Week Notes 21#47

The one with the new laptop, and the first week of pairing!

• Had some good chats with some of the other agencies about API discovery, API management and some other requirements we may want to take into account
• There was a very good X-Government Software Engineering group Lean Coffee, where API discovery/management was discussed, as well as how to build more sustainable tech. Was a shame not more folks were there, but really interested to carry on the conversations over the next few months
• Had some good discussion X-Government about why you shouldn't use microservices, at least to start with, and then break down things when you're actually ready to
• Not a great week of sleep - a mix of too hot, too cold, and storms, and some weird dreams - a clown car full of aggressive students, and picking a spot that led to my stomach returning to what it was like a week after my appendix
• Got the contents of my pedestal from Capital One, and it was a bit of a blast from the past going through the stuff and seeing a lot of stickers and swag from years gone by
• Had a lovely Friday afternoon catch up with Shama about our jobs, acquisitions going well, and that everyone's doing OK, and getting a chance to catch up on life
• Had a lot of back and forth on living room and the sofa setup, but think we've got the final setup, so now just need to sleep on it
• Work in London on Monday for planning out the federated API model
  • As my headphones were being repaired, I took Anna's which was nice, but made me miss mine!
  • Taking my old laptop, knowing I was imminently getting a new one was a bit of a shame, but made me appreciate being able to get a new one whenever I wanted!
  • Not the most productive journey, but did lots of reading of Brandur's blog, and got the correlation-id blog post out
  • Had a good start to planning out what the federated API model could look like
  • Trying to shave a few seconds off my journey home, I nipped out while a bus was going across the road and almost got hit by a car coming towards me that was hidden by the bus - was pretty scary, and I'm glad that nothing happened, and that the driver was OK - I hope I really didn't ruin their day
• The start on the development of the Federated API Model
  • Because we wanted to hit the ground running, I decided (with agreement) that we'd go for a Spring Boot application, as our experience would allow us to get something going more quickly, and we'd not have the problem of fighting with the language + stack as well as the problem domain
  • It's been nice working on a stack that I've got good experience with, and we've had some really good opportunities to focus on TDD / writing quality applications
  • It's the first time we've actually had to properly work together, which has been really nice and we've really enjoyed it
  • First proper pairing I've done in quite some time, so it's been pretty exhausting - more for Bethan as driver - but we're adapting the way we do it and making sure we take breaks more often
  • Google Meet wasn't very good for pairing, so after speaking with the GDS community, so we've been using Slack Huddles and that's been pretty good, especially as I've been able to draw on the screen, and I'm impressed with the ease of jumping into a call compared with /zoom
  • Bit of a shame to be back to thinking about work outside of work - one walk to Lidl resulted in me thinking about what's next in our piece of work, and it was a shame that my mind seems to be getting back to the swing of over-work, but hopefully it won't stay
  • Also my first real monorepo - rather than a multi-module Java project - so am looking forward to getting to learn + write some stuff about improving GitHub Actions for it
• Second - and last - in-person Homebrew of the year
  • Was a nice time with Carol chatting and coding
  • Made some very good progress on the scripts to convert my backfilled Twitter data to a format that my site can take. Still deciding whether I'll do it now, or once I've moved over to Vibrancy
• Got my headphones back from repair
• Disappointed with Black Friday, but got some bits for the new living room, and an air fryer!
• Morph's been pretty stressed this weekend with the storm, being half way out through his cat flap and yowling at a cat outside, and us moving around the living room, but now seems to be OK
  • Been a little bit worried about him this week, as he's suddenly started (attempting) to use his litter tray
• Little bit nervous about COVID, with the Omicron variant in Nottingham, and suggestions that the pandemic may restart, so we're going to be more careful about in-person
• Very excited to finally get my new laptop - an XPS 13 (9305) - after a couple of years of thinking of upgrading
  • Almost didn't get it in time for the weekend as I'd not properly activated my John Lewis card
  • Had a bit of a mad rush to get a USB/adapter in time to install it, but found a USB-C to USB-A adapter from a phone that could be used
  • As it's been out for ~12-18 months, it's got good support for everything that can be upstreamed
  • Had an issue with booting because RAID was set up, but I remembered seeing that as an issue on the Wiki so was able to turn it off and get going
  • Started documenting the progress / support on the Arch Wiki
  • Using my laptop between games has been very convenient, as now I'm USB-C gang, I can use the cable to my monitor to charge, instead of needing to move my laptop charger!
• A busier week ahead of Anna's parents coming for the evening - we planned to make the Normandy chicken, but got treated to Rakki Rakkas which was nice
• Sunday was a Normandy chicken day, as we opted for Chapati Junction instead of cooking on Saturday
• Severn Trent, despite saying they'd call me last week to talk about the implications of a water meter, have put me onto a water meter, without a call
• Got part of the way through upgrading my personal services to Spring Boot 2.6.0 before finding a Spring Security tweak is required, or I'll need to workaround it locally
• Had a nice unofficial Homebrew on Sunday - Anna and Carol had an in-person Tech Nottingham co-working space, and I gatecrashed for a bit
  • Was also very cool that I was able to run IntelliJ very easily while also doing other stuff, without the laptop breaking a sweat - it was a large part of me getting a new laptop, so I can code more easily
• Was very lucky to not burn down the house, by putting two mince pies in the microwave with their foil still on, but fortunately they were only in for ~20 seconds
• After thinking I wasn't going to get one, I've now got a work phone, which will make travelling easier, as well as allowing me to remove the temptation of work from my personal phone
• A lot of the week was spent being pretty shattered after a busy weekend, and with pairing on top of it, a lot of energy being used, as well as prep for guests

Watched:

• The Expanse
• Red Notice which we thought was really good - aside from a few bits towards the end that needed quite a bit of suspension of disbelief
• Tidying Up with Marie Kondo
• Hawkeye
• Marriage or Mortgage
• Dream Home Makeover
• Saturday Night Live