kindle) Upload it: Upload it: ... ...
In part 1 of this series, I talked about the setup that I'm using to manage my finances and investments. In this part, I'll talk about how I migrated my accounting setup to the Cloud, and what I have learned in the process. The goal: Accessing my finances from anywhere …
In the past months, I’ve been spending a lot of time researching about investing: building your portfolio, back testing it, tracking its performance, and acting accordingly. One of these endeavors (and my stubbornness to build my own tools) has led me to create a telegram bot, here’s a …
Currently, my job has taken a lot of my time. But who doesn't have time for side projects? At the end of the day - they keep us sane. So I’ve been currently hacking on a good way of managing my finances - and oh boy I’m having fun. Update …
On the 18th of June, Denmark announced new travel policies after the Coronavirus outbreak. From that date on, it allowed travel to all European countries except for Portugal and Sweden. Of course, this caused several news outlets to write on the issue (Local.dk, Politiken.dk, Reuters.com). But now …
Why?Why?¶¶I like the Vim editor a lot.I like the Vim editor a lot. However, (at least for me), the Vim user base is still a mistery. Don't get me wrong, ressources such as the However, (at least for me), the Vim user base is still a mistery. Don't get me wrong, ressources such as the Vim SubredditVim Subreddit, and the , and the
TL;DR: I created a small python package that allows you to share your jupyter notebooks right from the command line (like this one for example). To get started, visit nbhub.duarteocarmo.com. or pip install nbhub. Sharing jupyter notebooks is a pain We use jupyter notebooks for a wide …
It's now been almost 4 years since I first landed in Denmark to start my Master's degree at the Technical University of Denmark, here in Copenhagen. This is a small retrospective filled with tips, tricks, and memories from an international student. It serves no particular purpose other than possibly having …
tl;dr: This is a write up on how and why I use the famously hard-to-use VIM text editor. Skip to here if you already know VIM. Jump to the python specific section. See my .vimrc. Get my dotfiles. What the hell is VIM? We're all used to use our …
Recently, I have been working on a project for Dataverz, the company of my ex-thesis supervisor (and regular collaborator) Pedro Parraguez. I was looking at ways of predicting the number of collaborations between COVID-19 researchers. Here's a small technique I learned during that work. Just take me to the code …
Currently, the world is going through an epidemic crisis. Coronavirus has made most of us have to work from home, well, at least the ones who can. Foreseeably, for the next month, this will be the state of things. I have some experience working from home, although not extensive, most …
tl;dr: use this script to build a GitHub Repo like this one where you store all the highlights from your kindle books in an organized way. ⚠️ Update: Want to receive your kindle highlights as a newsletter? Well, I built something your will probably like! Kindle sucks, kindle is great …