Ben Griffiths

Hello, I’m Ben.

I’m a software engineer with a long career behind me and, with any luck, a fair bit ahead. I make things for fun: tools, games, text adventures, a music-box tape composer, a better D&D character sheet. I ran D&D for a living for a while. I try not to take any of it too seriously. More about me.

Most recent time-sink

Chaney

Chaney

A better D&D character sheet. Organised by what’s happening at the table, not by rules category, with the final numbers printed where you need them.

Latest weeknotes: Weeknotes 2762, 26 September 2026.

A better D&D character sheet

In which the author, asked by his youngest for help with a cleric, finds the official character sheet wanting and resolves, with some indignation, to print a better one.

27 September 2026 · 5 min · whitebeard

Weeknotes 2762

In which the author is introduced to everyone at once, rides a possessed hire bike home at twice the legal speed, and builds a pedalboard out of a bathroom accessory.

26 September 2026 · 3 min · whitebeard

Nag a ram: teaching my crossword page to solve anagrams

In which the author, defeated by a fifteen-letter anagram, builds a solver that is fast, plain and deliberately unhelpful, and then discovers that zip is cleverer than he is.

19 September 2026 · 8 min · whitebeard

Weeknotes 2761

In which the author finds his cycling legs and then loses them again, dreams of a faithful remake, and discovers something rubbery growing under the beans.

19 September 2026 · 2 min · whitebeard

Weeknotes 2760

In which the author begins a new job after five years away, negotiates with a railway, abandons his leeks to the weeds, and signs up for a maths degree at last.

12 September 2026 · 2 min · whitebeard

Learning about myself through Elm

In which the author explains why Elm gives him joy, confesses to a memory that once won a national competition but cannot manage a shopping list, and learns a bit about how his mind works.

10 August 2026 · 4 min · whitebeard

What kind of machine-consciousness denier are you? Take our handy quiz

In which the author sorts the many ways of being certain about machine consciousness into eight tidy boxes, supplies a flowchart, and neglects to mention which box he is standing in.

30 July 2026 · 6 min · whitebeard

Unequal, and hungry for it

In which the author reviews Eugenia Cheng’s Unequal, enjoys the maths more than the politics, notices he finds progressiveness thrilling now, and gets extremely hungry.

12 July 2026 · 2 min · whitebeard

There's a STAR man, waiting in the sky

In which the author, between jobs and stalling magnificently, builds an AI coach to drill the STAR interview method instead of actually applying for any.

27 May 2026 · 5 min · whitebeard

Introducing Uruk, a language for tabletop games

In which the author admits to a nagging feeling that computing has gone wrong somewhere, points at a tiny algebra that maybe gets a part of it right, and starts building yet another programming language. Sorry.

17 May 2026 · 8 min · whitebeard