In the past weeks, I have gone from having a webcam setup for presenting my education sessions to complete madness. It has snowballed and I am now waiting for another shipment of things to set up for a full-fledged studio setup. I have even set up my old YouTube channel finally and have a pretty big list of topics to place there. In short, I am going full YouTube, and it is something I have been considering for a very long time. I guess it felt right now for some reason.
Besides ordering everything from microphone to camera to lightning, I also have made some small investments into assets for Adobe Premier pro. While they are probably not necessary, I feel like trying some things out with proper gear rather than going in half-baked. Well, at least as far as equipment goes. I still need to learn how to do videos properly, since it is a lot different from holding education sessions. I also need to learn the tools, and it will take a while to learn how to use Adobe Premier pro and OBS to its full potential.
Furthermore, I threw out a test shot using nothing but webcam and no real settings for microphone at all. It is bad, but not terribly so. I still feel awkward talking to myself, but it gets easier, I feel. I also had the beginnings of a bad cold, which you probably can pick up in the video. Right now, I can barely speak...
Later this week I will do a full rebuild of my desk to set things up, and I have not yet decided if I should invest in a new desk at the same time. There is nothing wrong with my desk, but it is a bit short and I would like to have that walnut desk top. I am also considering getting a desktop that is arched with a short extra right side. Not sure if that would work in my very limited space, but I am considering it.

I am also contemplating getting a new chair since this one is a bit stiff and I do have lower back issues to consider. Not sure what to get, though, so I'll hold off for now. I might get something like the Secretlab Titan Evo 2022, but I have not decided yet. For now, I'll keep my existing one and focus on other things, like how to fit a good camera angle with a 48-inch TV as monitor...
That is probably my biggest issue right now, since my lighting setup will be very dependent on how I set up my camera. With a 48-inch TV, standing on a small shelf as well, I tend to look up towards the top of the screen quite a lot. My face is in a pretty good spot facing the center, or slightly above the center of the screen, but to get to the top of the screen I have to tilt my head up a fair bit.
Having a camera at that height might look weird. Like me looking up towards the people watching the video or stream. I do have a second camera for screen sharing, so maybe that will be less of an issue than I imagine it. Once I get the new camera and have it setup, I might make some changes due to this. Things do get a bit tricky when you have limited space, sitting in a little cave where your closet used to be in your bedroom.
Anyway, first I need to get this sore throat taken care of, then I'll just focus on making content and let things evolve from there. I do not expect to become a huge YouTube star anyway, just to publish some instructional videos here and there.
So, off we go 🙂

This week I did some upgrades to my home office. I added a second screen, purchased some lights and did a big investment in a green screen. This adds some useful tools for me, so I can not only do my job better, but also start working on some video content for the website. The green screen require some commitment as it is not something you throw up in a hurry for a video call, but it is pretty great for what I plan for the future. So let us dive into it.
A second screen
Adding a second screen to my setup was not really planned. Previously I had my MacBook on the side and the plan was to use it for quick calls. It worked fairly well, but since I already have a camera setup that is a lot better than the camera on the MacBook, it was kind of redundant. So I just got an idea to try out having a second screen when I was browsing for some additional lights to add to the camera setup. I stumbled upon a portable external screen that looked pretty cool and since I had a screen standing in the closet I figured I would just see if it worked y removing the laptop tray and place a VESA mount instead.
As it were, it turned out great, and it did not take very long to plugin. It's still a mess with cables, but I'll fix that later!
The benefits with having a second screen are many, but for me, I now have a very good way to have the overview I need for when I hold my training sessions. I installed a little program that give me a clock that I can place above content and when I use Teams I can move the overview and the chat to the secondary screen. I can also put my notes there instead of writing them down on paper, or use my iPad. This give me a far better overview of what I am doing, and I can see if someone raises their hands or write in the chat.
When I eventually will make more video content I can also see what the recording, or streaming looks like.
When I do not hold lectures or do video content, it is a great place to have things like my Teams and Email, so I always see if someone need me. I am also testing out Tasks, which was actually much better than I thought, since I can very easily switch between accounts. I also see it inside Outlook in the task bar, which is great. Anything I flag in emails, I can also sync with Tasks which is awesome. The only downside is that Outlook does not work with private accounts, but I can live with that.
Overall, I am super happy with the second screen.
 
