bphogan

bphogan, 12 days ago to random

Listening to 70s/80s rock this morning and I learned many things.

The jungle has fun and games.
When it’s love, you’ll know. Nobody can tell you.
I know exactly who to call for underhanded things at little expense.

What #RockLessons have you learned?

bphogan, 25 days ago to random

Last night, I figured out that I had sold over 70,000 copies of my books so far.

What's my secret?

Sitting down and writing the damn books.

Not every book I wrote was a winner. One book sold 15k copies. Another one sold 300.

But each sale contributed to 70k.

Write.

bphogan, 1 month ago to random

Can we please stop being “Ruby developers” or “JavaScript developers” and start being “people who solve problems with code”?

Languages and frameworks are tools.

Never once have I met a “hammer carpenter.”

“If you use a screwdriver you’re doing it wrong. “

Let’s grow up.

bphogan, 1 month ago to random

Once you've "made it", keep the network going. And give back.

Give back to the nonprofit that lifted you up.
Stay in touch with the people who helped you out.
Pay it forward to another person in need.

Don't just disappear once you've "got yours."

Everything is temporary.

bphogan, 1 month ago to random

The next issue of the Code, Content, and Career newsletter comes out tomorrow.

It's going to talk about moving from passive learning to active learning with assessments.

It's also going to show off another cool CLI tool. Are you subscribed?

https://newsletter.bphogan.com/

bphogan, 1 month ago to random

I've moved my résumé to Markdown, styled it with CSS, and used Pandoc to convert it to a PDF. And you can too with this step-by-step tutorial I wrote over at my smallsharpsoftwaretools.com site.

https://smallsharpsoftwaretools.com/tutorials/pandoc_resume/

bphogan, 1 month ago to random

Super frustrated that with most social apps, you need to register "an app" to make an API call. I just want to automate some stuff. Gimme the key.

Thank you, BlueSky and Mastodon, for having good APIs. And LinkedIn can go to hell.

bphogan, 4 months ago to random

I bought Transmit 4. I have to "subscribe" to use Transmit 5?

Renting tools is terrible.

I guess I'm using the CLI for this. At least the sftp command won't charge me.

Yet.

bphogan, 4 months ago to random

When moving from speaking to teaching, like running workshops, you may struggle to move beyond lecture.

“Watch me code” is great for YouTube. But it’s not effective teaching.

Up your teaching game: Move from lecturer to facilitator.

bphogan, 5 months ago to random

My book, Small Sharp Software Tools, and many others are on sale now for 42% off at my publisher's web site. Start the new year off with the right books for you. Visit https://pragprog.com/nysale/ to learn more.

bphogan, 5 months ago to random

I wrote a demo app that uses temporal.io to post to X/Twitter, Mastodon, and BlueSky for a conference talk, but I'm using it almost daily to post. It's not production-ready, but it works.

bphogan, 5 months ago to random

I hate the new world we live in where we rent software. And I especially hate the part where I need to log in to use desktop software. Looking at you, Adobe.

Anti-piracy methods only punish those who don't pirate. The pirates already have workarounds.

bphogan, 6 months ago to random

My newsletter's latest issue is out. See the tools and process I use to create technical content and presentations using Markdown, and how you can too.

https://newsletter.bphogan.com/archive/issue-23-tools-for-text-based-content-creation/

You should subscribe.

bphogan, 6 months ago to random

The company values are what you tolerate, not what you write down on a slide deck.

Or the office wall.

bphogan, 6 months ago to random

While I don't write code full-time anymore, I'm always thankful that I can. It's so nice to be able to write a tool I need to do my primary job better. Or just to solve a problem.

bphogan, 7 months ago to random

I wrote this post and published it to multiple places using an app I wrote powered by Temporal.

bphogan, 7 months ago to random

This whole work thing keeps cutting into my piano playing time.

bphogan, 7 months ago to random

The downside of continuous delivery is that every app is continuously updating.

It’s a miserable user experience to sit down at your console or gaming pc after a week of work and have to update ALL THE THINGS.

bphogan, 7 months ago to random

People like to tell you that feedback is a gift.

What they fail to mention is that not every gift is welcome.

Sometimes a gift is unsolicited. And creepy.

Nobody is obligated to accept your gift.

bphogan, 8 months ago to random

It’s my birthday today which means I took the day off from work.

Been doing this my whole professional life. Nobody should have to work on their birthday 🎂

bphogan, 1 year ago to random

I am unbelievably embarrassed but I share to show you #CodeNewbie folks that we all mess up.

I spent four hours today on what amounted to a spelling error. Two strings in my app needed the same value and I made a typo in one.

I should’ve used a variable. But I was foolish.

bphogan, 1 year ago to random

I’m gonna save you tons of time and money:

How to get good at any skill:

Do the skill.
Get people to tell you how you did.
Do it again, incorporating the feedback.
Repeat forever.

That’s it. There are no shortcuts. No hacks.

Practice and feedback.

bphogan, 1 year ago to random

content creator: “look at what I can do!“

educator: “here’s how you can do it!”

To be an educator, take the spotlight off of yourself and shine it on your learners.

bphogan, 1 year ago to random

“Body language is an important part of communication” is a popular belief people hold. They’ll use it to justify in-person work and “cameras on.”

This belief, like many others about “professionalism,” ignores whole groups of people, including neurodivergent folks.

bphogan, 1 year ago to random

Just because someone says “that’s a great question” does not mean that your question was great. Or even good. Or even coherent.

Sometimes people say that just to be polite in the moment.

Your questions might not be gaining you the favor you think.