Many, Many Ideas

I have so many ideas. Yet, I don't know how to get them started. There is so much out there, so much to learn. I often wonder how this whole development idea got away from me. It seemed just yesterday, I felt on top of the development community: that I knew all the appropriate languages and development techniques. Now, there are so many things to learn, so many directions to go. Everything has grown so rapidly, that I often wonder, when and where was I left behind. Take Java, when I first learned it, Java 2 hadn't even come out. Now, there is talk about Java 1.7! I just downloaded Java 1.6, and to me, they should have stopped at Java 1.4.3!! There are so many packages, so many classes, that I honestly have no clue what all they do. It used to be Java could be summed up in the Java in a Nutshell book. Now, that does not do the trick. Several years ago, they introduced Swing, now you need more than Nutshell book, as well as the Core Java books. And, they don't even cover everything.

This past semester, I took a Visual Basic class as part of trying to come "up to speed", with a language that is simple, yet important to use (for future use mainly). It seems like a pretty "self-taught" style language, but it would still be good to learn. So, I have a book, took a class, and have some projects that I did.

Yet, at the end of the day, I still have all these ideas rattleling in my head. Yet, often I don't know how to express them. Many people have told me that I should give up on these projects--that I should just use my skills for work. If that were the case, I often think I would just live a life of even more quiet desparation. For me, I feel that I need to express my ideas in some form or another. Yet, I often don't know how. This development blog has been perfect for me. This is a place to at least put down my thougts in a journal type form. Actually, I should just update the wikis and blogs related to the projects I have released. Often, when I start these projects, I think of the things that I need to do as part of the project. Often, these "things start to build up" and it makes the taks seem unsurmountable. I often should think of these things as part of the project itself. That would make it as part of the project's allure and chalenge.

One of the ideas I have is making a weather station from a 1-wire device. As part of my running, I discovered something to add to my Pace Calculator application. It seems for my Garmin, the max pace is not given, but the max speed is. This is a possible improvement that could be added to the Pace Calculator--to take run speed and translate into a pace.

I often wonder if I am just waisting my time with all this. I often wonder if I should just give up on all this. There are household and family projects that I often put on the "back burner" as an attempt to do all of this. Not to mention this is less time that I spend with my family. So often, things get overlooked when I start these projects: not to mention the fact that I might consider going to grad-school. Grad-School, how do you shuffle that into the mix? For the working individual, time is a valuable commodity. For me, I have so much vaction time that I need to use this year, that perhaps, I will get do completing all the things I want to accomplish (this would be a great year to go to grad-school because of that).

I would also like to place a lot of the code from the many projects that I have done on a "web reprository" (at least on a web page local to the home network). That way, I know where they are. This old code has so many good examples. Not only that, but I can put my .bashrc from Linux on there as a way of remembering how and what to set up (as well as the .vimrc). Plus, any thing else I would like to remember, but forgot--like setting up an executable JAR file. This is something I have NEVER documented!!! I can't believe that! How stupid am I?

Well, I just need the disciplie to "Just Do It" (as Nike would put it). In the end, writting this out did help. Well, it is now time to start taking action. That is what all this comes down to: stop talking and start doing.