Glossary
Technical terms used in the blog posts. If you don’t know what something means, look for it here.
General AI and LLMs
LLM
Large Language Model — language model trained on a large scale to understand and generate text
MoE
Mixture of Experts — architecture that activates only a fraction of parameters (experts) per token, keeping inference fast
GGUF
Optimized file format for language model inference in llama.cpp (successor to GGML)
Reasoning Model
Model trained to generate explicit reasoning in text (thinking process) before the final answer
Thinking Tokens
Tokens generated internally by reasoning models before outputting the user-visible response
Tool Calling
The model’s ability to invoke external tools (run scripts, search the web, read files) in a structured way
Metal
Low-level graphics and GPU compute API by Apple for macOS and iOS
KV Cache
Mechanism that stores Key/Value vectors from previous tokens to speed up context processing
BYOK
Bring Your Own Key — usage model where you provide your own API key to pay for direct consumption
OpenRouter
Aggregator service that unifies access and routing to dozens of LLM providers
Systems and macOS
daemon
Background process that runs continuously on the OS without a direct graphical interface
launchd
Native service and daemon manager for macOS (equivalent to systemd on Linux)
plist
Property List — XML or binary file format used by macOS for service and app configurations
Guitar and audio
Plexi
Nickname for the Marshall Super Lead, the ’60s tube amp that defined the British rock sound
JCM800
The ’80s version of Marshall, same topology as the Plexi with more gain
1960A
Marshall 4x12 cabinet (4 12-inch speakers), the rock standard
Greenback
Celestion G12M-25, 25W speaker with a warm and creamy midrange
Preamp
Preamplifier — stage that provides gain and saturation to the guitar signal
Cab
Cabinet — speaker box where the amp is connected
Cranked
Amp with the volume at max, saturating naturally
Scooped mids
Attenuated mid frequencies — “hollow” and aggressive sound
Twang
Bright and dry sound, with more treble and less bass
Tone stack
EQ (equalization) circuit of an amp or pedal
FMV
Passive 3-knob tone stack format (Bass/Mid/Treble) used by Fender, Marshall, and Vox
Presence
Treble control via negative feedback from the power amp
Boost
Gain increase — usually an extra saturation stage for solos
Channel switch
Toggle between two amp channels (or pedals with 2 voices)
Downstrokes
Picking technique using only downward strokes — Johnny Ramone’s signature
Mosrite
Japanese guitar brand used by Johnny Ramone (Mosrite Ventures II)
Bridge pickup
Pickup (microphone) closest to the guitar’s bridge — more aggressive and brighter sound
Electronics
JFET
Junction Field-Effect Transistor — transistor with a response similar to a vacuum tube
12AX7
Preamp tube used in the Plexi (3 gain stages)
EL34
Power tube used in the Marshall Plexi power amp
mu-amp
2-JFET configuration that emulates the push-pull of a tube power amp
Push-pull
Final amp stage where 2 tubes work in opposition to generate power
Op-amp
Operational amplifier — IC that amplifies a signal with controllable gain
TL072
General-purpose op-amp, low noise, FET input — standard in DIY pedals
Trimpot
Adjustable potentiometer with a screwdriver — used to bias JFETs
Bias
Adjustment of the operating point of a transistor/tube — affects the sound
PCB
Printed Circuit Board
Perfboard
Perforated board for circuit assembly (no traces, uses wires)
Protoboard
Solderless breadboard — for testing circuits before soldering
Diodo Zenner
Zener diode, a diode that regulates voltage — conducts in the reverse direction at a fixed voltage
PTH
Plated Through-Hole — components with legs that go through the PCB
Tântalo
Tantalum electrolytic capacitor type — smaller and more stable than aluminum
Pedals and effects
True Bypass
Signal goes straight from input to output without passing through the circuit when the pedal is off
3PDT
Triple Pole Double Throw — footswitch that toggles 3 circuits simultaneously
Footswitch
Pedal button pressed with the foot to turn effects on/off
TS 1/4”
6.35mm TS (Tip-Sleeve) jack, standard guitar connector
TRS 1/4”
6.35mm stereo jack (Tip-Ring-Sleeve) — used for balanced or stereo signals
DC 9V
9-volt power supply — standard for guitar pedals
LED
Light Emitting Diode — visual status indicator for the pedal
Stompbox
Another name for a guitar effects pedal
Digital audio
IR (Impulse Response)
“Fingerprint” of the response of a cabinet + speaker + microphone (.wav file)
Convolução
