What Julia Evans thinks about software performance

@julia-evans · 4 positions · 2 changes of mind · On ppll ↗

Writes jvns.ca, a blog explaining networking, debugging and Linux internals in plain language and comics. Publishes Wizard Zines, illustrated programming zines. Software developer based in Montreal.

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1 dated position, 2026, in their own words. Our reading of what Julia Evans has said — not written or endorsed by them.

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1. 21 Jul 2026

   Our readingWhen diagnosing a performance problem, starting with a CPU profile is more useful than checking database queries first.

   Their wordsI've been running into a variety of performance issues (like this template caching thing) that are not because of slow queries, so instead it's been more useful for me so far to start by running a CPU profile.

   ↗Some more things about Django I've been enjoyingjvns.ca 2nd of 2 in this piece