This year 2019 is over and its time we reflect on it and plan for the next year. This is a post that most people will not find useful but I write it for myself and whoever may want to know how my year was. I’ll simply write bout exciting events, achievements and next years goals.

Events and Activities

DevFest 2018 and 2019: 

Yes, the first event I attended in 2019 was DeveFest 2018. You must be confused here. This is the thing 2018 we never had Devfest so it was pushed to 2019 late January. Developer Festivals are community-run events focused on community building and learning google technologies. Personally, I go there to meet new friends in my field and to learn about new tech. This particular devfest I got started with flutter, I knew about flutter but never got serious into it until the day I attended.

I again attended devfest 2019 in December where I got to meet new friends and learn new skills in project management and collaboration skills and tools.

Industrial Attachment:

From May to August, I was on Industrial Attachment which is a requirement in my course before graduation. I must say getting a place to do my attachment was not an issue but getting a good place that is relevant to my field was a hell of work. I applied in several software companies but only a few replied, which were: Podii, Codeinn and Talklift. Podii and Codeinn are code academies (they teach people how to code) at the same time they build and maintain software for their clients, Talklift builds chatbots for businesses. so they were both good and relevant place for me. But I didn’t have my attachment at any of the above.

I did not pass the interview at Podii, it was based on Elixir which was new to me. Talklift and Codeinn called me when it was now too late to start organizing transport and accommodation in Nairobi since I’m based in Kisumu.

I finally got called at NHIF but I found it hard for me since I was doing so little related to my line of sturdy.

So I moved to County Government of Kisumu. I fell in love with this place, there was no software development here, it was all about networking and maintenance but I loved the people I got. My supervisor was the best, he taught me everything. after the four months, I felt like a professional network Admin. During this time I also made them a system to automate Support Ticket creation and tracking. I’ll write more about my attachment experience and day to day activities I was taking.

Achievements and Milestones 

 A talk on lipa na mpesa:

I gave a talk on lipa na mpesa (MPESA STK PUSH). Mpesa is a mobile money payment gateway. These talks were organized by Maseno hub. However small these events were, I felt special as it was my first time giving such talks. I’m hoping for more talks next year.

 I did four client projects in Django:

After learning Django for a year, in 2019 I delivered four projects to four clients, It made me happy though there were challenges. if I mention a few of the challenges:

• • Hosting Django is Hard and Expensive as you all know. I found a solution to this and its now easy to host on shared hosting (see this post by my friend. I’ll post it here too if he allows me to ).
  • Clients don’t pay as agreed. After completing a project a client decided to abandon the whole thing and I didn’t get paid. I regret the nights I spent on her project. Others pay $50 and feel that is much. My solution to this is getting half the total amount as deposit before starting the work and the other half before delivery.

• Under Estimating a project. I got a client who wanted a project that looked simple but very complex, I could not finish it in agreed time so I had to look for other developers to help me.

These challenges are so many, I’ll also write a post on “challenges I face as Django developer”

 I worked on my personal projects:

This blog is part of my achievement this year, getting this site up and running was not hard but very hard when I used to procrastinate. I have also worked 0n other personal projects and organization projects like hairways

 I created a youtube channel:

Most of the practical articles will have videos here

Other Interesting Things I did

 I attended a baby shower:

My colleagues at the County Government of Kisumu organized a baby shower for our friend. I never knew I would attend one, I didn’t even know males are allowed in such events. My role was to delay her until everything was ready so I lied to her and we walked some miles, I enjoyed it.

Next Year Goals

I don’t believe so much in announcing my goals before achieving them or working on them, at the same time I don’t see anything wrong with it. I will therefore just list them:

• Give more and more talks
• Do more of my personal projects
• Build 5 apps and publish on playstore( with flutter)
• Finish My fourth-year project
• Contribute more to opensource projects
• Get a decent office for my businesses

Conclusion 

That was my year in short words, I would be glad to hear yours. leave me your link in the comment section below.

Thank you for reading.