Connor

[Femke Plantinga @femke_plantinga]

Everyone's suddenly talking about 𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴.

Weren't we just getting the hang of context engineering? 😵‍💫

Here's the 3-step evolution of how we work with AI in 2026, and why each stage matters:

𝟭. 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗺𝗽𝘁 𝗲𝗻𝗴���𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴
It's about what you 𝘴𝘢𝘺 to the model.
The practice of figuring out what instructions/framing/examples a model needs to nail a task or answer a question in your domain.

Do this right and the model does in one shot what used to take five.
But it can only work with what you put in that one ask.

𝟮. 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝘅𝘁 𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴
It's about what you 𝘣𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 to the model.
Your context window is finite (200K tokens, maybe 1M on the smartest models). Every token you load upfront (memory, AGENTS.md, skills, docs) is budget spent.
Context engineering is the practice of deciding what earns a spot in that window, and what stays out.

Do it well and the model feels 10x smarter. Overpack, and it drowns.

𝟯. 𝗛𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴
It's about what you build 𝘢𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥 the model.
A model on its own does one thing: take an input → return an output → stop.
Harness engineering is the practice of building the system that runs it in a loop, and gives it tools to act, memory to remember, and guardrails to stay on track.

→ Prompt and context are what you hand the model for 𝘰𝘯𝘦 turn.
→ The harness is what strings 𝘩��𝘯𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘥𝘴 of them together into an agent that actually goes and does the work.

That's why everyone's so hyped about harness engineering.

In only a few years, we've gone from 𝘵𝘢𝘭𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 to a model → 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 a model → 𝘣𝘶𝘪𝘭𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢 𝘴𝘺𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘮 around it.

Which stage is your team at? 👇

[Connor @Brighter2]

日落拍摄@上海元荡

[Ali Ghodsi @alighodsi]

My co-founder @rxin personally wrote this really good paper that explains the main idea behind postgres Lakebase as well as LTAP. It almost serves as a primer on how transactional databases are built and how Lakebase and LTAP work. Maybe more importantly, what are the tradeoffs, and what are you giving up by adopting this new approach. Highly recommended reading:
https://t.co/d5V12x1Fqr

[Andy Pavlo (@andypavlo.bsky.social) @andy_pavlo]

The video of my 2021 NewSQL retrospective talk is available here: https://t.co/VKDrM2m9J4
Thanks to @asatarin for inviting / hosting me for this event.

[Connor @Brighter2]

其余明天再想，peace .

[Postgres Weekly 🐘 @PostgresWeekly]

Upgrading PostgreSQL From 9.6 to 10 with Minimal Downtime using pglogical: https://t.co/CCOl3psc7V

[EDB @EDBPostgres]

Two Free Postgres Training Classes- 1. DB admin. 2. Create modern arch. w/ high avail./disaster recovery. Sign up: https://t.co/dGdgwt9BO3

[Franck Pachot @FranckPachot]

#beLazy
VACUUM FULL is not better than lazy VACUUM. It moves tuples. Resets visibility map. Index Only Scan has to Heap Fetch.

[intervals @intervals]

Five Simple PostgreSQL Optimizations for Improving Performance | https://t.co/tVf3qc8613 #postgresql

[Postgres Weekly 🐘 @PostgresWeekly]

A Practical Guide to SQL Transaction Isolation: https://t.co/LuIGfg9paX