2018 - My year end programming retrospective

This year has been a roller coaster ride for my journey in the world of Computer Science. I added a few more feathers to my cap but still it wasn’t the best year for me. Let me do a #throwback and explain what worked well and unwell for me this year.

Starting with The Timeline:

1. January: Capitalised on building simple yet powerful Pythonic scripts which could automate my daily activities.
2. February: Got bored doing similar automation stuffs and took the data science journey little more seriously and started reading more about ML and DS.
3. March-April: Completed many specializations pertaining to ML and Data Science (everything primarily with Python)
4. May: Got bored doing ML stuffs and felt to work on a fully blown Python project. Got hooked by some research from Carnegie Mellon University and pertaining to Image processing and Dynamic Programming.
5. June: Built a fully blown python library pyCAIR
6. July: Stumbled across premier Python conferences (The PyCon’s) happening across the globe and thought to try my luck with few interesting topics which I had discovered pertaining to Python
7. August: Started with a new job in a MNC and in start everything went smooth and easy.
8. September: Got selected to speak at PyCon UK 2018, PyCon India 2018, PyCon Balkan Serbia 2018 and PyBITS Hyderabad. Started preparing for the conferences. In the meanwhile the job started getting monotonous.
9. October: PyCon India happened and met some amazing Python core community members. I was the youngest speaker among the speaker lot. The month ended with a talk at PyBITS Hyderabad.
10. November: PyCon Balkan happened and it was the first international conference for me. Started getting more involved with Python community and devoted some handful time to study few reference implementations of Python language. In the meanwhile, I got admits from few universities for my Masters in CS. Realized that job sucks and I don’t think I can persist with this work for more than a year. (No way!)
11. December: Got selected to speak at PyCascades 2019, the premier community conference in USA. I realized that I am madly in love with Python and this ain’t gonna stop ever. In the meanwhile, I started preparing for my Masters and got back to what I am best at. “The #basics”. Started with Competitive programming + Algorithms + Data structures once again to get better at them. But now I have decided to code everything in all of the three C++, Python and Java. Made a clear resolution to learn Go and Rust. Started reading “Thinking, Fast and Slow” + “Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck” when I am not programming.

The good parts about journey:

1. I can call myself Pythonista yet I am just a noob at it.
2. Meeting core community developers and members of Python
3. Understanding the importance of giving back to society whatever has been learnt.
4. Making myself realize that its always good to be back at the basics.
5. Despite a good paying job, it feels great that I have found myself doing things that I love.
6. New meaning, purpose and direction in the world of programming.
7. Nothing is enough. Life is always to learn and understand new things.
8. Realized that the fire, desire and the excitement to learn still persists within me

Looking back, the parts that could have been more better:

1. Learning curve wasn’t great.
2. Improper scheduling which resulted in clear priority inversion of my short-term and long-term goals.
3. Couldn’t devote more than 6 hours/day for what I loved because of my job.
4. More time could have been devoted to personality development and public speaking.

Wishing everyone a very happy and prosperous 2019.

Ending the year with memories of PyCon’s which I have attended to date:

https://ibb.co/album/izSD1F