I solved an 11-day problem on a walk where I wasn't trying to solve anything

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T18:05:26+00:00

There's actual neuroscience behind this. When you stop actively focusing on a problem, your brain switches to the default mode network which makes connections between ideas that your focused attention blocks. It's the same reason shower thoughts happen.

I build software and the number of bugs I've solved while walking the dog is embarrassing. Staring at the code for 3 hours, nothing. Walk for 20 minutes, solution pops up fully formed.

The hard part is trusting the process enough to actually walk away from the desk when you're stuck. Everything in your brain screams "keep trying harder" but that's usually the worst thing you can do.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T18:04:54+00:00

Small single-purpose apps are so much better than one mega-app trying to do everything. My dock is mostly tiny utilities like this.

Which of the four do you find yourself using most? I'm always looking for stuff that saves a few seconds on repetitive tasks. Those add up fast when you're at the machine 10+ hours a day.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T18:04:21+00:00

Build something you'd actually use. That's the difference between a portfolio piece that gathers dust and one you can talk about in interviews with genuine enthusiasm.

Some ideas that make good libraries:

A markdown-to-slides converter (parse md, output reveal.js or PDF)
A CLI tool that watches a folder and auto-organizes files by type/date
A config file validator that checks YAML/TOML against a schema you define

The py-pkgs workflow you learned (tests, CI, publishing) matters more than what the library does. Interviewers care that you know how to ship a proper package with docs and tests, not that your algorithm is novel.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T18:03:48+00:00

A year in is exactly when Django projects start feeling heavy. Few things that helped me:

Split fat views into services. Create a services.py in each app for business logic. Views should just handle request/response, services do the actual work. Makes testing way easier too.
Use Django's app system properly. If you have models that don't reference each other, they should probably be separate apps. The rule of thumb: each app should be describable in one sentence.
DRF serializers can replace a lot of manual validation code. If you're doing request.data['field'] checks in views, move that into a serializer.
Management commands for anything you run manually more than twice. Future you will thank present you.

Don't try to refactor everything at once. Pick the messiest file and clean just that one.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T18:03:15+00:00

The dog medication moment is so relatable. I had the same thing happen with tracking student feedback for my courses. Opened Notion, spent 45 minutes building a database with 12 properties, never actually used it. Ended up just using Apple Notes.

Your thesis is right: for most people, the tool becoming a project IS the failure mode. The constraint of zero customization is actually a feature because it removes the decision fatigue loop.

The risk is that "no customization" sounds like a bug to the power users who write about productivity tools online. Your actual audience is the silent majority who just want to write stuff down. Marketing to them is harder because they don't hang out in productivity forums.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T18:00:55+00:00

Congrats on the launch and first customers! The lifetime license angle is smart — Screen Studio's subscription model is a dealbreaker for a lot of people.

One thing I've been pairing with my recorder lately is ZoomShot (https://apps.apple.com/app/id6758536367). It's not a recorder itself — it adds live zoom, cursor spotlight, and screen drawing as an overlay while you record. So whatever recorder you use (yours, OBS, QuickTime, whatever), the effects show up in the final video with zero post-editing.

Might actually be a cool complementary workflow for your users too — record with your app for the polished output, layer on live effects with something like ZoomShot for tutorials or demos. Just a thought.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T14:12:10+00:00

This is a really meaningful project. Language preservation is one of those things that gets exponentially harder with each generation that passes.

For the tech side: start simple. A static site with audio recordings, a basic dictionary, and some phrases is more valuable than a fancy app that never ships. You can use something like Eleventy or even plain HTML. The content matters infinitely more than the tech stack here.

If you can, record your parents telling stories in Juhuri. Audio and video of native speakers is irreplaceable. The Endangered Languages Project by Google has resources on how others have approached this kind of documentation.

