Let’s just start now
They say the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago, but the second best time is now. If there’s one thing I know from being a mom during the pandemic, it’s that second-best is basically first-best now, because nothing is getting done the actual best way.
I’ve been working on some version of Intarsia for about 10 months now; it was a pandemic project born of a specific client need. But in many ways I’ve been working on parts of things that are now incorporated into Intarsia for years. Although I took my first programming class when I was 5, and continued to dabble thereafter, I’m basically self-taught, and have learned so many things the hard way. This has been no exception.
To get Intarsia going, I’ve had to become somewhat proficient - coming from either zero knowledge or basic knowledge - at all of the following:
Force-directed node diagrams and what they are
Far more in-depth Javascript
Observable
D3
Github
Constructing Python modules
Google Sheets API
Pandas & data manipulation
SQL
BigQuery
JS/D3 data manipulation
Promises
Async functions
Oauth
Using Javascript to access APIs
Google App Engine
Firebase
Flask
This school year, we chose to homeschool. It was the best choice for us given the options we had available, and I’m sure I’ll look back at it as both difficult and rewarding. (It’s April now and the homestretch is in sight.) Seriously though, it’s been TOUGH for me. My schedule is bonkers and I’ve done a LOT of this work either with my laptop on the kitchen counter while I also make everyone quesadillas and teach math, or at 4:30am.
This project has both made me nuts and kept me sane, sometimes both on the same day. I need something really mentally challenging to keep me going, and this has definitely been that. But at the same time, day-to-day life would be so much easier if I didn’t do this, which would only be possible if I didn’t need to do it. A real catch-22.
The past couple of weeks, my kids have been in (outdoor) camps, and that has been amazing. I’ve had actual time while people are supposed to be awake to use my daytime brain on these problems. I’ve shirked some of my client work to do this, because I knew this was an opportunity to make kind of a phase change. And I’m very happy to say, I’ve done it. In these two weeks I have:
Made some reports accessible - by iframing in Observable content - on Intarsiadata.com. This will allow me to onboard some “trusted testers” and get some user feedback.
Created app.intarsiadata.com, set it up on Google App Engine, and put together a very basic app that successfully logs users in with Oauth and then queries APIs from the back end with those credentials. This means I should be able to build a real thing, without exposing all of my code by hosting it forever on Observable. It works end-to-end and I couldn’t be happier about this. Google’s documentation is just so so terrible so piecing that together made me feel like a superhero.
Got connected with a potential new client who needs exactly the special things that Intarsia can provide. I’ve been using parts of it with existing clients but this would be a real “how to work with a client” test. Fingers crossed!
So, this seems like as good a time as any to start my #momblog, about the reality of creating a new product/startup and also working and momming it up during a pandemic.
