Your Local Code Smithing Hero Goes back to his Day Job

This is the 4th and final post in this mini series. In the last post I wrote about how I was able to use my extra time during the Covid-19 lock-down to further my skills at the keyboard as a software developer. In this article I’ll detail how I continue progressing my skills after the lock-down, through stages one, two and three of reopening.

I missed my clients, I missed helping people and I missed the regular structure that daily work brings.

It’s now July 2020, my home town (Kitchener, Ontario) has been slowly returning back to normal after the Covid-19 lock-down. Kitchener has been in stage 3 for two weeks and I have been back to work practicing massage therapy for two months. It’s great to see things slowly opening up and it’s also fantastic to hear that we’ve had no new Covid-19 cases in the Region of Waterloo for two days in a row. It’s certainly nice to be back to work; I missed my clients, I missed helping people and I missed the regular structure that daily work brings. Being back to work doesn’t mean that I’m done with programming but it does mean that I have to focus on managing my time now.

Despite having to split my efforts between family, massage therapy and programming I have been able to get quite a bit done. Using an API I discovered, I have developed and deployed a new component for my D&D(Dungeons and Dragons) app using vanilla JavaScript. I completed another course by Wes Bos, React for beginners as well completed just enough of his Advanced React course to learn ‘styled-components’. I then redid the new D&D component using React. And now I’m working on making a portfolio website using React and Gatsby (a static website generator built on top of React).

The API that I found contains all the open source content provided by Wizards of the Coast. I used this resource to create a one page app component that allows the user to browse through the rules and reference material the API provides. It was a great learning process to dynamically update the DOM manually using only JavaScript but once I spent time learning React it made no sense to continue on in this style. React and Styled-Components have changed my approach to web development so I then redid the app component using the React library.

I still have some work to complete with the D&D app but I have switched gears for a bit. I’m developing a portfolio site for myself. I’m using Gatsby to do this. Gatsby is a static website generator built on top of React. This is a powerful combination providing the speed and security of a static website on top of the functionality, performance and componentized development framework React provides. I used Figma to prototype the layout and design then export any SVG’s and images I needed. I have implemented the UI with the React/Gatsby stack along with Styled-Components as a CSS preprocessor. I’m also using Sanity as a headless CMS to manage any content the site will use allowing easy updates in the future. The Sanity schema is done, now I’m in the process of implementing the GraphQL hook allowing communication with the CMS database at build time. For deployment Netlify will be the solution. Netlify offers a continuous integration / continuous development hosting solution, providing fresh builds followed by redeployment with any content changes in the CMS or anytime new code is merged into the master branch.

Covid-19 was a tragedy in all our lives but I believe I was able to turn it around and use the time provided to my advantage. Rather than waiting around to see what would happen, I sharpened my pencil and got to work.

Covid-19 was a tragedy in all our lives but I believe I was able to turn it around and use the time provided to my advantage. Rather than waiting around to see what would happen, I sharpened my pencil and got to work. Being back to massage therapy limits my time working at the keyboard but it provides me stability while I continue developing myself and my craft.

The next big step will be gaining experience while working within a team of professional developers. I’m sure this will seem overwhelming at first and I know I will feel like an imposter from time to time but when given the opportunity to learn I’ll put the hours in and do the work necessary to take advantage of the situation. I don’t have this opportunity in front of me right now but you never know when the next exciting opportunity will come around the corner. In the meantime I have lots of work to do in order to complete my current projects as well as some ideas for future projects. I also have a long list of technologies and skills I’d like to advance my understanding off, and at the top of this list is brushing up on my testing libraries. I have experience writing unit, integration and functional tests with Jasmine, Rspec, Cucumber and Capybara but I’m a bit out of practice

Though the story isn’t over, this completes my 4 part series detailing my progression as a software developer. Stay tuned to hear more about my exciting adventures as your local code smithing hero.