Let’s get this ball rolling. I want to start learning something new, so it is time to create my first project! For some reason when I started thinking about this post this morning the old school Batman TV show (WPC Score: 24) theme song popped into my head. So just because I can, here are the lyrics:
Batman, Batman, Batman, Batman!
source: https://www.lyricsondemand.com/tvthemes/batmanlyrics.html
Batman, Batman, Batman!
Batman, Batman, Batman, Batman!
Batman, Batman, Batman!
Batman, Batman, Batman!
Batman, Batman, Batman!
Batman, Batman, Batman!
Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na
Batman!
I would love to know that this has now caused the hopefully dozens of people that might read this to get that tune stuck in their heads… but let’s be realistic here. I am getting old and the population of people that might get this reference is shrinking. *sigh* Oh well – let’s get to the project.
This will be the first project that I attempt to document in this way. I have written user manuals, quick reference guides, instructions and other documentation as an Engineer, but this is the first time I am judge, jury, and executioner on the project, goals, and outcomes. I also want to create something that someone else might enjoy reading so a bit of humor and a big emphasis on clarity and brevity is in order. So let’s start by defining the project goals:
Goal #1 – Get better at writing. This will be inherently hard. Usually when trying to learn something new I am a bull in a china shop. I start on one topic and 2 hours and 38 chrome tabs later I am very very distracted. It also means that I tend to move quickly – if I can find an answer to a problem I usually grab it and go without taking a lot of time to understand it. When writing about how to do something the journey is more important that the destination so slowing down and taking more time is very important here
Goal #2 – Gain a better understanding of certain technology and learn some new technologies along the way. For this project I am going to target Docker (build new knowledge), Ruby on Rails (grow existing knowledge), Github (retain knowledge), and APIs (build, retain, and explore knowledge)
Goal #3 – Support open source and build my presence. One of the overall goals of this blog is to grow my presence and to give back knowledge and ideas. Therefore, this project will both be documented on the blog and also all code will be licensed as open source (need to research that one as I am not even sure if I am stating that correctly) and posted on a public repository in Github. Win-win for everyone!
What next? While this would be a good opportunity to go over some project management practices – I am going to skip that for this project. The primary reason here is that there is enough to do and focus on here and I am afraid that the messaging will get to broad if I try and talk about project management alongside the current goals. So – let’s save that for the next project. However – there are elements of project management that will help this project keep moving forward, I just won’t be taking the time to discuss what those elements are and why they are being used.
Oh yeah – goals are nice and all but what is actually being created here? The next project post will define this in detail but as a hint it has something to do with the Wikipedia Philosophy Challenge…
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