Silicon45 | kdb+/q Expert | Contract (part-time OK) | Portland, OR (Hybrid) or Remote

We're building a heterogeneous execution platform to accelerate data analytics and ML workloads, and we're looking for a deep kdb+/q expert to work alongside our hardware acceleration team. You'll focus on kdb+ internals, query optimization, and the C API, helping us understand how queries execute under the hood, where the bottlenecks are, and how to integrate acceleration into kdb+ workflows.

Looking for: expert-level kdb+/q, engine internals, query planning/optimization, C API extensions, performance analysis. Nice to have: exposure to hardware acceleration concepts.

Apply: email amir@silicon45.com with your resume and a short note on 1-2 performance-critical kdb+ systems you personally built or optimized.

It's not about productivity, it's about having fun with your toys.

> Compilers did not replace programmers. Spreadsheets did not replace accountants. CAD systems did not replace engineers.

In the long run, this is as misleading as saying: Humans did not replace animals.

It probably would, to save energy

Saving energy is something we are biologically trained to prefer.

Computers won’t necessarily have the same drivers.

If evolution wanted us to always prefer to spend energy, we would prefer it. Same way you wouldn’t expect us to get to AGI, and have AGI desperately want to drink water or fly south for the winter.

Who's energy? Turning off the lights when you leave the room isn't innate.

Because you are worried about bills or are concerned about waste.

If we design an AI to do work, it won’t innately care about not working to preserve power.

No they are generated at build time (static). I was thinking of generating on the fly but wanted to release and get feedback first. Re. multiple choice, is easier than typing I guess.

Depending on your OS/screenshot tool, you can bind a key to select an area and copy it to the clipboard, then paste directly into Claude (Ctrl/Command+V). No cluttering.

I suppose (among many other things) LLMs are changing this. We no longer need that many contributors when we can use AWS docs, intercept AWS API calls and give it to AI agent to mimic. Of course, contributors are still needed for maintaining tests and validations.

Coming from a moderate muslim family, my life actually got a huge upgrade when I realised God doesn't exist (at least the way religions describe it).

Regarding organized religion, a quote attributed to Diderot [0] goes as follows:

    Le genere humain ne sera heureux et libre que quand on aura étranglé le dernier roi avec les boyaux du dernier prêtre.

Or, in plain English:

    Man will be happy and free only when the last king has been strangled with the entrails of the last priest.

However, I like to complete it with a quote from Voltaire [1]:

    L'univers m'embarrasse, et je ne puis songer - Que cette horloge existe et n'ait point d'horloger

Or, in plain English:

   The universe baffles me, and I cannot conceive - That this clock exists, yet has no clockmaker.

[0] https://www.persee.fr/doc/rde_0769-0886_1991_num_10_1_1097

[1] https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:Voltaire_-_%C5%92uvres_c...

I know what it's like growing up in a religious atmosphere. Since you've been trained to think inside the box, you realize the box is nonsense. The problem is thinking that the only valid alternative is that there is no creator and everything is just random (the opposite extreme.) Look into other philosophies like advaita vedanta, buddhism, or progressive science like another commenter mentioned about nassim haramein.

I didn't say there's no creator. I'm pretty confident that the God defined by these religions doesn't exist. Since then, I have lived comfortably with knowing enough that I don't know and might never know.

As a lifelong atheist and critic of organized religion, I congratulate you on your improved frame of mind.

Thank you!

I love it, but 1) I don't have good ideas to implement, 2) I need to do the same as job hunting, just dealing with more than one customer.

Rust experts, appreciate your feedback on the code quality and idioms!