👎 Event: What is bad code?

“Q: Tell me a coding joke about headless CMS”
“A: Why did the headless CMS have trouble sleeping? Because it couldn’t REST!”
🤣 source: ChatGPT

Today I bring to you an in-person event in Toronto, headless CMS, and a different social media platform.

1. Event: What is Bad Code?

📅 People ask me all the time if I have tips for them on how to get a job as a coder. One of the most useful tips I can give is to join a meetup.

Today I come to you with an in-person event on Feb 23, in case you are in the Toronto area (if you are not, you can find an event in your area if you look at meetup.com)

This is a meet up focused on React, but even if you don’t know anything about React, I recommend you going to the event.

If you check their agenda, they have time for networking and the presentation itself is just about 30 minutes. Yes, you will get some useful tech information, but I recommend you go and focus on networking.

“But I’m shy, I don’t know how to network”. Get a grip. Just approach someone and ask what they do. That is what is expected in those events. The conversation will flow from there. If not, move on and approach someone else. I know I’m simplifying it too much, but it is that simple.

I will not be joining this event because I have class to teach at the same time, but I would otherwise. Final note: I got my last job because of a meetup.

1. What is a headless CMS?

💆 CMS is the acronym for Content Management System. I’m talking about tools like WordPress, Wix, Squarespace, Joomla, Drupal, and my all-time favorite DNN (I worked with it quite a lot) - If you are still not sure what a CMS is, check this.

A lot of coders, like us, end up working with these kinds of tools through our careers.

This is a simple and quick video (4 min) that will expand your understanding of CMSs and will show you what a headless CMS is, which has become very popular in the last few years.

Basically in a headless CMS, the backend code is very loosely coupled with the frontend, connected only by simple APIs.

1. Have you heard of Mastodon?

🐘 This is a not a tech link, but I think it is related to career. This is something I know very little about, but I have been trying to wrap my mind around as I see more and more smart people using it.

In a nutshell Mastodon is a decentralized version of Twitter where you control how your instance works. I’m not a big social media user, but I became curious about this one.

If you know how to use it, hit reply, and tell me what you know about it. Otherwise let’s discover it together. Maybe on the next newsletter I will have our own Mastodon instance.

My personal update:

• 🌨️ Too much snow this past week. I’m still sore from shoveling.

• 🎮 If you have kids, this is for you: “How can I handle kids telling me extremely boring stuff?” - I have to deal with this on a daily basis🙂. This is also useful when dealing with adults telling boring stuff - Actually I’m going to give this to my close friends too. I tell a lot of boring stuff and this will help them dealing with me. 😂

• 🎿 Skiing was awesome! Going again today - Main lesson from my instructor: “Lean Forward if you feel you are loosing control” - I think you can apply the same lesson to life in general. BTW I fell down twice when skiing. It felt I was in slow motion. I think I looked like a sloth falling 🦥.

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“A child can teach an adult three things: to be happy for no reason, to always be curious, and to fight tirelessly for something.” — Paulo Coelho.

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Cheers, hasta la vista and bye!