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About this blog
- Authors
- Name
- Pat Nadolny
- @pat_nadolny
The internet is full of AI hype, academic research, and shallow “tips and tricks”.
What’s harder to find is the perspective of a software engineer who’s actually in the trenches, shipping AI powered software into production.
That’s what this blog is about: practical lessons from the field, written by someone who’s moved across disciplines and now spends every day building with AI.
Who am I
My career has been a series of pivots — each time learning a new discipline, teaching myself what I didn’t know, and evolving into a new kind of engineer.
- I started as a mechanical engineer, learning design and systems thinking.
- I pivoted into analytics consulting, where I taught myself to code on the job.
- From there I moved into data engineering, shipping real production systems.
- I shifted again — growing into platform engineer and product lead building a suite of AI agents for data teams.
- Today, I’ve made my latest pivot: founding engineer at a seed-stage startup, building AI agents for enterprise customer success teams.
The throughline: I’m not a specialist with a single path. I’ve reinvented myself across disciplines, and AI engineering is my latest (and most exciting) evolution.
Why this blog exists
When I looked for content during my own pivot into AI engineering, I found plenty of great research, forward-looking breakthroughs, and consumer-focused tips. But what I didn’t find much of was guidance for engineers trying to actually ship production systems with LLMs:
- How to build software that leverages LLMs
- What actually works (and doesn’t) in production
- Framework tradeoffs and best practices
- Tools worth paying for
- Real-world system design patterns with LLMs
That’s the gap I want this blog to help fill.
What you’ll find here
On this blog, I’ll share:
- Practical guides for building AI-powered software
- Lessons learned from putting AI apps into production
- Reviews of frameworks and tools I’ve tested
- Thoughts on how AI is reshaping the craft of software engineering
If you’re a software engineer who wants to evolve into an AI engineer and actually ship working systems, this blog is for you.