Goals for 2017 in Review

A year ago I set a few goals, much like the year before, and now it's time to review my results, also much like the year before.

Let's again begin with a scorecard:

1. really learn to touch type: ✗
2. write every week: ✗
3. learn a new programming paradigm: ✗
4. up my Python game: ✓
5. release one project each month: ✗

Score: 1/5

1. Really Learn to Touch Type: ✗

I'd say I'm significantly better at typing, but I didn't invest the kind of concerted effort I intended, so no dice. I'd wager that at this point I'm close enough not to fret over it too much.

2. Write Every Week: ✗

This most definitely didn't happen. I did better than in 2016, but mostly in the first few months of the year. I'm not really a blogger per se, so trying to force it results in quality below what I'd like for this particular platform.

3. Learn a New Programming Paradigm: ✗

Analysis paralysis was the biggest challenge here. I had spent so much time deciding between Elixir, Elm, and React that I ended up with nothing. On the plus side, I did toy around with all three a little bit, and it looks like in 2018 I'll get to do some of it at work, so all is not lost.

4. Up My Python Game: ✓

The one victory for 2016 was my understanding of Python. It's hard to put into words, but I feel much more in tune with the language philosophically. I'm not quite sure how much (more) expertise I have, but I feel like I understand what "pythonic" means far better than before, and that was the goal.

5. Release One Project Each Month: ✗

This was going reasonably well for a few months, but faded in the second half of the year.

Here's the list of released projects, in order of appearance:

• Autohook: A very, very small Git hook manager. Essentially a shell script meant to be symlinked to that looks for appropriately named scripts to run.
• Send Otter Love: Send cute otter pictures with puns to someone you love.
• Parsenvy: Tiny library for environment variable parsing in Python with type support.
• SPI.vim: Vim plugin for Python import sorting.
• pep20.org: Small tribute to my favorite PEP.
• Starminder: GitHub starred project reminder.
• funatparti.es: A meta-memetastic static site I'm not even really sure how to describe.
• SocalPython.com: Static site for my local Python meetup group.

All in all, I'm actually pretty happy with the results, as Autohook, Send Otter Love, Parsenvy, and Starminder have all been successes in their own ways:

• Autohook has 22 stars on GitHub as of this moment, and at least I'm using it.
• Send Otter Love actually profited a little when it was launched last Valentine's Day.
• Parsenvy is now part of all my Python personal projects.
• Starminder has 25 users.

I'll give myself partial credit for this one.

Now What?

One (and a half) out of five is, uhh, definitely not great.

That said, 2017 was a big year for me personally, with my priorities and rhythm shifting throughout the year, so I'm OK with it. Additionally, the successful projects have far surpassed anything I've ever accomplished before on my own, which is a huge win.

In a few days I'll write up my thoughts for 2018. This time I plan on doing something different.

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