Log - field notes
Blog
Notes on models, signals, and the parts of research that do not make it into papers. Mostly things I wish someone had told me earlier.
All entries
N = 13Build the Thing You Keep Wishing Existed
The best tools come from being annoyed often enough. On scratching your own itch, and why researchers should write more software.
Future You Is a Stranger. Be Nice to Them.
Reproducibility is not about virtue. It is about the fact that in six months you will not remember anything, and a reviewer will ask.
Doing a PhD in a Language You Can Barely Order Lunch In
Moving from Algeria to Tianjin, doing research in English, living in Mandarin, and thinking in French when nobody is looking.
How I Read a Paper Without Falling Asleep
You cannot read every paper, and you should not try. A three-pass method for deciding what deserves your afternoon.
Transformers Are Not Magic on Small Data
Vision Transformers are extraordinary given enough data. Most of us do not have enough data. Here is what actually happens.
How to Get Several Mediocre Models to Cooperate
Bagging, boosting, and stacking, explained without the textbook fog. Why ensembles win, and when they are not worth it.
Feature Scaling, and How to Not Shoot Yourself in the Foot
StandardScaler, MinMaxScaler, RobustScaler. Which one, when, and why outliers change the answer.
Nobody Warns You About Class Imbalance
SMOTE is not a magic spell, and applying it at the wrong moment will quietly ruin your evaluation. A practical guide.
Accuracy Is a Liar
A model that predicts 'healthy' for everyone can score 95%. Here is what to report instead, and why reviewers keep asking.
Your Model Is Probably Cheating
Data leakage is the reason your accuracy looks amazing and your reviewer looks unconvinced. Here is where it hides.
Building Research Tracker: A Chrome Extension for Academic Researchers
A privacy-first extension that saves papers, manages deadlines, and recommends journals through the OpenAlex API. No server, no telemetry.
What is MFCC and Why It Matters in Voice Analysis
The explanation I wish I'd had when I started: how Mel-Frequency Cepstral Coefficients work, and why they are still the workhorse of voice analysis.
My Journey from Bioengineering to AI
How curiosity about the body led me to machine learning and a PhD in medical AI.