Pulling it all together...

I'm feeling good about where I am with my coding, I started a new book on Rails this week, called Pragmatic Agile Programming with Rails 4. I'm kind of wishing that I had done this before I repeated the Michael Hartl tutorial. This book is really enjoyable and I'm taking my time getting through it. I just finished chapter 6, today. The demo app that they started with in this book was different from the other tutorials and books that I have read, in that it was much simpler and clear.

I found out over the weekend that I can't dual boot Linux with my Windows 8. After being frustrated with the compatibility issues with Ruby Gems for Windows, I decided to do whatever it took to get Linux working. I spent the better part of Saturday morning and early afternoon working on this to no avail. I gave it a half-hearted attempt when I first got this computer,almost a year ago, but it didn't work out because, at that time, you had to disable the secure boot to get it operating and I didn't bother to do that. Apparently, this no longer an option. I really don't understand why Microsoft is doing this. Are they banking on all developers, that aren't currently using Apple or Linux, exclusively, to just switch over to using their development tools? I'm contemplating trying to switch my OS to Windows 7. At this point the only reason that I'm using Microsoft is because of Photoshop, Rosetta Stone, and the years of work that I have on my external hard drive that I carried over from the computer that had before this one.

A few months back a started taking a Stanford MOOC course on networking. I learned a lot about how networking works, in theory, but I started getting real world experience this week, when I had to change my password, because one of my neighbors has been leeching off my WiFi signal. I had been putting it off, because a.) it wasn't a serious issue, and b.) I didn't feel like resetting the passwords on every device in the house, but they finally forced my hand by hogging up all of the bandwidth, which led to additional googling and experimentation with my router.

I've also decided to start getting my professional stuff, like my LinkedIn and resume updated, so that I can seriously start looking for a job doing programming. I've been writing a real summary for my profile. Last night a friend of mine asked if I would be interested in interviewing for a position at ThoughtWorks, so that also forced the issue a little bit, although, I have been meaning to do this stuff for a while. The problem is that I enjoy programming so much, right now, that I just really want to keep learning it as a skill and I end up not devoting as much time as I should to the "career" side of coding. I'm starting to think that I may end up just doing freelance work.


PS- I didn't get that Code for America Fellowship. :(

Advanced Ruby Features

I have decided that buying a mac is going to be unavoidable. I never thought that I would own a mac, but Windows 8, their lack of interest in what's best for the user, and the inability to create apps for iPhones and iPads make owning one a necessity as a developer. Windows 8 even blocks you from running Ubuntu side by side with it and I'm still trying to decided whether or not I want to add this third party software to my system that will allow me to to this. [it's been 2 days] I'm seriously disappointed in Microsoft...shopping for macs online today was so depressing.

Two weeks ago I went to Octane and there was this chick there with a mac 

who sat on facebook for two hours...all of my nope, every bit.

I've been taking it kind of easy on myself this week, I think. That last chapter was a little bit taxing, interesting, but taxing. I had to take my time and take it in pieces so that I could retain as much as possible. The chapter that I just finished in my book was about advanced Ruby topics [whew!].  It took me a few days to get through it, just because I was trying extra hard to take everything in [probably not the best idea ever]. This is probably one of those chapters that I'm going to have to go back and read again...and again.  My favorite topics were probably the ones about Win32API and win32ole. I'm definitely going to have to learn more about that stuff.

Topics that I remain weak on are threads, fibers, and RubyInline, although RubyInline is awesome and I need to learn a lot more about that...and new languages. Being able to use C in ruby for hyperspace in your programs is sweet and I am also very interested in using any and all other languages with RubyInline. I'm extra excited about learning other languages now, even though I probably won't start anything new until 2015. It will probably be my New Year's Resolution. This year's resolution was learning to code[killing it, btw].

In the next chapter, that I've already started ;), I'm going to be making a bot, like Eliza. It's supposed to bring most of the stuff that I've learned in the book, so far, together, and it should be pretty interesting. I'm looking forward to working on it more tonight... after I do a little bit more Hindi. Hopefully, this will be great review for the things that I have already learned and clear up some of the topics that I was fuzzy on going through the book.