Bright light, but not enough
My home office is dark, very dark. So in order to get some light for video, I bought an Elgato Key Light. It is indeed extremely bright, and it works great for training sessions in Teams and things like that. When I pull up the green screen, however, things are still too dark for the green screen to work properly. I can still make it work by doing some tweaks in OBS, but I will probably add more light sources eventually to increase the light in the room. It will also help prevent sunburn from the super bright Elgato Key Light.
I could have bought the Elgato Key Light Air, which was almost half price, but I don't have a lot of space on the desk, so I decided to pay some extra for that reason. The Elgato Key Lights come with an app to control the lights, which is nice.
 
Elgato Green Screen
The Elgato Green Screen is pretty awesome, as I can easily pull it out and put it back in seconds. No need to use clips or mounts, just pull up and shoot, then pull down and stash away. It was not cheap, but the investment feels motivated since my home office is in the bedroom and I will save on time and comfort instead.
It is a bit tricky to set up since space is very limited, and I need to have it at an angle since the camera is also at an angle and I have a wall in that direction. I am considering if I should switch sides on the setup, since that would remove the need to put the green screen at an angle. Probably will test that when I get the new desk top.
 
YouTube plans
I already have my YouTube Channel ready, so it is just a matter of using it properly. I have made some tests and so far things look pretty good for what I plan to do later. I have several ideas on what I want to do, and I will start out with a Jira and Confluence series on how to set up Jira and Confluence. Furthermore, I also plan a few videos for Invision Community on how you can use Pages and how things work in terms of code and so on. Finally, I wonder if I want to add sort of a rant/opinion where I talk about different topics, like the communication failures of Atlassian and Invision Community this week.
We'll see what I come up with, but I will start with Atlassian guides for Jira and Confluence. I do not aim to be a big YouTuber so I'll just try to have fun with it.

In the past couple of weeks, I have had several interesting conversations about weird new roles and fields of work. Some are downright silly, like the UI Engineer, while others just seem unnecessary, like the field of Development Experience (DX). What is clear though is that people, especially from the USA it seems, have no idea what titles are in their field, so they make things up. This means that without definition work titles are pretty useless and this is where a proper database where we define roles will be important.
While I find it interesting how young people, especially in the US, have an almost absurd desire to name themselves with titles of self-importance, it does cause a lot of confusion in the industry. Poor understanding of the work itself from the employers, and to some degree the people, is bad enough. It does not help that we add titles that make no sense or even add to the confusion.
Hopefully we can create a database over these strange new things and evolve them together, since some new names is actually not that bad and others already exist and need to be adjusted. I already have the base, so it's just a matter of getting things put together and styling it. Unfortunately, I do not have an abundance of time right now, so it will be when time permits.
Always moving forward though 🙂

The Stories section is now in a fairly good place. It will be some tinkering, and I am still playing around in my mind how I want to make the database relations show up. It is in a good enough place, so I can move on to other areas. The areas that are up on the board are a new Links database, a new Videos database and the Code Reference database. I probably will start with the Links, since it makes it a bit easier to work with Stories that way.
The things remaining to iron out with Stories are a little bug in the category listings where you can not rate the first entry, and I also want a way to map feeds to the custom fields. Fosters over at the IPS forums had an RSS plugin that allowed that, and I hope that this might lead to a solution for this. I can still live without it, but it would help a lot to have this mapping.
For links, nothing beats Links Directory from Adriano. Unfortunately, though, I can't cross-link applications with databases. This means that I can not pull in data from different databases. It is also affected by different changes that IPS does, which has ruined applications in the past more times than I care to think of. So, while I will never get all the features that are in Adrianos amazing product, I do get a solution that fit into the overall structure that is also less prone to be affected by application rules and changes.
This is the same reason for the Videos database. While the current solution is very good, I do want a solution I can cross-reference and that I can control. I also want a way to automatically bring in videos from popular creators, which again would benefit greatly from having a mapping with custom fields...
The Code Reference database on the other hand will be a different beast. While the documentation is not that hard to do, there are a lot of cross-references that needs to be handled. For HTML, for example, there are elements and attributes with several reference sheets for languages and so on. CSS have selectors and functions. So the solution must have options for multiple references with different names. I will start this for frontend, and then we can see where we go from there.
Onwards towards greatness 🙂

