I finished a couple of online tutorials regarding Python, and now I am working on a tutorial that walks me through how to create a weather forecast mailer. Python is a much simpler language than JavaScript, though I’m still struggling with the algorithmic logic aspect of coding. I know enough of the Python language to follow along as someone else codes in the language; the structures she uses are familiar to me, but the logic is still beyond my ability.

I would like to be able to create my own apps and post them on my website. I guess a weather app would be interesting, but I would really like to be able to explore some other possibilities, like a news feed or some sort of interactive website functionality. I have noticed, the last few times I have visited it, that the BYM Camps website is a truly interactive site. That’s the kind of site I would like to be able to create. I’m sure they use JavaScript and jQuery, but I think Python can do a lot of the same stuff. jQuery is a fairly simple coding language, like Python, but I’m not completely in the dark with full-on JavaScript. I like the way the BYM Camps site animates their transitions from one page to another and from one section of a page to another. It really adds interest.

I guess the way to go is the way I have been going: continue to develop the content of the site while also working on my coding skills. My memory of the BYM site from a year or two ago was that it was the typical static website with separate pages for each new class of information. The site, as it is now, seems to have more information per page, but some of the information is hidden until it is clicked upon. It then loads new information without reloading the page. This produces a very cool, slick effect. I want my site to act like that.

Pulamusic.com is currently a WordPress-powered blog, but I think I can make better use of that url. The site should contain a blog, but it should also have all the stuff I am currently putting on the GitHub portfolio site. I would like for their to be some sort of interactive jumbotron on the first page, possibly with a carousel of images, and/or maybe a sound file clip. The site should basically scream musician and academic, featuring my work and my blog posts. I would like a simple, clean blog like this Jekyll blog, but wrapped in an interactive page with some sidebar functionality. Basically, I like aspects of both the WordPress and Jekyll blogs, but I would like to find a way to combine the best of these two models with some slick interactivity.

Coding really needs to be a kind of back-burner skill set - useful for me academically, but not core to my professional practice. Maybe if I were to make a commitment to digital humanities I could then justify putting a bunch of effort into coding, but for now it is essentially a hobby, albeit a hobby that I spend a significant amount of time working on just now. In any event, let’s see where it goes.