Guides

R-multiple & expectancy, explained

Position sizing from the stop, results in R, expectancy per trade, the break-even win rate table, and why a 70% win rate can still lose money.

• What is an R-multiple?
• How do you calculate expectancy?
• What is risk of ruin?

Anchored VWAP, and the one setup that survived testing

What anchored VWAP is, how it differs from session VWAP, where to anchor, what a reclaim means, and the walk-forward result behind it.

• What is anchored VWAP?
• How is anchored VWAP different from regular VWAP?
• Where should you anchor a VWAP?

How backtests lie, and what an honest one looks like

Why in-sample backtests lie, what lookahead and survivorship bias look like in code, how walk-forward works, and how to spot a curve fit.

• What is lookahead bias in backtesting?
• What is walk-forward testing?
• Why do in-sample backtests look so good?

A trading journal that changes behaviour

The fields that change behaviour in a trading journal — R-multiple, setup tag, mistake tag, MAE/MFE — and how to review without lying to yourself.

• What should you log in a trading journal?
• Why record trades in R instead of dollars?
• What are MAE and MFE?

Kelly, fractional Kelly, and the gap between them

How the Kelly criterion works, the formula for trading with an R-multiple edge, why full Kelly is unusable in practice, and how half and quarter Kelly compare.

• What is the Kelly criterion?
• How do you calculate Kelly for trading?
• Why do traders use half or quarter Kelly?

VCP and bases, described honestly

What a base is, how contractions are counted, why volume dry-up matters, where the pivot sits, and the walk-forward result that came out breakeven.

• What is a VCP in trading?
• How do you count contractions in a base?
• What is volume dry-up?

Where the stop goes, and what it decides

Structure-based, ATR-based, or percentage stops. Why the stop sets position size rather than the other way round, and the places never to put one.

• Where should you place a stop loss?
• Does the stop determine position size, or the other way round?
• What is an ATR-based stop?

Volume profile, and what the histogram at the bottom cannot tell you

How volume profile differs from a volume-by-time histogram, what POC and the value area mean, how to read volume nodes, and how it pairs with anchored VWAP.

• What is a volume profile?
• What is the point of control (POC)?
• What is the value area?

Leveraged ETFs, and the arithmetic nobody reads

Daily rebalancing, volatility drag, and a worked two-day example where a 3x ETF loses on a flat round trip. When they fit, and why sizing must be tighter.

• Why do leveraged ETFs lose money over time?
• Can you show an example of leveraged ETF decay?
• What is volatility drag?

The gap between paper and real money

What paper does not simulate: slippage, partial fills, borrow, emotion. Why a promotion gate matters, and the 60-trade rule my engine enforces in code.

• What does paper trading fail to simulate?
• Is paper trading worth doing at all?
• What is a promotion gate in trading?

Running a local LLM, and when it is actually the right call

Running a local LLM with Ollama: picking a model for your RAM, the HTTP API, quantisation, context limits, and when local beats a cloud API.

• What is Ollama?
• How much RAM do you need to run a local LLM?
• Should you call Ollama from the CLI or the HTTP API?

RAG, without the diagram everyone reposts

What retrieval-augmented generation is, how chunking, embeddings and reranking fit together, where RAG breaks, and when a graph beats vector search.

• What is retrieval-augmented generation (RAG)?
• What is the difference between RAG and fine-tuning?
• What is chunking in RAG?

Automate the deadline work, not the thinking

A practical filter for which small-business tasks AI should handle, the two-tier local plus frontier pattern, and why the quality gate is the product.

• Which business tasks are worth automating with AI?
• What should stay human in an automated workflow?
• What is the two-tier model pattern?

An installable app, no backend, no app store

How to build an installable offline PWA with no backend: manifest fields, service worker caching, cache versioning, and how iOS install differs.

• What makes a website installable as a PWA?
• What is the difference between cache-first and network-first?
• Why do users still see the old version after I deploy a PWA?

Tools with no backend, and the honest trade

No account means no breach surface. What you gain from browser-only tools, what you give up in sync and compute, what it costs to run, and how to say so.

• What is a client-side-only tool?
• Is a tool without accounts more secure?
• What do you lose with no backend?

Turning long footage into clips, automatically

Scene-change detection, audio-energy highlights, lossless cutting and concatenation, 9:16 vertical conversion, and why a local pipeline beats a cloud API.

• How do you detect scene changes with ffmpeg?
• How do you find highlights in a video automatically?
• How do you cut a video without re-encoding?

