ProjectEcho: Interstitial Journaling Project 3

 I am thinking it is 99% done as I am not coming up with new ideas to add to it. 

https://github.com/krgirard33/ProjectEcho

Started as a note taking app that time stamps the notes, 

• then got project labels so I could figure out what project I was working on, 
• then got todos which ties into the projects, 
• got a calendar so I could limit the notes to the last 2 weeks, 
• then finished todos got limited to 1 month and added to the calendar, 
• then project dashboards, 
• then elapsed time so I could see how many hours I spent in each day, 
• then how many hours on a project, 
• then I added in recurring todos (The thing I am still tweaking around, not sure I am happy with).

 Need to update the User's Guide. 

And now I wonder what will come next.  

 

Rule 14

 If it is a major issue to get something fixed in the source program, then you have to fix it in your program. 

Inventing work arounds is fun.

ProjectEcho: Interstitial Journaling Project 2

 I have been having a lot of fun creating this. Totally flying by the seat of my pants, creating new features based on "It be neat if it had..." 

I think it is almost ready to try and use at work.  

https://github.com/krgirard33/ProjectEcho

 

ProjectEcho: Interstitial Journaling Project

So, what does a programmer do after a week of programming? Works on my own silly project., an Interstitial Journaling page... that has mission creep. 

The basic idea of interstitial journaling is to write a few lines every time you take a break, and to track the exact time you are taking these notes. (For more on this: https://nesslabs.com/interstitial-journaling)

 I needed a better way to track what I am doing at work, as different projects get charged to different accounts, and this looked interesting and easy.

 I through in a calendar so I can see what I did last week, and a todo list so I can kinda plan stuff. 
But most of it has been me working with it and saying "It needs...". Very little planning. 

It is ProjectEcho as it is a way for me to get some feedback on where all the time went, what was I doing, etc.  

https://github.com/krgirard33/ProjectEcho 

Jira

 I have decided that 'latest' is the 'sudo' of Jira api. 

Also, does anyone have a good source for learning Jira api?  

31 character limit

Making something for work, a nice simple situation of reading all xlsx files in a folder and moving the data to a tab in a single xlsx file. Easy peesy. 

30 mins later I run it the first time. It ran, but was giving me "Excel found errors, but can recover the data". Data all looked good, except every tab after the first was named "Recovered #". 

2hrs of work, with lots of long walks, and off the clock research, later, I discovered that the issue is the file names that I am trying to use for the tab names are longer than 31 characters, and the first 31 characters are the same.  OK, the first 39 characters are the same, and then there are 10 more at the end that match. These file names are insanely long. 

So I set up a simple replace to remove everything that is duplicate data in the names, and it all works! The issue was in excel, not my code. I went so far as to try writing the data to a csv, and then to the final excel file to see if there was some weird characters or formatting setting it off, before I wondered if there is a limit to the size of an Excel sheet name.

Error code

 "Oh, I know this error code! I just need to google it to remember how to fix it." 

Life of a coder.

Naming conventions are important

People not following naming conventions is going to drive me insane. 

Xxxx_xxx_dddd is not the same as Xxxx_xxx-dddd.

Ok, so check if char 8 is... No wait, just get rid if char 8... Xxxx_xxxdddd doesn't care if there used to be a - or a _ there.

Ok, thanks for helping me figure out how to fix this.

It runs faster!

 I refactored some code, cutting run time by 34%.

The program runs once a day, takes 5 minutes, with 4 minutes of that being 2 rounds of "Wait 120 seconds and make sure we really disconnected". Around 6hrs of writing, testing, and getting approval to save 7 seconds of time per day. 

This is the life of a junior.

Can AI code?

 Today for fun I wanted to see how much I could do just using AI code.

Below is the prompts I used:

1. Using python, I want to create a todo type app that uses json to store the data
2. Based off the code above, add in a due date
3. Sort tasks by due date
4. Add in a priority rating for task, sort task by due date and then by priority.
5. Have option 5 show a list of uncompleted tasks, and a list of completed tasks
6. Add in an option to edit existing task, including description, due date & priority
7. Rather than using the command line, lets create a html interface

Step 6 I hit the first thing it didn't take into account. If you edit a task that already has a priority but remove it and don't assign it a new one it would assign it null, and then couldn't show the lists of tasks. I wrote my first bit of code and changed None to 0. Step 7... it tried to use enumerate in the task filter, which didn't work. I told it the error message I was getting and it offered me 2 fixes. Both worked, so I went with the simpler one.

Then I found out the edit button didn't bring up the edit form. "Oh hey, sorry. Here are some fixes to the JS"... still not working. Fed it all of the code in index.html. "Here you go. I had left the edit form empty". That worked.

