[MM’s] Engineering Weekly #24 — September 8th, 2025
Exploring code reviews, Spring Boot techniques, JVM improvements and the evolving role of AI in engineering.
⏩ TL;DR (Quick Recap)
- Code reviews are about collaboration, not just bug-hunting.
- JVM news: Project Loom, Jakarta EE 12, Kafka tuning and JetBrains API scanning.
- Spring Boot updates: caching, utility classes, servers showdown and tutorials.
- Beyond the code: AI workflows, career growth, hiring truths, passkeys and more.
🎯 Featured Article
💡 Purpose of Code Review
Code reviews are about shared understanding and better design, not just catching bugs.
- Encourages collaborative knowledge sharing.
- Focuses on long-term maintainability, not one-off fixes.
☕ JVM Corner
⚡ Project Loom: Structured Concurrency in JDK 25
Exploring the new concurrency model arriving with JDK 25.
- Simplifies handling of async tasks.
- Makes multithreaded code safer and more predictable.
🛡️ Enhanced Vulnerable API Detection in JetBrains IDEs & Qodana
JetBrains adds stronger API vulnerability scanning.
- Helps identify insecure dependencies early.
- Integrated directly into developer workflows.
🚀 Boosting Kafka Latency Performance by 3x
Optimizing Kafka with JVM tuning and AutoMQ.
- Significant latency reduction benefits real-time apps.
- Shows the power of JVM-level optimizations.
📦 Jakarta EE 12: Consistency & Configuration
Plans shaping up for the 2026 release.
- Standardization across specifications.
- Focus on developer experience improvements.
🛠️ Do You Use These 7 Tools as a Java Developer?
Practical tools for debugging, testing, and coding efficiency.
- Covers real-world scenarios.
- Helps improve developer productivity.
🍃 Spring Updates
📚 Mastering Spring Boot: 49 Essential Utility Classes
Essential helper classes every Spring Boot dev should know.
- Saves time with ready-to-use utilities.
- Reduces boilerplate in projects.
⚡ 7 Spring Boot Caching Techniques Most Developers Ignore
Strategies to speed up your applications.
- Boosts performance with minimal effort.
- Often overlooked by dev teams.
🌐 Tomcat vs. Jetty vs. Undertow for Spring Boot 3.4.4
Comparing embedded web servers for modern Spring apps.
- Trade-offs in performance and resource usage.
- Helps choose the right fit for your project.
📖 Spring Boot Tutorial
A clear walkthrough of Spring Boot basics.
- Great for newcomers.
- Foundation for building complex Spring apps.
🔍 Extra Reads
🤖 My Current AI Dev Workflow — Balancing Ghostty, VS Code, and Claude Code.
📝 First attempt will be 95% garbage — Lessons from using AI as a staff engineer.
⚠️ Dangerous advice for software engineers — Powerful tools can harm if misused.
🛡️ The Dark Side of JWT — Why JWT is often discouraged.
📈 Build vs Buy in the Age of AI — Navigating trade-offs in the AI era.
🌱 Professional Development is a Choice — Growth depends on deliberate effort.
🔑 Passkeys and Modern Authentication — Moving beyond passwords.
📆 Maker’s Schedule, Manager’s Schedule — Why meetings drain creative flow.
👥 No, you don’t want to hire “the best engineers” — Rethinking hiring strategies.
🛠️ Do the simplest thing that could possibly work — Design simplicity over complexity.
📱 Your Phone Already Has Social Credit — Credit scores as disguised social credit.
🌀 Next.js Is Infuriating — Frustrations with debugging Next.js in production.
🌍 Welcoming The Browser Company to Atlassian — Atlassian acquires Arc/Dia browser team.
📊 Issue counts always go up — Why issue counts rise even in healthy projects.
Originally posted on marconak-matej.medium.com.