Mathematical operation that applies the IR response to the audio signal
IR Loader
Device or software that loads and applies IRs in real time
USB Audio Interface
Device that converts analog audio to digital via USB (and vice versa)
ADC
Analog-to-Digital Converter — converts analog signal to digital
DAC
Digital-to-Analog Converter — converts digital signal to analog
Balanced (XLR)
Balanced signal — 2 signals (hot+cold) + ground, rejects noise in long cables
Unbalanced (RCA/TS)
Unbalanced signal — 1 signal + ground, susceptible to noise in long cables
Open source and DIY
Open hardware
Hardware with public schematics, PCB, and BOM — anyone can build it
CC BY-NC-SA 3.0
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike — can use/modify/share, cannot sell
AIAB
Amp In A Box — pedal that emulates a complete tube amp
DIY
Do It Yourself
BOM
Bill of Materials — list of components with prices
Runoffgroove
Site with open hardware pedal circuits (tubes-to-FETs)
Zuko
Pedal name — the fire prince from Avatar: The Last Airbender. Fire = saturation, duality = 2 channels
Stem separation (Phase 3+)
Stem separation
Separating an audio mix into individual tracks (vocal, drums, bass, guitar)
Demucs
Meta/Facebook AI model for stem separation
RTF
Real-Time Factor — how much time the processor takes to process 1s of audio
Backing track
Accompaniment track (music without an instrument, e.g., without guitar)
Mechanical keyboards
Switch
Individual mechanism under each key — defines typing feel and sound
Cherry MX
Most common mechanical switch standard — Red, Brown, Blue varieties, etc.
ALPS
Older mechanical switch type — tactile and hard to find today
Keycap
Plastic cover that goes over the switch — the part you touch
Keycap profile
Shape/height of the keycaps (SA, DSA, XDA, Cherry) — affects ergonomics and visuals
Plate
Metal plate where the switches snap in — keyboard structure
Case
Keyboard enclosure — houses PCB, plate, and switches
Sandwich case
Case made of overlapping layers (acrylic/MDF) screwed together
Handwired
Keyboard built by soldering switches with wires straight to the microcontroller (no PCB)
Hotswap
Sockets that allow swapping switches without soldering
Stabilizer
Mechanism that stabilizes large keys (Space, Enter, Shift)
Costar
Stabilizer type with a metal wire and hooks
Underglow
LEDs on the bottom of the keyboard — lighting that shines through a translucent case
Backlight
LEDs under each key — illuminate the keycaps from below
QMK
Quantum Mechanical Keyboard — open source firmware for custom keyboards
Bootloader
Program that allows flashing firmware to the microcontroller via USB
HID
Human Interface Device — USB class that makes the PC recognize the keyboard/mouse
ATMEGA328
Atmel 8-bit AVR microcontroller — brain of the Arduino Pro Mini
RP2040
Raspberry Pi ARM Cortex M0+ microcontroller — 133MHz, 264kB RAM
AVR
Atmel/Microchip 8-bit microcontroller family
USBaspLoader
V-USB bootloader that emulates USB on AVR without a native USB peripheral
USBAsp
External programmer for flashing AVR microcontrollers
Standalone
ATMEGA328 circuit built without the Arduino board (just the chip + crystal)
I2C
2-wire communication bus (SDA/SCL) between chips
WS2812B
Addressable RGB LED — each LED has its own address on the strip
SK6812
Addressable RGB LED smaller than the WS2812B — fits under the keys
6028R
RGB LED with 3 separate channels (R/G/B) in one package
swillkb
Web tool that generates keyboard case files from a layout
keyboard-layout-editor
Web tool for designing keyboard layouts
40percent.club
Site with compact keyboard projects (40% of the keys)
Gherkin
40% keyboard (3x10) open source from 40percent.club
Plaid
48-key open source keyboard with ATMEGA328 and USBaspLoader
Git and servers
Self-hosted
Software hosted on your own server instead of a third-party service
VPS
Virtual Private Server — virtual server you rent
CGI
Common Gateway Interface — runs programs on the web server to generate pages
cgit
Web interface for git repositories, in C, runs via CGI
stagit
Static page generator for git repositories
Merge Request
In Gitlab, equivalent to Github’s Pull Request
Pull Request
Proposal to merge a branch into another on Github
Mirror
Automatic copy of a repository between servers
systemd
Default service manager (init) in Linux
journalctl
Command that queries systemd logs
Suckless
Minimalist software philosophy — small programs that do one thing well
Game development
SDL2
Simple DirectMedia Layer 2 — C library for 2D graphics, audio, and input
Engine
Framework that abstracts game loop, rendering, physics, etc.
