Hello, world (wide web)

It’s been nearly 3 years since I created my first porfolio site using Github pages (which I presciently gave a “v0.1.1” tag to). I’ve learned lots about backend engineering since then; I used to rely on static HTML and screen-recorded Streamlit demos (lol) to showcase my work to potential employers. This was in the old days, before you could ask The Machine God to walk you through web development step-by-step. As such, I figured it was time for an upgrade.

It’s also been a bit more than a year since I wrote my first blog post, which was the one and only post that I ever made on that site. While this seems like a resounding failure and another notch on the belt of half-assed side projects, it fulfilled it’s intended purpose of demonstrating my technical knowledge to help me secure an internship, which turned into a job.

The post reads as incredibly contrived, because it was. I had originally intended to continue writing more “Perspective” posts, but found it incredibly dull, and since I had already gotten the job that was the original ends, the means no longer felt as appealing.

I was inspired to start a blog again after reading DHH’s. The main thing that struck me was how short some of his posts were. Clearly I did not like the long-form blog format… so why did I place that constraint on myself in the first place?

DHH’s blog also helped me realize that the best way to showcase my technical perspective is through a consistent stream of thoughts, not an annual mega-post. This seems obvious in hindsight, but fresh out of 5 years of school it was not.

Despite both of these drives, the most compelling reason to publicize my thinking was for the purposes of “I told you so”. An under-discussed aspect of life after school is that you’re making decisions and formulating opinions in real-time, just like everyone else. I’ve had countless instances of seeing an idea that I had in passing be presented online and recieve warm reception. Of course, this means absolutely nothing to someone who is not me, because for all they know I could be pretending. With this blog, I’ll be able to say “I told you so”.