Link to the repo I am storing it in, with pictures, and arrows, and a note on the back: https://github.com/krgirard33/todo_app

I did what?

 Work is them asking for a program to do a thing. 

It starts off bare bones, and gets more and more complex and complete each day.

And then one day it is done, and you turn it over to be run by an automated system, or other people.

Later, they ask you to make some changes, so you open up the files and try to understand why you wrote that, and this does what?

Eventually you make the changes, and hand it off again, not to think of it till they want more changes. 

I know how to do it...

 Me: I know how to do this. I have done it multiple times over the last couple of years. 

Me 20 minutes later: OK, I think I missed a step... or 10. OK, off to read my notes... or should I just google it? 

Me 30 minutes later reading "Hello World" at one of my favorite websites: http://127.0.0.1:5000/

And now, because I have been thinking about Flask, I have Flash (Gordon) by Queen playing in my head.

Just part of writing code

TFW you think "This function should do XYZ" and make it do it right the first time.

So much better than when I rewrote a function 3 times, and was questioning if I even had a clue of what I am doing, before realizing I was editing the wrong csv, which is why it wasn't finding my test cases.

That these 2 things happened 15 minutes apart... That is just part of writing code, right?

 I have made the thing.

I used what I made to update part of a Confluence page.

The updating the Confluence page part is ugly.

Part of the part I made turned a section filled with 'MW-Req-1124' 77 times, and 'MW-Req-116' 56 times into 'MW-Req 1124: 77, MW-Req-116: 56'

Now to make it better, and based on api calls and not scraping a spreadsheet.

 Coworker is not yet sold on AI as a helper, so I point out the things I have it do.

Today's was I had it turn a 300 row, 2 column table into a python dictionary.

The computer did it in about 2 seconds.

It would have taken me a long time, as took

Col1 Col2

and turned it into

'Col1':'Col2',

for all 300 rows.

This is what AI is for.

Sure, I could have written a script to do it, but why spend time creating something I might not need again for some time?

Oh wait, I should have hired someone to do it, to prevent 'robots' from taking our jobs.

 How focused am I on wrapping my brain around making this code work?

Well, I just used my teeth to rip the top off the Ziploc bag my sandwich is in, and only noticed when I was trying to get the sandwich out.

I am blaming it on my having also pulled a tiny package of chips out of my lunchbox, so I was thinking I was opening that.

Bang your head! Tech stuff will drive you mad!

If at first you do not secede, bang your head on the desk a couple of more times. Then step back and look at it all again.

Trying to install custom HTML snippits in VS Code. Looks super easy. Follow the tutorial perfectly. https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/editor/userdefinedsnippets#_create-your-own-snippets

Go here.
Select HTML
Paste this in the json file that opens.
Save it.
Done.

Fails to work. OK, delete file and try again.
Fails again.
What the... oh wait. The html file I am trying it in is coming up as a django-html file. What if I pick django rather than html?
SUCCESS!

Get A Big Picture View

 One of the things that has come up when I am helping people is that they don't just need to create a solution, they need a solution that works well with what others are doing. Your solution shouldn't create headaches for others.

This isn't just a coding thing, but in all things. Moving the teapots to the 3rd shelf might be a solution, but some of the folks who use the teapots are not able to reach the 3rd shelf, and now they have to get the step stool to make tea.

Sometimes you need to step back for a minute and get a big picture view of what's going on.

I think I work better on a team

 I have an interview today with Boeing, so I fired up our capstone project, and realized I am missing the insanity of that time, chatting with folks as we try and solve problems, playing with all the different personalities as each person takes different ways to approach them.

I've been doing some stuff on my own, but I think I work better on a team. 

My 1st interview

 I had my first real interview. Not just for a coding job, but ever. All the jobs I have had in the past were the type where you talk to someone for 10-15 minutes, and they say "Can you start Monday?", or my 20+ yr office job where I came in as a temp, and after 6 months they asked if I wanted to become an employee. 

I bombed it. Big time. 

In the first 2 minutes, I said something that was overly friendly, and then all I could focus on was how I messed up, so then I did it again, and again, and it became a downward spiral.

Afterward, I could tell you every single part I messed up. 

Meeting with LaunchCode giving me feedback on the interview.

Them: We got feedback. 

Me: I ::: covers everything I did wrong :::

Them: Yep, that about sums it all up. So what are you going to do about this for the future?

Me: I am going to ::: list out the things I need to do :::

Them: Yeah, that is what I was going to suggest. I think this is the fastest meeting like this I've had. You know what to do, now you just need to practice more.