Last night I could not sleep, so I played around a bit with this idea I have had for a while to have a section for quick links to interesting blog posts or news. I realized that not only would this be fairly easy to build, but the functionality to promote, or like, things was already built and I had the code for it installed! I just need to adjust the code a bit and give it some design love and it should be good to go.
Anyone who remember the old Digg site probably remember the many great things you could find there in the early days. While I have no ambition to reach anywhere near the same popularity, I hope that some people might find it useful at least.  With so much content, it is hard to keep up with all the great things, so this can at the very least be a nice way for me to drop in great articles that I find.
The idea behind this setup is fairly simple. Provide a simple way to add links to specific articles or news, so content creators can get some links back to their websites. Use a simple boost button to let people vote up good content and a bury button to vote things down. Allow for the users to see things based on last added content, curated content or based on ratings.
In short, it will be a news aggregator like the good old Digg and it's many copycats. While it will not have as many bells and whistles, I will add a few things that I have not seen before. The perhaps most interesting thing will be the connection to other databases. This will allow me to not just share links in the Stories section, but also to cross post to for example products, companies and later on people and certain add-ons like the Atlassian add-ons.
For now, I am just playing around in Figma to see what kind of designs I can come up with. All the heavy lifting has already been done by Ralf Herrmann, an amazing IPS creator that provide some of the best plugins for Pages. His plugin SuperVote have all the features I need to build this, even if I will hack it quite a bit.
For now, I have an idea in my mind where I will keep the same style as for other parts of the website, which means that I will color each story based on category. I am also playing around a bit with RSS imports for certain sites that I want to keep tabs on. These will be added as hidden and then manually edited for now. Later on, I plan to have them be fully automatic, but I want to control them a bit first. Images, for example, will only be added if uploaded by the owner of the links, or if I have their permission.
I will start small and then see what happens.

As Year 3 continues, I start to get some ideas sorted in my mind. I have long struggled to find a way for the site to be useful beyond just articles and places of discussion, but as I look into the development section, that has changed. I am taking some inspiration from W3 schools that I myself have used a lot over the years, and I also start to look at the new links section as well. With the template changes needed and the new plans, I have a feeling I will be very busy in Year 3.
As the About Me section is now in a decent shape, I am looking into the sections in more detail. I have started to plan out the landing pages and now starting to dive into the branches and leaf portion of the navigation trees. I feel it is important that they follow the same structures, even if the content may differ a bit. I also want to make sure that the sections have focused content to avoid DRY (don't repeat yourself). This means that some content may be generic to a root level rather than multiple branch levels.
So for Development, that I will focus on first, the root page will branch off into two sub-sections: front-end and back.end. The front-end branch will then have multiple sections where I will start with HTML, CSS and JavaScript. There will be a generic section also for front-end frameworks such as Bootstrap. Basic reference sheets like language and country codes, or HTML symbols will also be added.
At the root of Development, I will also have a new database for code references. This will be a similar setup as on W3Schools with every tag and property will be listed, but a bit more fleshed out with discussions, videos and more. I will also add a page for code editors that will link to the product database. It will be a landing page of sorts with all the code editors presented and then linked to the product page that will be fleshed out with more information and content such as news.
The new Links database will be fairly similar to the add-on I used to have, but with references and more information. The main reason I wanted to build this as a database is control, of course. Not just over the design itself, but also to be able to control linking with other databases. By doing this I can connect links with products, companies, people and more. I will most likely do a new database for Videos as well later, since it is fairy easy to build for what I use it for.
So there is no shortage of things to do, that is for sure!

While working on the components for the new About Me section, I realized that I needed a proper way for people to communicate with me. After considering the options for a while, I decided to build my own ticket system. This is fairly easy and I could have done things in several ways, but decided to use some tricks from my Task Manager to make it a little more dynamic.
 
