Notes from a developer who writes ABAP on real SAP systems and hands that work to agents. Art, travel, the economy and books live next door.
TUE 10.06
2026.10.06 Korea time
'26/10/05 UPDATE
A reading guide to volume 6 of Minumsa's World Literature series, Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: the text Kim Wook-dong's translation is based on, the novel's four settings, the scenes in Chapters 15, 16 and 31 that build to Huck's decision, the argument over the last twelve chapters, and what to mark as you read.
'26/10/05 UPDATE
A Python default value is made once, when def runs, not on each call. Using Python 3.12.14 output, this note shows why tags=[] keeps growing and a datetime.now() default stands still, and when to use a None default, a dataclass default_factory or a cache kept on purpose.
'26/10/05 UPDATE
Four paintings by Claude Monet, from 1864 to his last years, set in date order to follow where the edges of petals, a face, a cliff and lily pads loosen into brushstrokes.
'26/10/05 UPDATE
An order number shown as 123 on the screen is stored as 0000000123. This note explains when the ALPHA conversion routine runs automatically and when it does not, when code must convert with ALPHA = IN, and which values get no zeros, using fictional examples.
'26/10/05 UPDATE
Korea's consumer prices rose 0.3% during September, yet the year-on-year rate fell from 3.1% to 2.9%. Rebuild 2.9% from four published index values and see how last September, and last August's phone bills, moved this year's rate.
Just arrived
An order number shown as 123 on the screen is stored as 0000000123. This note explains when the ALPHA conversion routine runs automatically and when it does not, when code must convert with ALPHA = IN, and which values get no zeros, using fictional examples.
Korea's consumer prices rose 0.3% during September, yet the year-on-year rate fell from 3.1% to 2.9%. Rebuild 2.9% from four published index values and see how last September, and last August's phone bills, moved this year's rate.
A reading guide to volume 6 of Minumsa's World Literature series, Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: the text Kim Wook-dong's translation is based on, the novel's four settings, the scenes in Chapters 15, 16 and 31 that build to Huck's decision, the argument over the last twelve chapters, and what to mark as you read.
Four paintings by Claude Monet, from 1864 to his last years, set in date order to follow where the edges of petals, a face, a cliff and lily pads loosen into brushstrokes.
A Python default value is made once, when def runs, not on each call. Using Python 3.12.14 output, this note shows why tags=[] keeps growing and a datetime.now() default stands still, and when to use a None default, a dataclass default_factory or a cache kept on purpose.
BINARY SEARCH trusts that the table is sorted ascending by the search key and discards half at each step. Using a fictional example, this note covers why an existing row is missed when the sort is absent or different, how to use sy-subrc 4 and 8 and sy-tabix on a miss, and the sorted secondary key alternative.
forEach never keeps the Promise an async callback returns, so the next line runs before the saves finish and errors never reach try...catch. Using actual Node.js v24.21.0 output, this note shows when to use for...of, map with Promise.all, batches, or Promise.allSettled.
Two finished pictures by Thomas Eakins set beside the perspective drawings beneath them: where the ruled lines survive in the paint, and where they vanish under it.
A reading guide to volume 5 of Minumsa's World Literature series, George Orwell's Animal Farm: how Do Jeong-il's edition is put together, which of the Seven Commandments change in which chapter, the gap between the pigs who write and the animals who remember, and how to read the two essays printed with the novel.
DELETE ADJACENT DUPLICATES compares only neighbouring rows, and without COMPARING it compares the table key. Using a fictional example, this note covers duplicates that survive without a sort, a standard key that deletes rows differing only in amount, and an inline-declared table where nothing is deleted, and how to fix each.
Called without a compare function, sort() converts numbers to strings and sorts them in dictionary order. Using actual Node.js v24.21.0 output, this note covers what a compare function must return, how sort() differs from toSorted(), and how to sort file names and multilingual strings with Intl.Collator.
In August 2026 the deposit banks' loan-deposit spread was 1.19 percentage points on new business and 2.20 on outstanding balances. See what each averages, split the 2.20 into two pieces using published rates, and check with a small calculation why outstanding rates move slowly.
