Howdy to anybody reading this blog, this is where it starts.

I have wanted to start a blog for a few years, but I didn’t for a number of reasons. However, I now have 2 toddlers running around the house and that has made me realise that I’m not young anymore.

Of course age is relative, but I decided that this year would be the year that I actually publish something.

I have spent a decidedly large amount of my time studying - school and university and I am always learning. I believe to be really good at something you have to continually learn and strive to do so.

I read countless technical blogs, follow the latest advancements in the technologies I use day to day and make sure that I’m watching what’s trending on github.

This means that I am exposed to all these amazing people who contribute so much to the developer community while seemingly maintaining a healthily balanced life. I wonder much of the time how do they do it?

Over the last year I started to contribute back to projects that I use at work, where previously I might find a workaround or write an in-house module I now fix the problem in the project and submit a pull request when I can. Many have been accepted and merged and of course some sit that and are ignored. That doesn’t so much matter to me, the point is that I am contributing back to the projects and people that have made my life easier.

It’s early days into 2017 yet, but I hope that I can continue the trend I have started; continue to contribute to open source projects and to this blog. There are plenty of moments when I have solved a problem and thought perhaps I should tell the world how to fix it and save somebody else a headache. Instead of doing that I have moved onto another problem that demands my attention and by the time I’m at home that desire to publish my findings has faded.

I think this is a feeling shared by many developers, often you do not have the privilege of blogging in work hours or do not have the time to do so. Yet all the while the problems you have solved may need solving again by somebody else in the world and you could have helped them, as I am sure that you have been helped by a blog or a tweet or a github issue.

Will somebody else encounter the problems I’ve faced? Will they read this blog and find the solution? Maybe. Even if nobody reads this, the process of writing down a problem and how you solved it can enhance your understanding of it and of your own strengths and weaknesses.

Obviously I hope that somebody somewhere does find it helpful!