I’ll try to find a video I saw on the matter that is interesting about our projects.
Most of us learn engineering through school and through work, where the is a product owner and a project manager that gives us work in chunks and manage the project week to week.
When you do personal projects that you can’t finish in a day, you have to be product owner, project manager and engineer at the same time. And it is hard, especially if we hope to produce the same quality of work.
So either it takes a lot more time to get there, or you need to “downgrade” the quality of the work to finish the project in a timely manner.
And in the end, projects in your free time should bring you joy, not dread.
I hope it helps you, or someone reading this, cope with a pile of unfinished projects, that will never be finished. And that’s fine.
Thankfully as a software engineer, Claude Code is helping me catch up on a lot of my unfinished projects, especially ones with tedious amounts of integration.
As an engineer with ADHD and an affinity to design and build stuff for fun halfway… I feel seen.
Yeah same. I have a box full of filament just sitting unopened by my printer.
My printer works non-stop for 2 months then is completely abandoned for 3 more months, then the cycle repeats.
Unless I really need something printed, then the periods get messed up.
I feel this, and I swear half of what I print are just mods for my printers.
Yeah and of course when someone asks for a print, the printer is down for maintenance/modding
I don’t remember posting this comment… But there it is, describing my life.
Edit: i found the video
A rant on personal engineering projects by BPS.shorts
I’ll try to find a video I saw on the matter that is interesting about our projects.
Most of us learn engineering through school and through work, where the is a product owner and a project manager that gives us work in chunks and manage the project week to week.
When you do personal projects that you can’t finish in a day, you have to be product owner, project manager and engineer at the same time. And it is hard, especially if we hope to produce the same quality of work.
So either it takes a lot more time to get there, or you need to “downgrade” the quality of the work to finish the project in a timely manner.
And in the end, projects in your free time should bring you joy, not dread.
I hope it helps you, or someone reading this, cope with a pile of unfinished projects, that will never be finished. And that’s fine.
Ugghh, I just want to finish one project! Is that too much to ask for brain!?
Brain: “Yes, yes it is…ohhh, shiny new thing”
I store the projects next to my collection of hobbies that are too numerous to be able to dedicate the time which they deserve.
Thankfully as a software engineer, Claude Code is helping me catch up on a lot of my unfinished projects, especially ones with tedious amounts of integration.