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I'm horrible when it comes to finishing personal projects. My projects usually begin with some sort of 'a-ha!' moment- a novel idea or design- followed by a stretch of what makes me love programming, the egoless, effortless outpouring of code that is a hacker's Nirvana. That's usually where it stops. The initial novelty worn off, the sharp-pointed focus gone, the idea becomes a dessicated corpse in my ~/projects directory.
I used to not mind this, figuring that the academic exercise was in itself worth it, but nowadays it frustrates me that I didn't spend all that priceless free time working more mindfully on something that would be useful and mature by now. Some of the most interesting development happens refactoring, extending, or integrating mature codebases. I know this because it's what I do all day for my real job.
I suppose this shouldn't be surprising. I was the prototypical ADD kid, bouncing from one thing to another. "So much potential!", the teachers would all say, but I was always more interested in exploring things my own way than structured assignments. I got through secondary school and (almost) college on a combination of innate ability, bullshit, and charm.
It wasn't until I got a 'real' job about six years ago that I finally started learning new things, and finishing projects. The incentive structure of a real job was much different from school, and I was surrounded by very smart people, working on very challenging problems. I had the benefit of some truly great mentors, who taught me how to move a project from design to delivery. I have yet to apply those principles to my personal work, though, so I'm still sitting on the same pile of dusty, half-finished projects.
So, project Piss Or Get Off The Pot (POGOTP) begins this weekend. I'm going through all this unfinished junk and deciding what to do with it. I'll post the results of this exercise as I go - if you see something interesting, please speak up (I know at least a couple people read this blog). |
