Reflecting on 2023 and Looking Forward to 2024

{CodingBlocks}.NET

It’s that time of year…the time we (reluctantly) look back at what we said we were going to do this past year and see if we actually did it. Then, we repeat history and set some goals we’ll likely look back and wish we’d accomplished this time next year. In addition, we continue with the antics we’re known for, Joe gets a little aggressive in Mental Blocks, Outlaw has finally nailed nouns (or so we thought), and Allen tries not to look back at 2023’s plans.

The full show notes are available on the website at https://www.codingblocks.net/episode225

Reviews

Again, thank you so much for the heartfelt and funny reviews! And if you reading this and have thought, “I really should leave them a review”, we’ll make it easy! Just click https://www.codingblocks.net/review for some helpful links.

• iTunes: Aan012, ajswizzle, The baze girl
• Spotify: rodney, dylan, Ghostmerc, Finn Pomfret

Upcoming Events

• Orlando Code Camp Conference is February 24th
  https://orlandocodecamp.com

Random Thoughts

Contemplating replacing consumer mesh network with one of the following
This first one I found while editing the notes for the podcast – looks super promising
Alta Labs AP6 Pro – https://amzn.to/3HurKYZ

TP-Link Omada equipment – https://amzn.to/41Rxk0S

Ubiquiti Unifi – https://amzn.to/48LvkJN

Why? Better control what devices can talk to other devices on the network (VLAN’s, separate SSID’s, etc) – security and performance focused

Looking Back and Looking Forward

• Allen
  • What was actually accomplished in 2023
    • Fully embraced DevOps as a culture
    • Kubernetes all the things
    • Duplicate data…intentionally
  • Looking forward in 2024
    • Way deeper into data streaming (maybe doing a talk on it…maybe making videos about preparing)
    • More usage of AI’s – images, coding, questions in general
    • More automation, less manual intervention
    • Hopefully more YouTubing
      The microphones Allen bought that will force his creative hand
      https://amzn.to/48zCrVw
      
      An alternative wireless setup for guitars:
      https://amzn.to/3NRTcTQ
      
      
    • Maybe attending more events, like MVP Summit
• Joe
  • Looking back on 2023
    • Healthy…Fail!
    • Wealthy…Boooring, pay yourself first and forget about it
    • Wise
      • Did not spend any significant extracurricular time on Spring, Streaming, or LeetCode
      • I did do quite a bit of GameDev
  • Looking forward in 2024
    • Healthy – Food Diary
    • Wealthy…Boooring, pay yourself first and forget about it
    • Wise
      • Keep investing in Obsidian, more tags, more dates
        • Restaurant orders, meeting notes, daily TODO tracking
      • Yousician – Guitar, Bass, Ukelele, Voice, Piano weekly streak
      • Godot – Publish more and smaller games, tools, and soundtracks on itch.io
        https://godotengine.org
      • Some fun web project

Please leave us a review! https://www.codingblocks.net/review

• Michael
  • Looking back on 2023
    • Kotlin. YES! Love it.
      https://kotlinlang.org
    • Deeper on streaming technologies … not to a satisfying mastery level … yet
    • Music theory and techniques .. getting there
  • Looking forward …
    • Flink … really want to master this one
      https://flink.apache.org
    • Reaper … so powerful but I know nothing about it
      https://www.reaper.fm
    • Sweep picking, scales/fretboard knowledge, improvisation
    • Health goals – walk 5 miles per day, MORE cycling!

Resources we Like

• The “I Workout” song: LMFAO – Sexy and I Know It (Lyrics) YouTube https://www.codingblocks.net/podcast/2023-resolutions/
• Minikube with Multi-Node setup
  https://minikube.sigs.k8s.io/docs/tutorials/multi_node/

Tip of the Week

• Tony Anderson is a music producer that specializes in minimalist ambient piano music. It’s really lush and inspiring, check it out!
  https://open.spotify.com/artist/3aRscMJRah0QrvGE5rkvZl
  https://music.apple.com/us/artist/tony-anderson/19063662
  Tony Anderson’s studio walkthrough that Joe mentioned as well
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n13IqwJlYgg
• Using Podman + Kind = Lower CPU overhead than Docker
  Podman (Docker replacement) – https://podman.io
  Kind (Run Kubernetes Nodes as Pods with Docker or Podman) – https://kind.sigs.k8s.io
  Want to run Kubernetes as close to a cloud implementation as possible on your mac? https://opencredo.com/blogs/building-the-best-kubernetes-test-cluster-on-macos/
  mirrord – https://mirrord.dev/
• Be careful. But it’s so cool.
  git pull --rebase=interactive origin trunk
  https://git-scm.com/docs/git-rebase