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Neat stuff

# TO-DO: think up better post title

Thought I might try blogging like it’s 2004.

Books about reading and working with existing code

I started reading The Programmer’s Brain by Felienne Hermans this week. From the publisher’s site: “Learn how to optimize your brain’s natural cognitive processes to read code more easily, write code faster, and pick up new languages in much less time. This book will help you through the confusion you feel when faced with strange and complex code, and explain a codebase in ways that can make a new team member productive in days!”

Another new addition to my “work” TBR pile is The Missing README by Chris Riccomini and Dmitriy Ryaboy. From the publisher’s site: “Early chapters explain what to expect when you begin your career at a company. The book’s middle section expands your technical education, teaching you how to work with existing codebases, address and prevent technical debt, write production-grade software, manage dependencies, test effectively, do code reviews, safely deploy software, design evolvable architectures, and handle incidents when you’re on-call.”

Other things I’m keeping an eye on:

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The origin of “An Idea of Happiness”

Many years ago, I was inspired by a quote from Thich Nhat Hanh:

“Our notions about happiness entrap us. We forget that they are just ideas. Our idea of happiness can prevent us from actually being happy. We fail to see the opportunity for joy that is right in front of us when we are caught in a belief that happiness should take a particular form.”

I named my blog at the time “An Idea of Happiness” and over time used some variation of that phrase for various social media accounts.