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Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

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Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#451

Post by racl101 »

zerkten wrote: post #255
racl101 wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate on: > If one day you forget to do XYZ task, they can take it all away. What kinds of tasks? Who's they? I can see Medium and Substack changing their rules and stuff. But WordPress? Isn't it controlled entirely by you?

>> What kinds of tasks? Who's they? They is whatever service you are signed up to that is outside of your control. "Takes it all away" I think is really meant to mean a multitude of things. At the worst end is the service closing down unexpectedly. They may have been impacted by a cyberattack, haven't been paying hosting bills, never tested backups etc. Your site is under something.theirdomain.com and theirdomain.com…

Thanks for explaining. I was curious.

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#452

Post by madeforthis »

I started blogging about 12 years ago as a way to gain some visibility for my skills within my field, data journalism. One post I wrote, which simply explained how to set up Python on Windows 7, somehow got indexed very high in Google search results and ended up generating hundreds of thousands of page views. More interestingly, most of the comments on the post were very complimentary of my ability to simply explain the topic.

That got me thinking: Why not write a whole book about a tech topic I enjoy? So, I started doing that. It took about seven years, but the positive feedback from my blogging gave me inspiration.

https://nostarch.com/practical-sql-2nd-edition

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#453

Post by drakonka »

I've been blogging for I think over 15 years, probably closer to 20. My blog has come up in job interviews and I think I've had some recruiters reach out after reading my blog. I also referenced some of my technical blog posts when applying for work as a technical writer, which helped I think. But mostly I use my blog to process my own thoughts and help integrate my own learnings for myself. I also often refer back to my own blog posts when doing something... a few times I've Googled for something only to see my own blog come up and realize past-me already answered future-me's question. Having said that, there are times when I read my old blog posts and cringe at my old self. It also feels nice when people either leave comments or email me telling me my blog post helped them solve some problem. So overall, it's just been rewarding on a personal satisfaction level.

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#454

Post by allenng »

When I got my first job as a professional SE, I'd been in technical fields for almost 15 years, and had been programming as a hobby for most of my life. I was smart, articulate, and passionate, but had no experience. I think the thing that pushed me over the edge during the hiring process was that I had made a number of hobby projects that I shared with them and they could see my work.

https://apps.stupid-genius.com/Brotplot/

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#456

Post by gabereiser »

luizs wrote: post #305
reactordev wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I take it you don’t play video games either. Spelunky was a pretty popular Indy game back in the day. Named after, you guessed it, spelunking. I first learned the word from “Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego” back in the 90s. I had to ask my parents what it meant.

There's also an old NES game called Spelunker.

Yes but my experience with WITWICS predates the NES for me.

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#457

Post by lannisterstark »

xena wrote: post #12

I've been running a blog at https://xeiaso.net for almost a decade now. It has been the single best decision I have ever made in my career. It allows me to skip technical screening interviews. It has made interviewing at companies _easy_ because I have _already proven_ that I understand what I'm talking about. Learning how to write well also makes it so much easier to explain things succinctly, especially when workin…

>It allows me to skip technical screening interviews. It has made interviewing at companies _easy_ because I have _already proven_ that I understand what I'm talking about.

Can you please elaborate more on this? Do you just go "I made a post about it, go read?"

Re: Ask HN: What has your personal website/blog done for you?

#458

Post by pfoof »

LoulouMonkey wrote: post #427
pfoof wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also used to have lack of confidence but rather towards what I would write.

Interesting. So you mean more, the content rather than the form? I noticed you used the past tense. How did you get through that if I may ask?

I asked a college colleague who started a blog two years prior and he said that he just tries to research as much as he can the subject but also need to commit to a deadline. So, that's what I did - commit to a deadline no matter the quality.
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