Game loop
Main cycle: input → update → render, repeated every frame
Godot
Open source game engine, in C++, with GDScript/GDNative
GDNative
Godot’s interface for C/C++ (and other languages) extensions
Tetrominó
Tetris piece — 4 blocks in an arrangement (I, O, T, S, Z, L, J)
Dear ImGui
Immediate mode C++ UI library — menus and debug overlays
WebAssembly
Binary format that runs C/C++ in the browser at near-native speed
Emscripten
LLVM → WebAssembly compiler — brings C/C++ code to the web
FOSS
Free and Open Source Software
Análise estática
Static analysis. Analyzes code without running it — finds bugs via patterns (e.g., gcc -fanalyzer)
Makefile
make script that automates project compilation
Nuklear
Immediate mode C UI library — lightweight and dependency-free
LVGL
Light and Versatile Graphics Library — graphics for embedded systems
Embedded electronics and DIY audio
ESP32
Microcontroller with dual-core WiFi+Bluetooth — ESPBoy base
DevKit
Development board with the exposed microcontroller
GPIO
General Purpose Input/Output — digital pin of the microcontroller
Menuconfig
Configuration system of ESP-IDF (ESP32 SDK)
ROM
Game file (Read-Only Memory) — the emulated cartridge image
Emulação
Emulation. Reproducing the hardware of a console in software on another device
TFT
Thin-Film Transistor — type of color LCD display
Backlight
Lighting behind the LCD display — controls brightness
PAM8403
3W×2 Class D audio amplifier IC — used in DIY projects
TP4056
Lithium battery charger IC — standard in battery projects
Divisor de tensão
Voltage divider. Resistor circuit that divides the voltage to read multiple buttons on one pin
Buzzer
Small piezo speaker — generates tones (not polyphonic)
SD Card
Memory card to store ROMs and data
MOSI/MISO/SCLK/CS
Pins of the SPI bus for displays and SD cards
Email and infrastructure
Yunohost
Self-hosted system for managing web apps, email, and DNS on a VPS
Postfix
Email server (MTA) for sending and receiving SMTP messages
Porta 25
Port 25. Standard SMTP port for sending email — often blocked by providers
SMTP Relay
Third-party service (SendGrid, etc) that sends email for you when port 25 is blocked
SendGrid
Twilio’s SMTP relay service — allows sending transactional email
iptables
Linux firewall — controls ports and network traffic
Firewall
Layer that filters network traffic by port/IP — can block email
Web and design
Keyframe
Point in a CSS animation that defines the state of the elements at an instant
@keyframes
CSS rule that describes the sequence of keyframes of an animation
Prompt
Terminal indicator (e.g., $) — where you type commands
Typewriter effect
Animation that simulates typing character by character
dmenu
Dynamic menu from the suckless project for X11 — base for several tools
This glossary is updated as new posts are published. If you think a term is missing, let me know.
This glossary is updated as new posts are published. If you think a term is missing, let me know.\n## Travel and Tourism\n\n### Cavezalle\nLuggage brand.\n\n### Aeroparque\nAeroparque Jorge Newbery (AEP) — airport located inside the city of Buenos Aires.\n\n### San Telmo\nHistoric neighborhood in Buenos Aires, famous for its Sunday antique markets.\n\n### La Boca\nTraditional neighborhood in Buenos Aires, known for the La Bombonera stadium and Caminito.\n\n### La Bombonera\nStadium of Club Atlético Boca Juniors in Buenos Aires.\n\n### Riquelme\nJuan Román Riquelme — idol and current president of Boca Juniors.\n\n### Parque Centenario\nCircular park in the geographical center of Buenos Aires, famous for its book and craft market.\n\n### MEP\nMercado Electrónico de Pagos — exchange rate in Argentina used by international cards (close to the Blue Dollar), essential for tourists.\n\n## Health and Neurodivergence\n\n### TDAH\nAttention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).\n\n### TAG\nGeneralized Anxiety Disorder (GAD).\n\n### ANC\nActive Noise Cancellation — headphone technology that cancels external noise by emitting inverse sound waves.