weekly stats
- applications sent: 2
- interviews: 0
- rejections: 1
- github activities:
- leetcode problems: 4
- hiking miles: 10.5 miles
- exercise time: 7 hours 11 minutes
- words written: 1,924 words
- books read: 2
- documentaries watched: 0
- items baked: gluten free peach streusel bars with blackberry yogurt sorbet and pflaumenkuchen (yeasted plum cake)
- tech learning of the week:
- non-tech learning of the week: I'm doing some on-page SEO work which has necessitated a refresher on Google's most recent algorithm updates. I also got to do a little SEO crash course with Anya Aven.
pre-week journaling
This week, I really want to dedicate some time to planning out some freelance web work. I've already been working on a few exciting web development plans, but I need to put in a bit more work to really jumpstart my plans.
Next, our team at Interconnected Collective is preparing for the Lesbians Who Tech conference next week! We make the unofficial conference bingo game and I build the website. This is our testing week so I'm expecting some last minute changes.
I've finally been to the grocery store after my camping trip. Now the fridge is full, but all I've got is ingredients. In other words, I might as well have nothing. I'm going to be doing lots of cooking and baking this week.
Finally, it's data structures and algorithm time again. I'm looking forward to reacquainting myself with Leetcode.
thoughts for the week
The week started out as expected. I was doing my Leetcode, I was working on my own website, I was applying to jobs, and I was making the occasional edit to the Interconnected Collective website.
But then I was faced with one of my least favorite software engineering questions. "Do I spend several hours now completely refactoring this code or do I spend a few hours parsing this every time I need to make an edit to this code?"
After much deliberation and a non-nonsense conversation with Brian Aston, I decided that the answer to take the time to refactor now.
In all of my other moments, I've done so much baking and cooking. I think I've washed all my dishes twice and it's only Thursday.
post-week journaling
final calendar
what I accomplished this week
This has been a busy week. The benefit is that I haven't felt the lack of productivity that I was experiencing last week. While I didn't get to a few of the things I wanted to, I'm still feeling good about what I accomplished this week.
The exception is the job rejection I got Friday at 5pm. To all the companies out there, please don't send your rejections out last thing on Friday. I appreciate not being ghosted, but send them out Wednesday at 11am or some other nondescript time.
edits to the Interconnected Collective site
When we first launched the InCo website, we were in a bit of a time crunch. A few of our React components worked, but they were held together with tape and prayers. This is fine until we need to make an edit.
Most of the confusion was with the CSS. We were following the React pattern of each component imports its corresponding CSS file. In my case this week, HomePage.jsx imports HomePage.css for all of the component's styles.
We had a few problems:
- Class names in the
HomePagecomponent were not unique toHomePage. These class names and the associated styles were also present in the nav bar and app components. Styles were colliding and overwriting each other, making it hard to identify where to make edits. - Styles were applied with a mixture of internal stylesheets and inline CSS. Some stylesheets were using
!important. - The code was generally messy. Class names were duplicated in the
HomePage.cssfile, there were a plethora of breakpoints, and many elements were individually styled with highly specific CSS.
I spent a few hours trying to untangle everything. In the end, I just broke it more and didn't bother committing any of it.
Instead, I removed the entire CSS file and rewrote it. With the goal of easy maintenance for when I pass this codebase on, I focused on:
- Component specific names. I might someday update the entire project to CSS modules, but for now I decided to pattern match the other components. Where appropriate, they follow a class naming pattern of "ComponentName-class-name" to avoid colliding styles.
- Documentation and organization. I organized classes by page section (I would love to break the giant homepage component up into more components, but that's a change for another time). All breakpoint specific styles are at the end of the file following that same order.
- Consistency. I opted for almost entirely CSS stylesheets to define the site's styles. This is a design heavy site, I'm not a huge Bootstrap fan, and this matches our other components.
The refactor took 7 hours in total. Through that, I reduced the JavaScript file by 50 lines and 1,305 lines! It is now 75% smaller than it was. That should be much faster for updates and maintenance going forward.
Prior to the refactor, edits such as changing a button width, took about one hour. The edits I've had to make since deploying the refactor are closer to five to ten minutes each. So I should make my time back in about eight edits.
If you are attending the Lesbians Who Tech conference, be sure to play InCo's bingo game. And if you see any mistakes on the website, you know who to contact. (Me. It's my fault and you should contact me.)
Also, if you are looking for a volunteer role in the tech industry, send us an application! We're recruiting for all kinds of roles.
other accomplishments
I completed by quarterly breakfast burrito meal prep. With an assembly line process, I made 14 breakfast burritos on Friday. That should last me three or four months, although I can't fit anything else in my freezer now.
I also got to experiment with a new pie and ice cream combo. I made some gluten free brown butter peach streusel bars (recipe from Bake from Scratch with modifications) with a blackberry Greek yogurt sorbet. The sorbet is relatively tart and probably not ideal on its own. With these amazing peach bars though, it is perfect.
I also hiked Mt. Ida in Rocky Mountain National Park. It is about 12,800 feet, so it was all the work of a 13er without the bragging rights. The views were incredible and from the top, we could see Julian Lake. I made sure to get a picture of myself with it.
I'm sad summer is almost over.
priorities for next week
Next week will be a lot of networking! I have a few different job fairs and conferences coming up so I'm going to really focus on my job search.