Today I want to write about Architectural Decision Records and why everyone should be writing them, all the time. If you’re like me, you looked at the repo link and thought “dang, that’s alot. And everyone has opinions on them.” And I think you’re absolutely correct, and therefore you’ve already put ritual and taboo around them that you’re also thinking you don’t need in your life. But hear me out, I think the concept of the ADR needs to be less formal, and more of an every day occurrence.

What makes a team more productive? There are many aspects to increasing productivity, but I believe one of the most important ones is keeping the team focused on one thing. Teams that can keep single project flow have much more success in moving that project along. You hear it time and again about single piece flow and how that maximizes productivity, but how does that look practically? Business usually can’t afford to work on just one thing, so teams don’t get afforded that luxury either.

Obsidian released bases this week and honestly, I don’t know how I feel about it yet. If you’ve read my previous articles, you know I’m a huge Obsidian fan and use multiple vaults for various journals, posts, etc. I thought I would take this week to talk about bases and my initial thoughts. The Good The bases plugin provides native support for filtering and aggregating data on your files. It allows you to filter based on file names, folders, tags, and custom properties (there are more filter options as well).

This weeks topic is another obvious one, but I thought it would be good to talk about as I’ve reaped the benefits of it in the past few days. Today I’m going into why little things add up over time. There’s a myriad of small things you can do that can make pay dividends in the future. From a simple email system to taking the extra time to set up extra configuration, the 30 minute tasks add up over time.

I’m back after a little break last week (sorry I couldn’t think of anything good to write for last week) and I just had a thought about 20 minutes ago. I’m winging this entire post, more than I usually do, but here goes. What is a common problem that many companies have? I think its communication. Engineers don’t have an easy way to gather info about what’s going on in their company.

I messed up. Full stop. I had planned to write an article about basic coding. I had some idea in my mind, driven by rage, but I did the thing I call people out for: I didn’t write down enough context for myself to come back to that article. I wrote a few sentences, but I don’t know why I was writing it. So today I’m going to write about the importance of good note taking.

Over the past two years or so, I’ve been working on a new way of measuring work. This has evolved from a simple task list of things I need to get done for the sprint and other tasks, like reminding myself to ask someone a question or put in for time off. This concept has evolved into a daily note that houses three main areas to put tasks: Goals, Meetings, and Bonus Items.