“It’s supposed to be a challenge, it’s a shortcut! If it were easy, it would just be The Way.” Every now and then, a moment of insight sneaks itself into an unlikely source. The above quote, from the Tom Green vehicle Road Trip, is one of those moments. It’s a fantastic line, which flutters through …
The Imposter’s Guide To Bug Hunting
To me, there’s something thrilling about debugging. Other developers might find this strange. Every bug — every software defect — is a mystery waiting to unravel. I get to play detective; I get to be detective. It is an opportunity to engage some unknown opponent in a battle of the wits. Sure, as with all …
Lessons Learned After An Hour of Arduino
In an attempt to improve my shaky knowledge of — and confidence in — electronics, I have set myself a challenge: 6 months of dedicated circuit board projects. Of course, the first step was actually owning a circuit board. This was harder than it sounds — there is an overwhelming amount of kit available for the …
Why I Don’t Understand Electronics
20 minutes into my first electronics class, and everything was going smoothly. For a start, I no longer had to do woodwork — there were no hacksaws, no clamps, and no godforsaken dovetail joints. As someone whose hands might well be on backwards, this was great news. “Electronics is just maths,” I thought, “I’m good …
Other Imposters
Every tech blogger who’s ever put finger to keyboard seems to have written about the Imposter Syndrome. There’s no shortage of opinions and experiences. The following is a brief look at some of these posts. I’ve tried to summarise the below in a way that does them justice. If I’ve failed, feel free to shout …
When Tech Was Wizardry
“Technology is magic. They’re wizards, doing what they do.” I had heard this kind of thing before. This particular time it came from a retired music teacher, during a discussion round a dinner table. This is what I would normally say: there is no magic involved. Instead it is all long meetings, and hours of …
Old Man Yells At Tech
Being a developer with an aversion to hardware, I often find myself shaking my fist at any new iPhone or laptop or Smart Kettle that comes along. As I mentioned before, this is a key contributor to my own feelings of Imposter Syndrome. In order to help turn this around, allow me to first list …
Filling In The Blind Spots
Imposter Syndrome is rife in the tech industry. You might have heard the term. It’s that feeling when you start a new job, and the core technology is something that you can’t even pronounce, let alone use. Or — just when you feel nicely established — a colleague drops a mysterious Three Letter Acronym into …