Engineering notes for curious builders

I am Harshal Patel, a computer science student exploring the systems behind the products we use every day: networks, AI pipelines, real-time applications, graphics, and low-level software.

This is a collection of practical deep dives, project lessons, and mental models for understanding how technology works beneath the surface.

Featured

• Designing AI Agents That Survive Production

  6 Jun, 2026

  A detailed architecture guide for production AI agents with typed tools, bounded autonomy, state machines, approvals, security, observability, and evaluation.

• Gemini: How Google Built a Multimodal AI Model

  18 Apr, 2026

  How Gemini-style multimodal models are trained and served: text, image, audio, video, long context, tool use, MoE ideas, and how open models like Kimi are designed.

• Vector Search and RAG from First Principles

  14 Mar, 2026

  A detailed guide to embeddings, vector indexes, chunking, hybrid retrieval, reranking, citations, evaluation, and secure production RAG systems.

• Memory Management Deep Dive — Stack, Heap, Virtual Memory & Cache

  17 Jan, 2026

  Everything you need to know about how memory actually works — from stack vs heap to virtual memory, paging, cache hierarchy, and why understanding this makes you a better engineer.

• Building an Ultra-Low Latency Order Book — Low-Level Design for High-Frequency Trading

  6 Dec, 2025

  A deep dive into building a realistic high-frequency trading system — from order book data structures to lock-free algorithms, kernel bypass networking, and a backtesting engine.

• Building Reliable Real-Time Apps with WebRTC

  8 Nov, 2025

  A practical, production-focused guide to building WebRTC applications with signaling, ICE, media adaptation, data channels, recovery, security, and observability.

• Network Engineering Deep Dive — From Cables to Cloud

  16 Aug, 2025

  A practical deep dive into how data actually travels across the internet — from physical cables to cloud infrastructure, routing, firewalls, and VPNs.

• The Complete Guide to Networking & Communication Protocols

  26 Jul, 2025

  Everything you need to know about how devices actually talk to each other — from TCP handshakes to HTTP/3, WebSocket, DNS, and load balancers.