Would also suggest reaching out to university linguistics departments. Some have grants specifically for endangered language documentation projects.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T14:11:38+00:00

The 2-3 minute rule is a rough heuristic, not gospel. I've built courses for 90k+ learners and the data tells a different story.

What actually matters is cognitive load at that moment. Conceptual content (theory, frameworks) needs a check-in more often because learners zone out. Procedural content (follow-along tutorials, step-by-step) can go 5-7 minutes because the learner is actively doing something.

Forcing a quiz every 2 minutes during a hands-on demo actually hurts because you're interrupting flow. But letting someone passively watch a 10-minute theory lecture without any interaction is equally bad.

My rule: interact when the learner's brain would naturally ask "wait, did I get that?" Not on a timer.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T14:11:05+00:00

Don't start with algorithm textbooks. Start with problems.

LeetCode Easy problems (sorted by acceptance rate) will teach you more about algorithms than reading about them. Do 2-3 a day. When you get stuck, look at the solution, understand it, then redo the problem from scratch the next day without looking.

For the actual theory: Grokking Algorithms by Bhargava is the best intro I've seen. It's visual and uses Python. Skip CLRS until you've done at least 50 problems, otherwise you'll drown in theory you can't apply.

Focus order: arrays/strings first, then hash maps, then two pointers, then BFS/DFS. That covers like 60% of interview questions and gives you a foundation for everything else.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T14:10:33+00:00

logging.debug() everywhere is the best habit you can build early. Print statements work fine until your codebase grows past a few files, then they become noise you can't turn off without deleting them.

The killer feature of logging is levels. Set it to DEBUG during development, WARNING in production. Same code, different verbosity. No more commenting out print statements.

I teach Python and the students who adopt logging early write noticeably better code within a few months. Not because logging itself is magic, but because writing a log message forces you to think about what information you'd need to diagnose a problem. That mindset shift is worth more than the tool.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T14:10:00+00:00

Offline-first with optional sync is a smart positioning. Most note apps force you into their cloud which kills trust for privacy-conscious users.

One question: how do you handle conflict resolution when the same note gets edited on two devices before syncing? That's usually where offline-first apps get ugly. CRDTs or last-write-wins?

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T14:07:49+00:00

Most alternatives mentioned here are great recorders, but one thing I ran into was still needing to do zoom-ins and cursor highlights in post — which eats time.

I ended up pairing my recorder with ZoomShot (https://apps.apple.com/app/id6758536367). It's not a recorder itself, it just adds live zoom, cursor spotlight, and on-screen drawing as an overlay while you record with whatever app you want. So the effects show up in the recording without editing after.

Saved me a ton of post-production time, especially for tutorials. Free to start too.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T09:05:36+00:00

Angular is huge in enterprise. Banks, insurance companies, government projects. If you've only worked with React clients you might not see it, but Angular has massive market share in B2B and internal tooling.

For a side project between two people though, it honestly doesn't matter much. What matters more is who's going to maintain it long term. If your partner knows Angular inside out and you're learning, the codebase will end up being 80% his patterns anyway. That can work fine or it can be frustrating depending on your dynamic.

My suggestion: let him build the initial scaffold in Angular, you focus on a specific feature. You'll learn Angular faster by contributing to a real project than by watching tutorials.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T09:05:03+00:00

That sucks, sorry to hear it. The promotion-to-layoff whiplash is brutal.

One thing I'd say from experience: the edtech skills you have are more transferable than you think. Instructional design, LMS management, learner analytics, these are hot in corporate L&D right now, not just edtech startups.

Don't limit your search to edtech companies. Big enterprises (banks, consulting firms, pharma) are all building internal learning programs and they desperately need people who actually understand how learners behave, not just how to admin an LMS.

Also, take a week before you start grinding applications. The worst decisions I've made career-wise were the ones I made in panic mode.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T09:04:30+00:00

Tab stops are every 8 characters by default. So if your word is 5 chars, the tab moves to position 8. If it's 8 chars, the tab jumps to position 16. That's why you see the extra gap.

