Preface
This piece records and reflects on my life from 2024-07-22 to 2024-07-30.
After an exceptionally rich Adventure X week of activities, I’ve returned to the daily routine of coding with focused attention. I’ve been busy with work requirements; continuing to develop the API portion of EpubKit using Cloudflare Worker; refactoring the backend of a side project I started over a year ago but never fully realized using Go, and beginning to attempt writing an API server in Rust; created an Astro web project “tools.pseudoyu.com” for my personal toolkit project “GitHub - yu-tools”; wrote a tutorial blog on Remark42 deployment, which was validated by a reader in the process of setting up a blog system; went with my family to a water park in Thousand Island Lake, feeling like I’m living quite a fulfilling life; tried watercolor painting and initiated a garage wall painting project; and many other interesting happenings.
10x Engineers
Randy recently launched a project called “Ask Hackers”, which is a search tool based on Hacker News Comments. It seems that from the inception of the idea to its launch and promotion, it only took about a day or two. This reminded me of the concept of a “10x engineer” - someone who can quickly develop and implement their ideas. I admire this ability.
I’ve actually worked on quite a few projects, both professionally and personally, and I’m embarrassed to say that while I’ve touched on many tech stacks and can write a bit in each, I’m not particularly deep in any of them. My ability to quickly implement and iterate on a product is still quite poor. There seems to be a missing link between idea and demo/product for me. I’ve discussed this topic with Randy, and he thinks it’s a matter of engineering experience. When he sees a certain effect on a website or app, he can generally guess how it’s implemented and reproduce it, whereas I might still need to look at the source code or consult AI to barely manage it.
Technical Passion
Beyond this, I’ve found that passion and motivation also influence my behavior. Perhaps because I still haven’t found my own product idea and direction, I always feel that when I was doing side projects before, I was merely “implementing” or doing technical exercises. What attracted me wasn’t the product itself taking shape, but the learning and improvement of technical skills in the implementation process. This is fine for personal growth, but for a product, it seems to lack soul. It’s like when I first met Randy and curiously asked him why he wasn’t updating Cusdis anymore, which had quite a few stars and many self-deployed users including myself. As I recall, he said that besides economic factors, it was more because he no longer had the motivation to do it, and couldn’t muster more enthusiasm for a product he wouldn’t use or pay for himself.
My own dilemma lies in this as well. It seems I still haven’t found an idea that would excite me to the point of sleeplessness. On the contrary, when developing EpubKit together, as I’ve been a long-time user of e-books myself, approaching from the perspective of a user, I have more ideas and enthusiasm for product iteration, and it feels more fulfilling.
One must be the first user of their own product.
Personal Toolkit Project
I’ve always been a heavy tinkerer of various software and hardware. I spend a large amount of time selecting the most suitable tool for almost every niche need I have, even if the time spent researching far exceeds the time using the tool itself. I still enjoy it immensely. From college until now, countless people around me have asked questions like “Do you have any camera/keyboard/microphone/xxx recommendations?” or “I want to do xxx on my phone, are there any recommended apps?” So over two years ago, I had the idea to create a personal toolkit list - “GitHub - yu-tools”.
Initially, it was just a simple GitHub project with a README.md file. Later, I gradually added some categories and a brief description for each item. I updated it periodically over two years, and surprisingly, it became my most starred repo.
I had previously seen a toolkit website made by a developer I really like, “devaslife/Takuya Matsuyama” - “A curated list of the tech I use”. He photographs each tool and adds his usage experience, which I found very valuable. So I spent an evening using Astro to create a website based on his template - “tools.pseudoyu.com”. It will focus more on software and services, and as the number of entries increases, I also want to add a conversational search function similar to “Ask Hackers”.
Photographing, screenshotting, and introducing software and hardware is a big project, and it’s continuously being updated. Those who are interested can keep an eye on it.
Personal Life Snippets
Watercolor
One time after dinner, my family tried painting watercolors on fans together. It was a completely new experience. I chose the Rust little crab, and with a bit of guidance from my senior, I completed this work. I’m very happy!!!
Garage Wall Painting
Since generating the image I wanted to paint on the workshop wall using DALL-E, we finally found time to start work. Progress is at 30%, but due to a team meeting on Monday night, it was my senior and my sister who did the painting. Although I brought my camera, I didn’t have time to record the complete process, which is a bit regrettable. Next time I’ll take more photos of the process and details. Looking forward to the final effect.
Nini
Recently, perhaps sensing my busyness, both kittens have become more clingy. Every time I write code, Nini quietly lies on the desk, occasionally stretching lazily or making a coquettish sound, relaxing and healing.
Interesting Things and Objects
Input
Although most interesting inputs are automatically synced to the “Yu’s Life” Telegram channel, I’ll still select a few to list here. It feels more like a newsletter now.
Collections
- Hono - Ultrafast web framework for the Edges
- Ask Hackers
- OpenMoji
- Vercel AI SDK
- Open Source Alternatives To Proprietary Software
Books
- Shape Up, written by the founder of Khan Academy about thoughts and practices on GPT and the future of education. It provides quite a few inspirations for daily use of LLMs. Besides becoming a tool like search engines, there’s still much room for imagination.
Articles
- Subscription-based Search Engine: Kagi
- Build Your Free Blog Commenting System from Scratch (Remark42 + fly.io)
Videos
- Encountered the Top Player Kid on the Street, He Wanted to Give Me Money on the Spot!?
- You Have the Ability to Be Happy | Book Recommendation “Counselling for Toads”
TV Series
- Go to the Windy Place, watched while eating.
Related Posts
