Specific focuses and vague goals for 2017

Hello from 2017! I’m sticking with the title from last year because I like the idea of focuses rather than trying to define specific objectives when the year has barely started.

Reading.

My love of reading books has officially returned, and I’m now always on the lookout for things to explore. I set a goal of 26 books in my 2017 Goodreads reading challenge, an average of one every two weeks. It’d be great if I beat that!

I’m starting off the year in the middle of Neuromancer, so that should be done soon. I have a handful of non-fiction books that I’m excited about. After reading Kim Stanley Robinson’s excellent Aurora from last year, I want to go through the Mars Trilogy.

A couple days ago I poked at Moby Dick, which I’ve never made it through, so that could be an interesting one for the year. I was already surprised by some of the material in the opening pages—”GRAND CONTESTED ELECTION FOR THE PRESIDENCY OF THE UNITED STATES”.

Joyce is still interesting, and if I feel like going crazy I’ll probably try Finnegans Wake again. There’s also Dubliners, which should be more approachable.

And other random things. The bookshelves at home are full of things that haven’t been read. 📚

Writing.

This will always be a focus. I preach sharing your work to everyone I talk to at WSU, but I don’t necessarily practice it so well myself. I’d like to spend more time stopping to explain some of the stuff I’ve done so that I remember and so that others may find it useful. This will also be important as part of our work at WSU to help ensure long term health of the community we’re building.

Learning.

I’m going to focus on learning computer science a bit more. I pick up plenty of things here and there during the development process every day, but it would be fun to go back and explore some of the history and some of the basics from the beginning.

The two books that I’m starting with are Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs and Foundations of Computer Science (C Edition). We’ll see where those take me, I’m already loving the beginning of SICP.

I also like the idea of being more familiar with cryptography. I got Bruce Shneier’s Applied Cryptography a while ago, but never really started past the first few pages. It should be fun to get past the first few chapters.

Aside: I’ll toss in a recommendation here for The Code Book, which is very approachable and an excellent introduction to the history of cryptography.

Speaking.

I’m not sure speaking will be a focus in 2017, but this is where one of my more specific goals exists. I’d like to find a new topic I’m passionate about and develop a talk around it. Once I have that, then I’ll be focused on speaking again.

Open Source

I should probably cover this as a separate blog post.

In general, open source will be a focus for me in 2017. I still believe open source is one of the most important things we have and it is worth the time we give it.

Most of my open source time is spent contributing to WordPress. I don’t expect this will change much, though I want to make sure I’m spending enough time thinking about and working on other things as well.

I had some inspiring conversations last year, as well as the opportunity to visit the open source lab at Oregon State University. It’d be great to turn some of those conversations into action. At the very least, it’d be great to continue having those conversations.

That’s a super vague way of saying “I don’t really know what I’m going to do, but open source is great everyone, let’s do more of it!” 😎

Washington State University

4 years in July! Whoa.

We’re still doing good work. I want to make sure that we make progress early this year on a couple things:

• Have the best solution for monitoring web accessibility on all university sites.
• Syndicate content throughout the university.
• Give everyone a place to share their work with open registration for students, faculty, and staff. Free websites!

I’d feel a little weird making it through 4 years without at least having 2 of those 3 in a very good place. I think we’re close enough to say that.

Beyond those specific goals, my focus should be on documenting and sharing our work.

Activity.

I decided that focusing on “exercise” wasn’t really any fun. I want to focus on being active in 2017.

We got snowshoes a few days ago and I’m super excited about that. I’d like to spend almost every weekend between now and the end of snow season exploring snowshoeing possibilities.

Once spring comes, and maybe even before then, I’d like to spend many weekends hiking, camping, exploring, and just getting the hell away from the computer.

With activity will come exercise, just because.

Saying Yes.

I want to make sure I say yes to the right opportunities. This probably requires saying yes to a few of the wrong opportunities along the way. But I think I have a bad habit of avoiding some fun things just because it’s easier. If I do have that habit, then I want to be conscious of saying “yes” this year just to see what happens.

This might be freelance opportunities, career opportunities, travel opportunities, whatever. On December 31, there should be more “yes” than “no”.

And all of the other stuff that gets focused on.

Because why limit it to a list you thought of on January 1… Happy 2017, see y’all around!

Previously, 2016 and 2015.