Happened: On On!
This is the fourth project update for my project “Happened” and participating in the One Side Project challenge. You can find my previous posts here.
The plan for this month was to build upon the platform I established these past few months. Add features, fill in around he core.
This didn’t happen. Where I left things, API split from the client, there was still a misunderstanding that made it seem no data was transferring between. Three or four times I tried to untangle that misunderstanding, and it still eluded me. I became disheartened, mulling over what to do.
Work continued to pressure for more programming, things that worked and hat I understood. I talked myself into rewriting the API again, this time in Python. I knew Python, I liked writing it. Surely this would solve my problem. I began dreaming of how much better it would be in Python, how much faster I would implement features and how effortlessly I would avoid errors.
I finally had time to focus on it, and I decided to start by writing down why I was doing it. I’m glad I did. I realized that it wasn’t the API that’s as broken; couldn’t be the source of my confusion. I reasoned my way through the chain of communication and decided it had to be the way the client was calling the API and consuming its output. Some simple debugging showed this to be true, the API was returning good output but my client was throwing it away. Another few minutes of fiddling with it yielded results.
I’m both elated and chagrined; I’m happy to have fixed it, though I almost fell for the dark lure of the Rewrite. If I’d spent an hour rewriting the API I wouldn’t have fixed my issue and wouldn’t have gotten any further understanding JavaScript. It was only by owning up to my mistakes and pursuing them to the end which allowed me to get a better understanding of callbacks and of when to use synchronous and asynchronous techniques.
Done in April:
- Fixed a nasty bug that prevented the client from working
- Roughed out list sharing with some object analysis and storyboarding
- Found time slots that work for me to focus on Happened
To do in May:
- Finally write the admin elements I promised, and
- Build out the list-sharing features
I’m being more modest about my goals, real work continues to take much of my focus and real life has been busy. I have found some time slots where I can work on Happened, which is a huge win over February and March.
All my best to my fellow OSP, just keep putting one foot in front of another. Soon you will have a breakthrough where it all falls into place!
And as always, give this article a 💚 recommend if you enjoyed it, and follow One Side Project Challenge for my future updates and other inspiring side projects.
