I'm not addicted to social media. I don't doom scroll. I don't use my phone while driving. I don't feel compelled to get every notification from every tiny interaction with my online persona. But I still feel like I spend too much time staring at my phone.
That's why I decided to turn my smartphone into a dumbphone.
In this post I'll walk through my reasoning, how I performed the switch (including why I didn't buy an actual dumbphone), and how it's going so far.
I've used Google Analytics on my site(s) for many, many years. It's fine. I honestly don't really have a problem with it from a developer's perspective. That said, I don't need all the things it does, and I fully understand the concerns of many people with the various tracking methods employed by Google and (many) others.
So, what other solutions exist? And what about for a static site where I don't get access to the server logs? And as a static site...
A couple years ago a friend and former colleague said to me, "you like puzzles and games and stuff, right? How about you make a badge challenge for this conference."
I've been privileged to have attended and spoken at more than my fair share of conferences and similar events; however, these were almost entirely software development events, and none of them had a "challenge" to earn a badge. But this wasn't for just any conference, it was for DEFCON 32...
In nearly every role I've held there have been people that do not understand open source. That's not to say that they couldn't, they've just never had to truly understand the nuances of the ecosystem, the players involved, their motivations, or the criticality of the delicate balance being held. I often become "the open source guy": that person in your organization that gets it. The one others refer you to when you have a question about open source software.
Software engineering isn't magic, and neither is engineering leadership. Too often organizations leave engineering teams to fend for themselves when it comes to basic tools, techniques, and practices. A good leader makes decisions, leads from the front edge of those decisions, and then listens to their team to iterate and improve over time. But how can a new leader approach an existing organization to make a positive impact?
This article will explore some strategies for...