Getting cited when the answer replaces the click

Entity consolidation, llms.txt, robots.txt rules for named AI crawlers, FAQPage that mirrors visible text, answer-first writing, and IndexNow for fast recrawl.

• What is generative engine optimization (GEO)?
• Why does entity consolidation matter for AI search?
• What is llms.txt?

18 things to fix before your first real user

An 18-point security checklist for student founders shipping their first product: secrets, dependency CVEs, config, TLS, backups, and more.

• What is the fastest way to check if I've ever committed a secret?
• If a secret key leaked, do I need to rewrite git history?
• What's the minimum security setup before a first paying customer?

CPT vs OPT for F-1 students

Who authorizes what, the one-academic-year rule, the 12-month limits, the STEM extension, unemployment days, and how to plan the timeline backwards.

• What is the difference between CPT and OPT?
• Does CPT affect OPT eligibility?
• When should you file for OPT?

What an ATS actually does to your resume

What applicant tracking systems really do to a resume, the formatting rules that matter, how to mirror a job description honestly, and the myths.

• What does an ATS actually do to a resume?
• What resume format is safest for an ATS?
• Do ATS systems reject resumes automatically?

The internship search, run as a system

How international students should run a SWE internship search: the timeline, the sponsorship question, who to target, and how work authorization fits.

• When should international students apply for summer SWE internships?
• Do internships require employer sponsorship?
• How should you answer the work authorization question?

Write the profile for how recruiters actually search

How recruiters actually search LinkedIn, what belongs in the headline and About, why the first two lines decide everything, and what costs replies.

• How do recruiters search LinkedIn?
• What should a LinkedIn headline contain?
• How long should the About section be?

Shipped and reachable beats impressive-sounding

What a student software portfolio needs: a live URL, a README that pitches, three strong projects instead of ten weak ones, and case studies reviewers finish.

• What makes a student software portfolio effective?
• How many projects should be in a portfolio?
• Is a live demo better than a GitHub repository?

Track which pattern you fail, not how many problems you did

The pattern-based approach to technical interviews: the ten recurring problem patterns, why tracking the pattern you fail beats counting, and spaced repetition.

• What are the main coding interview patterns?
• Why is counting solved problems a bad metric?
• How do you identify which pattern a problem uses?

How undergraduates actually get into a lab

How to find a lab, email a professor, survive the first task, and why publishing as an undergraduate is disproportionately valuable.

• How do you find an undergraduate research lab?
• How should you email a professor about research?
• What does a first research task look like?

Learning to program in your second language

What bilingual coding is, why second-language load hurts novice programmers, and what a 60-participant SIGCSE 2026 study found about confidence.

• What is bilingual coding in CS education?
• Why is learning to program harder in a second language?
• What did the SIGCSE 2026 bilingual coding study examine?

Eligibility first, essays second

How international students find and win scholarships, where eligibility usually breaks, and how to run an application pipeline that survives deadlines.

• Can international students get scholarships in the US?
• Where does eligibility usually break for international students?
• What is the difference between a scholarship, grant, and fellowship?

Freight broker margin & rate per mile

Margin versus markup, all-in rate per mile, what deadhead really costs, how a fuel surcharge is built, when detention gets paid, and the break-even on a load.

• How is broker margin calculated?
• How is a fuel surcharge calculated?
• What is the break-even rate on a load?

After the load books, the real work starts

What a small brokerage does after the load books: confirmations, check calls, POD chasing, invoicing and AR — and what automates cleanly.

• What does a freight broker do after a load is booked?
• Why do freight invoices get paid late?
• What is the most chased document in freight?

The margin is fine. The volume is the problem.

Base cost, retail, platform fees, and net per unit on a tee and a hoodie — plus the costs people forget: returns, samples, artwork time, and ads.

• How do you calculate print-on-demand profit per unit?
• What margin is realistic on print-on-demand?
• Is print-on-demand profitable?

260 to 200, and the arithmetic that got there

How a calorie deficit actually works: maintenance estimation, deficit size, protein, why the scale lies week to week, and how to track it without obsessing.

• How do you calculate maintenance calories?
• How big should a calorie deficit be?
• How much protein do you need when cutting?

Trader's risk toolkit

Position sizer, R-multiple, expectancy, risk of ruin, Kelly, break-even win rate.

Freight calculators

Rate per mile, deadhead, margin, detention, fuel surcharge, break-even.

Visa Navigator

Backward-planned CPT/OPT and change-of-status timeline with a document checklist.

Bilingual CS glossary

Python terms and the ten most common error messages, explained in English, Spanish, Vietnamese and Arabic.

All apps

TradeLog, Cut, and Fire — installable, offline, local-only.