{"id":49608,"date":"2025-10-12T20:18:27","date_gmt":"2025-10-13T00:18:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/?p=49608"},"modified":"2025-10-14T14:47:30","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T18:47:30","slug":"script-to-detect-slow-usb-c-cables","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2025\/10\/12\/script-to-detect-slow-usb-c-cables\/","title":{"rendered":"Script to Detect Slow USB-C Cables"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kaushik Gopal<\/a> (via Hacker News<\/a>):<\/p>\n

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You have a drawer full of USB cables. Half are junk that barely charge your phone. The other half transfer data at full speed. But which is which?<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

The script parses macOS’s system_profiler SPUSBHostDataType<\/code> command, which produces a dense, hard-to-scan raw output[…]<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

The first version was a bash script I cobbled together with AI. It worked, but was a mess to maintain. Because I let AI take the wheel, even minor tweaks like changing output colors were difficult.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

But then he asked Claude to rewrite it to be easier to maintain.<\/p>\n

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That’s the real story. Not the script, but how AI changes the calculus of what’s worth our time.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

Previously:<\/p>\n