Time to Post

Finally It’s Time to Post again

There are currently several Articles trying to escape from my brain, and I think it is time to do something about it!

Okay, firstly, it’s been a very, very long time since I did any public posting at all, of any kind. In fact, I think it was probably around 2016 that I last posted, and I have been very busy since. (Thanks FirstWave)

Back then I was posting using Google’s Blogger which provided me with a nice little blogging domain called timedistort.blogspot.com

And once again, just like back then, I have a few articles that are just burning away in my head, waiting for me to post, and now I think it’s time to do it. (Breath….)

This time, rather than using Blogger, I’m going to have a go at doing things in a more code-like way.

Recently I have discovered Jekyll as a fantastic way to create static websites, (And more importantly, to author those sites by starting with a simple text format called Markdown) and this is my attempt at giving that a go.

Here is what I’m planning:

• I’m going to use GitHub to host the content of these sites.
• I’m hoping to post a number of articles that might be of interest and utility to someone.
• And I’m also looking to automate this as much as possible so that I can very quickly pump out content as I write it. (Think CI/CD pipelines that pump content out of my mindmaps as I write them - ok that would be nice!

Before I start, its “Confession Time”

To be honest, I do a lot of writing. Hmm, is that an understatement? Ok it is, let me rephrase that a little more honestly:

CONFESSION 1:      “I am a Meticulous Documenter”

Along the lines of:

• Tiago Forte’s “Building A Second Brain” and
• David Allen’s “Getting Things Done”

I’ve always been a firm believer in getting everything out of my head and into a storage system.

“If it is still in my head, it messes with my thinking and if it is in a storage system, then it is permanently searchable” (and publishable)

I haven’t always been this way, it has been a slow process over many years. Each time I’ve increased my documentation diligence, I’ve found that my productivity has gone up.

To do all this, I’ve been using a fantastic mind mapping tool called iThoughtsX going back to 2011 and then, before that, I was documenting in pure text. (Think command-line VI editor)

By doing this over the years, I have kept all that information in a level of detail that I could not possibly have remembered bare brained.

Mysterious Voice from my past: “Hey who was that client we spoke to five years ago and what software issue did we solve for them? Hey Simon, you will remember!

Further Confessions

Ok, so continuing my ‘confession time’:

CONFESSION 2:      “I keep a journal in mindmap format where I plan and document every day.”

Doesn’t everyone do this? Maybe not. Personally I have found that I could not survive without this. Over time I have found that this has helped me increase the my ‘bandwidth’ of available attention. If I stopped doing this, I’d have that same feeling you get when the internet goes off, or the power to your building gets cut off. Aaagh!!

CONFESSION 3:      “I keep a projects mindmap to track and archive information for hundreds of projects.”

Where as a journal is chronological, a projects map brings together everything into a project context. I tend to move things here from the journal mindmap once the time-span of what I’m working on goes beyond a few days.

CONFESSION 4:      “I keep a ‘Knowledge Base’ mindmap, where I document anything that takes me longer than about 30 minutes to figure out.”

Keeping your own ‘Knowledge Base’ is like having your own personal contextual Wikipedia. In fact I used to use a wiki (MoinMoin) for just this, but in the end it has been faster for me to use a mindmap for this.

Ok, now thats off my chest, I feel much better!

Why the madness?

The reason behind all this is that if I don’t document something that takes me some time to figure out, then I tend to find that, then, you know, six to 12 months later, I will find myself resolving the same problem over again, and taking just as long as the first time around. (and, of course, cursing myself that I didn’t document it)

So, now is the time!

In conclusion, I think now is the time to export some of that information out of my mindmaps and turn them into articles.

This means that I’m excited (and relieved) to finally resume sharing my thoughts on various topics. Over the coming weeks and months, I hope to publish some articles that explore various topics with the aim to provide some information, maybe some insight and hopefully at least something entertaining.

Please stay tuned!