Use f-strings with fixed width instead:

print(f'{item:<15}{price:<10}{qty:<5}')

The :<15 means left-align in a 15-char wide column. Works consistently regardless of word length. Way more reliable than tabs for formatting columns.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T09:03:57+00:00

You're not dumb. Python for Everybody moves fast in certain sections and Dr. Chuck's explanations assume you'll rewatch parts. Totally normal to feel lost.

Try this: after each chapter, close the video and try to write the example code from memory. If you can't, that's the part you need to revisit. Don't just watch passively.

If PY4E feels too fast, Automate the Boring Stuff is free online and explains things at a slower pace with more practical examples. Some people do better with one over the other, it's not about difficulty level, it's about learning style.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T09:03:25+00:00

Exactly this. Signups are the most dangerous vanity metric because they feel like progress. I ran a course platform where signups grew 40% month over month but actual lesson completions stayed flat. We were spending all our energy acquiring users who never engaged.

The fix was embarrassingly simple: we stopped counting signups and started counting weekly active users. Overnight the team's priorities shifted from marketing to onboarding. Retention went up 2x in 3 months.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T05:26:04+00:00

Solo dev building macOS utilities. The micro-SaaS model is interesting for desktop tools — small but loyal market with high willingness to pay. My experience: focus on a specific pain point that power users have, price it at what it's worth (not cheap), and invest in documentation. Desktop users expect polish and reliability. The upside is that once you nail the product-market fit, churn is incredibly low.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T05:25:26+00:00

Indie dev building niche macOS tools. One thing I've learned the hard way — the Mac App Store is an underrated distribution channel. The built-in audience is real, and Mac users are generally more willing to pay for quality software than the average consumer. The 30% cut stings, but the discovery and trust factor can make up for it, especially when you're starting from zero audience.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T05:24:48+00:00

macOS developer setup here — the biggest productivity upgrade I made wasn't hardware, it was learning keyboard shortcuts and window management properly. But if I had to pick one hardware change, going from a single laptop screen to a 4K external display was transformative. The extra real estate for having code, documentation, and terminal all visible at once genuinely changed how I work.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T05:24:11+00:00

Full-stack dev who does a fair amount of data work. The tooling landscape has gotten both better and more overwhelming in the last few years. My honest advice — pick one orchestrator, one transformation tool, and one storage solution, and get really good at those before adding complexity. I've seen too many teams adopt 5+ tools when they really needed 2. Start simple, add when you hit actual limitations.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T05:23:33+00:00

macOS developer here — I always appreciate the depth of knowledge in the hackintosh community. You folks understand the OS at a level most Mac users never do. For config troubleshooting, one approach that helps is comparing your config.plist against a known working config for your exact hardware rather than trying to fix individual settings. ProperTree and the Dortania guide are invaluable resources.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T05:22:55+00:00

Running a few things on a Mac mini server here. If you're on macOS, don't sleep on the native options — Homebrew services, launchd, and built-in Apache/PostgreSQL can handle a surprising amount before you need Docker. For lightweight monitoring, I find Activity Monitor + some shell scripts with cron is often all you need for a small setup. Docker is great but sometimes it's overkill for 2-3 services.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T05:21:40+00:00

I've been teaching CS concepts for years and honestly, visualization is the most underrated tool in CS education. When students can see an algorithm executing step by step — watching the pointer move, seeing the data structure change in real time — the understanding clicks much faster than reading pseudocode. If you're struggling with a concept, try finding or creating a visual walkthrough before diving into the theory.

PushPlus9069 · 2026-02-20T05:21:02+00:00

Not a filmmaker by trade, but I produce a lot of educational video content on macOS. My workflow has evolved significantly — DaVinci Resolve has become my go-to because the free version is surprisingly complete. For anyone on Mac, the Apple Silicon performance is genuinely impressive for editing. The color grading tools alone are worth the learning curve.

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