programming on Tim Cieplowski

New project: BlockMaps

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

New project from me: BlockMaps. BlockMaps is a custom mapping service for visualizing what’s happening in a specific place — a neighborhood, a town, a single block. You name the place and the activity (construction, road closures, public art, business openings, civic meetings), and BlockMaps builds, hosts, and maintains the map. The first map is live at sugarhouse.blockmaps.net, covering ongoing construction projects in the Sugar House neighborhood of Salt Lake City, where I live.

New project: Webster's 1913 Dictionary website

Sat, 11 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

A new side project from me: Webster’s 1913. It’s a static website serving the complete text of Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary from 1913. James Somers wrote a popular blog post about Webster’s 1913, explaining how its definitions are more vivid and literary than what you’ll find in a modern dictionary. There already exists another site, that I sometimes use, websters1913.com, but unfortunately it has an SSL cert issue, and is not very feature-rich.

New project: DVD Organization Simulator game

Sun, 08 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

A new side project from me: DVD Organization Simulator. A browser-based game where you organize DVD titles alphabetically across multiple shelves. DVDs spawn on the floor periodically, and you need to place them in the correct alphabetical order before too many pile up. This is kind of a joke, inspired by discourse on the “death” of physical media, “going digital”, and the lost thrill of organizing your physical collection… but it turns out to also be a mildly entertaining game.

Some advice for junior software devs

Sun, 26 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

That I barely feel qualified to give.

New project: Letterboxd Doppelgangers

Thu, 02 Jan 2025 00:00:00 +0000

A new side project from me: Letterboxd Doppelgangers. A tool for finding users who share favorites, on Letterboxd, a movie-oriented social network. It is a Next.js app, with the backend powered by a Cloudflare Worker. Code is here.

An AI-generated daily NBA audio recap

Thu, 16 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

I wanted a reason to try out some of the OpenAI APIs, so I came up with the idea of generating a short audio recap…

Creating Jot.zone

Tue, 10 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This summer, I took a 6-week trip to Europe. Prior to the trip, I was considering how I would share updates with my friends/family. I am not an avid user of any existing social media platforms, so I thought… why not make my own?

Creating Tonal Recall

Thu, 09 May 2019 00:00:00 +0000

TL;DR: Check it out here! TonalRecall.us. Background With about 1.5 hours of commuting to work each day, I spend a lot of time listening to podcasts. My absolute favorite of which is FilmJunk, a movie discussion show. They sometimes play a game called “Score Bits”, in which the 3 hosts each prepare clips of film score, which are played for the others to guess. Prior to the live 700th episode of the show, the listeners were asked to provide clips for a game of “Dialogue Bits” (same concept, with clips of movie dialogue).