Oops! I wrote this back in December but somehow forgot to post it. It’s a bit late, but I think it still has value.
Early this year I put up my list of developer goals for 2013. Here’s a quick summary:
- Learn Git
- I’ve been using Git exclusively for source control for 10 months at Wattpad. I wouldn’t classify myself as an expert just yet, but I’m very comfortable using it and most commands I use are built into my muscle memory now.
- Launch an app that generates money
- While I haven’t created and launched an app of my own that charges money, earlier this year I was heavily involved in a new project at work that required integration with Stripe for processing transactions with customer cards. I’m going to consider this a 50% success.
- Publish some open source code
- I haven’t actually published any code yet, but lots of time has been spent learning the tools that I would need to do so (Git, GitHub, BitBucket, Markdown).
- Write automated tests for most of my code
- I write more tests for my code than I did a year ago, but I don’t think I’m at the point where I’m more likely to have tests for my code than not. At work we’re pushing very hard towards TDD, and I’d say we’re getting close. I’m confident it will get there.
- Find a mentor
- 100% complete! Very early in the year through the magic of Twitter I was connected with Jeff Carouth, a PHP dev. out in Texas. We’ve had a number of online chats and even a few Skype calls to talk about various development topics. Our discussions often turned to Domain Driven Design (DDD), a concept that I was familiar with in name only, but now understand much better. I’m currently working on applying DDD to some Javascript projects that I’m working on.
Looking back at the list I’m a bit surprised to see that overall I have done decently well. Far better than in previous years where I didn’t end up touching any of my goals throughout the year.
