I have this tradition of mine where, on the first day of every new year, I sit down at my desk and armed with coffee, I prepare a sort of bucket list for the next twelve months. I think about what I want to focus on over the coming time.
This year was no different. Alongside buying a new car and finishing my master's degree, I added one more important goal to the list: starting a dev blog.
It took me more than half a year to finally get around to it, but as they say, getting started is often the hardest part. Once I did, building the personal blog turned out to be very fun and rewarding project. I built it using Next.js and MDX.
You can check the source code here (opens in a new tab) .
A little about me
I'm Angela and my journey as a developer started at 16, when I began studying computer science at a technical high school. Two years later, I landed an internship at a local creative agency called STETTINER (opens in a new tab) .
Over the next few years, I worked there part-time as a Web Developer while continuing my education. That's where I got my hands dirty with React, React Native, Laravel and WordPress.
Then, I spent two years at the marketing agency 180heartbeats (opens in a new tab) , building websites and web applications for marketing campaigns. During that time, I had the opportunity to work on projects for well-known brands such as Red Bull, T-Mobile and Xiaomi.
These days, I work at Shiji (opens in a new tab) , a product company delivering solutions for the hospitality industry. I ship React features in a microservices architecture running across multiple regions.
Why start a blog?
From some time now, I've been thinking about creating a place, where I could share the knowledge I've gathered along the way. I'm doing it for a few reasons:
- To learn and grow. About a year ago, I stumbled upon this learn in public (opens in a new tab) concept and thought it would be a nice idea to put something there instead of only consuming and consuming. Also, we learn the most when we teach others. If I can't explain an idea clearly, that's a sign I don't understand the topic well enough.
- To document my findings and break down complex topics. Whenever I learn something interesting, I write it down. Most of those notes end up buried somewhere in my Notion, never to be seen again. I might as well share them here and maybe, just maybe, they'll turn out to be useful for someone.
- To test my opinions against a wider audience. What if a solution I consider great isn't actually that great? Putting my ideas out there gives me a chance to get feedback, see things from different perspectives and challenge my own assumptions. Every post has a comment section, so feel free share your thoughts there!
What to expect on this blog
I plan to write here mostly about software development, especially frontend architecture, modern tooling and common problems I run into while coding. Some posts may be more technical and focused on specific concepts or libraries, while others might just be my thoughts on general topics, such as AI or career advice.
Most of the content will probably be aimed at mid to senior-level developers, but I also want to cover the basics. It's good to have solid fundamentals. Sure, we have AI now, but that makes it even more important now to be able to tell the difference between a good and a bad code.
Sooo, I think that's it. The first one done. Now let's see how publishing every two weeks works out. It all comes down to hard work and consistency now, like almost all things in our lives... 😄
If there's a specific topic you'd be interested in reading about, let me know in the comments.
Take care!