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Boot.dev is a fun way to learn Python

For forever, I had been wanting to learn Python. I haven’t been doing much with scripting languages in recent years, just the occasional shell script fix here and there. Last substantial thing I did was in Perl, back in the late ’90s. I built a Perl script for autogenerating static web pages about Los Angeles radio stations from a simple text file.

A few months ago, I learned of Boot.dev, which is a gamified platform for learning back end development technologies. It’s not particularly expensive to subscribe, and you can try it out for free before you commit. You are awarded XP for lessons you complete, are rewarded for keeping up streaks of daily learning, etc.

So far I’ve managed to maintain a 183 day streak of daily coding, which has been encouraging. The curriculum currently has tracks for backend development with python/go and python/typescript. I just finished a unit on memory management in C, which was a nice refresher course. The curriculum also covers things like basic Linux commands, use of git, and provides some guided projects and opportunities to build personal projects. The platform also has an active discord community, and is somewhat oriented towards people getting skills for their first programming jobs.

I’m basically using it to get some daily mental exercise coding, and to expand my reach on the backend of the stack, as mostly I work on mobile client apps. It is definitely a professional advantage , if not a necessity, when working with devops and backend engineers to be able to read and understand Python, Go, and Javascript.

Enjoying the journey so far, and about to start a personal project, which I’ll talk about in later posts.

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Meta: doing a little bit of maintenance

So, have been behind on maintaining the blog again, which is no surprise given that I hardly update it. Did an update to the current version of WP, which was long overdue.

Also made a few tweaks to the CSS on the theme, which I’m now not seeing in the editor — think what I did next might have wiped it out.

WordPress was giving me warnings about the security risk of having unused themes laying around, so I took a little time to look at what themes I had. Some were pretty old. The main thing about older themes is that they aren’t responsive for mobile, so those had to go. Other themes that had to go were ones that don’t look good with the current content I have. Most of those are set up to have an image with each post, and so they have huge blank spaces.

I’ve kept a couple themes that I might use yet, but that’s another session.

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Sometimes healing from DV requires a trip to the dentist. You can help.

One aspect of domestic violence that is generally overlooked is that financial and physical abuse can lead to severe dental issues for survivors.

There are charitable foundations which match survivors with dentists who can help survivors with free or low-cost dental work.

https://www.givebackasmile.com is one such foundation.

This kind of assistance can be crucial in helping DV survivors recover a normal life. It’s hard to successfully interview for jobs or perform in a public facing job if you have damaged or missing teeth, and often poor dental health results in other health issues.

Note: will add more resources as I find them.

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You know you’re a bad blogger when…

… WordPress updates more often than you post.

Seriously, WordPress has been pushing out a lot of maintenance releases, enough that I have been caught with a pending update more often than not when I want to make a posting.

I’m very happy that they went to an automatic update strategy that doesn’t require special server permissions. The update scripts are also really solid — my update from 2.x to 4.x used their auto-update, and it just worked, to my shock. The smaller updates have been painless as well. Given all the security concerns around blogging software in general, I’m happy that I can keep up to date easily.

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Apple Watch activity challenge – Earth Day

Just got a notification from Apple that they are offering an Activity achievement on Saturday, which is Earth Day. To get it, you need to get 30 minutes of outdoor exercise with your Apple Watch.  This unlocks a badge in Activity, as well as some special iMessage graphics. 

I think this marks the third such challenge they’ve offered, with the first two being Thanksgiving (5k of walking) and January/NewYear ( a full week meeting your move goal in January).

Macrumors, AppleInsider, and other Apple news sites have more details. 

I wish they would step up these rewards.  Gamification is really helpful, and Apple hasn’t taken advantage of it to the extent that Nike and other vendors have.

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Round and Round…

I love American Science and Surplus,  the Chicago retailer of magnets, science gear, and just plain weird stuff.  If you ever get a chance to visit their showroom, do it — it’s a treat, and the brick and mortar location has all the charm of their print catalog, with its witty copy and hand-drawn product photos.

I bring this up because today’s new product announcement is a reissue of one of my favorite toys as a kid,  the Spirograph.  Originally marketed in the 60s and 70s by Kenner, Spirograph was a set of gears with holes in them that let you draw elaborate geometric patterns.

AmSci is offering a die-cast set, with metal gear pieces instead of the original plastic parts.   Now, if they also have good pens to use, that will be even better — the cheap pens that came with the original set dried out quickly, but you needed a pen with a certain length to the ballpoint nib to fit into the gear holes — a Bic wouldn’t work.   I had good luck with the 4-in-1 ballpoint pens, though.

I doubt this offer will last long, so don’t dally.