Hi, I'm Kyle.

I enjoy learning and writing.

I'm a front-end developer currently working for AT&T in the good 'ol Midwest. When I'm not working I enjoy baking, gardening, gaming and watching anime. I'm very serious about my 1500 day Duolingo streak in German, have recently started studying ASL and absolutely love my lemon trees.

Freut mich, Sie kennenzulernen.

Latest posts

Why am I just finding out about #region?

#codequality #vscode

As much as I love to organize my code, I'm ashamed to admit I never knew that #region. A way to create custom, collapsible pieces of code.

Written on Aug 14, 2024 (updated Oct 11, 2024)

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RandomAnime.org

A top-ranked niche site with a wonderful community

A simple concept. Help people find new anime to watch.

Random anime has gone from a side project used to learn and experiment, to a useful tool utilized and suppported by many in the anime community.

Users can discover new anime through unbiased randomization based off selected preferences.

Life skills

Some personal and development skills I'd like to highlight

                
  • Angular

    My introduction into the SPA framework world. I helped oversee the transition of our web application at AT&T from AngularJS to Angular 12, with a fun hybrid mode in the middle.

    The rigid struture of Angular applications helped me pick it up quickly.

  • ASL

    I've always been interested in learning American Sign Language, especially being someone who has slight hearing loss. Recently, I took the plunge and started learning.

    I'm still in the early stages, but it is a fun learning activity that I'm able to share with my daughter.

  • Baking

    Baking? A skill. Yeah! In particular, baking bread. The patience it takes for various types of bread, as well as the different experimentation with recipes, has been quite the learning experience.

    Artisan bread, sourdough bread, pizza dough, pretzels, bagels; it's a lot of fun!

  • CSS

    CSS is a powerful language that only grows by the day. There are things that a lot of developers will immediately reach for JavaScript for, when CSS can do it natively.

    CSS makes websites beautiful; writing it consistently and DRY is more challenging than many think.

  • Gardening

    I've enjoyed gardening as a hobby for quite some time, but have really ramped up things in the last couple years. It's a challenge to grow various fruits and vegetables, and can take a while to get right.

    Don't tell the other plants, but my lemon trees are definitely my favorite.

  • German

    Learning German has been a hobby of mine for quite some time (I have a 1400+ day Duolingo streak). It started as something fun, and turned into a life skill.

    I haven't taken any formal certifications, but I'm at about A1 level, A2 on a good day. Cool, nicht wahr?

  • HTML

    HTML is a language that is often overlooked, or assumed to be known. Good, semantic HTML can do wonders for a website as well as improve overall accessibility.

    I take pride in writing HTML properly, and give it the extra time it deserves.

  • JavaScript

    JavaScript has to be the most important language for front-end development. Fully understanding the language at the base level makes it easier to learn the many, many frameworks built upon it.

    Frameworks are fun, but vanilla is pretty incredible (it has web components now?!).

  • Parenting

    Parenting? Yeah, parenting. It is a skill that changes every day and tests every ounce of your patience. Though it's challenging, it helps you look at things from a different perspective.

    Becoming a parent singlehandedly helped me grow better as a person.

  • PHP

    I love PHP. I taught myself, and have used it professionally and personally for as long as I can remember.

    I love the meme every year that PHP is dead, yet is still one of the top used languages (thanks Wordpress!).

  • React

    My first, and only so far, experience with React was re-writing my personal admin portal with it. There was a lot of Googling. I enjoy the extreme flexibility the framework has to offer, even if it makes it more difficult to learn.

    I look foward to learning more about it.

  • SQL

    Every time I think I understand it, I learn something new. I feel like there's always a way to improve a query, but hey, that's a part of learning.

    An SQL query walks into a bar, sees two tables and asks, "Can I JOIN you?"

  • Tailwind

    Modular CSS? Why would I need... Oh wow this is cool. I'm pleasantly surprised with how smitten I've become with Tailwind. The default colors it comes with are also really helpful for spinning up a quick website.

    It's like writing CSS without writing CSS.. CSS-ception.

  • TypeScript

    I was introduced to TypeScript at the same time of learning Angular and.. I wasn't a fan. I've come to appreciate it though, as it is helpful in reducing errors.

    "noImplicitAny" I respect you, and also despise you.

  • Vue

    I pivoted from AngularJS to Vue2, and eventually Vue3. Vue is definitely my framework of choice and I really enjoy working with it. I've recently started experimenting with Nuxt as well.

    The composition API is 🔥

  • Writing

    I've been writing on and off for my entire life. I enjoy creating a story with words and knowing that someone in the world has read, and hopefully, enjoyed it. It's fun to paint a picture with nothing but words.

    Maybe one day I'll finish one of my stories.