 
In essence, this is just a database where I have defined the setup so that you only see your own entries. As the owner, I of course see all entries, which makes it easy to work with. I have added a few fields to help sort things using filters. These fields include Status of course, type of request as this setup does not include any categories, Priority for escalation and SLA, which is just a date field I can set for due date that is then calculated to show time to completion.
I also have a field for Assignee, even though it is a bit of an overkill for my purposes. I have added it thought for others to use that have more than one person managing the tickets.
Database fields and Templates
While working on this new set of templates, I realized that I probably should add some variables for dealing with the field numbers. In most cases you use template names, so it's fairly easy to manage, but in the case of adding the ability to update fields in the frontend we use field ID's instead. Since everyone has a different ID sequence, this can be a bit annoying to work with, so I am thinking I will add variables instead at the beginning of the templates. This way they will work just like CSS, so you can change one variable and it will update across the template.
Easy creation
This setup is nothing fancy and it is just a first iteration. I will probably build more on it as I see the need for it, but for now it will suit my need. All in all, it took about a week to complete, but that was mostly because I did not have much time to commit to it. I will still do a new form for this one, but other than that I think this one is done. It is nice because I only needed to customize two templates and the form, instead of all five templates.
Tasks integrations
I have a field for database relations that I will add later. Not that I think I will actually need it, but more because I want to write a guide on how to do it and also so I can use it if I want. I also want to make sure that if someone else wants to use both together, they have a way to do it out of the box.
Onwards with About Me
With this, I now only have to figure out how I want to set up the History part about me. I have some ideas for it that include setting up a database where each category will become a full width component, or just use blocks for it. I'll ponder on it some more in the coming weeks to see where I might land on that.
Always moving forward 🙂

On July 23 Diablo 3 kicked off season 24 and as usual I have dropped in and have some fun. I am having some extra fun this season since the theme forces me to play a bit differently since I have to play all 7 classes. I am also waiting for the release of Diablo 2 remastered that come sin September. It is a game I spent a ton of time with back in the days, and I look forward to reliving those moments a bit again this fall.
At this point, I am almost done with the season, having all the ethereals unlocked and just missing one conquest to have the seasonal journey unlocked. I went for a demon hunter as usual and focused on the GOD build that is superfast. This has allowed me to pretty much done everything I need to do and after failing the 350 kills (I got 332) after searching for the cursed chest for an hour I decided to skip that mindless conquest and do the years of war conquest instead.
This conquest will of course take much longer since I need to complete 6 greater rifts with 6 different sets. Taking this decision also means I will have spent more time playing the game, while having fun, rather than just sniping maps for hours. I consider that a win.
So right now I am building up my Monk as I want to try the Innas new play style. This will make it fairly easy to do GR 55 with my five favorite builds: Demon hunter GOD, Demon hunter multishot, Demon hunter Sentries, Monk Explosive light and the new Inna build. That leaves one more build to complete, and I probably will go for a Whirlwind barb there. Just to see what the new transmogs that you get for preordering Diablo 2 resurrected look like.
It feels good to have fun again playing, but I do miss having a game I can enjoy now that I have decided never to play Destiny again. While Diablo will manage that itch for a while, I do need a new game to be my mental distraction. I have not seen any on the horizon, so I guess we will see what the future brings.
For now, I am just enjoying going back to hell 🙂

So yesterday was my birthday. My 47th, actually. It marks the beginning of year 3 as I started the new website based on Invision Community back in 2019. In 2019 and 2020 I have done quite a bit on the website and I aim to continue that in year 3 as well. The sections are finally getting some attention and I feel less focused on databases and more focused on pages to build up more structure. Year 3 will be a bit more focused on Pages in general, I think.
About Me
This section is missing the about me part, actually, which is a bit annoying. So I am focusing on that right now, where my focus is on building components for the About Me section. This page will focus on a few key areas:  My Competence, My story and probably a section about Who Am I. The Competence area are focused around four components: The Holistic Consultant introduction,  The Section Roles, The Hire me banner and a block with reviews.
The Section Roles will be a node in itself where I will make sort of a CV for each role. It will act as a landing page of sorts where I will present myself in that role. I will bring in relevant projects, downloadable CV,  some images and so on. I will probably also connect to the roles database and tools that seem relevant. With 19+ roles that I need to have in two languages (English and Swedish) this will take a while, but I am in no hurry.
For my Story, I will have multiple pages, I think. I have not quite ironed out how I want this yet, but there will be multiple sections for sure based on the different periods in my life. Early years, running my own company, the consultant years and so on. I am toying with a sort of timeline, but I fear it will be too much work to maintain in the long run. I do not aim to create a record of my life after all, just a background to who I am and why.
The Sections
Another area that is sorely missing are the Section areas. I had this idea in my mind, but it never really manifested the way I wanted it. Now I feel I have at least a little idea on where to take them next. I am still looking into the focus areas, as each section will have certain products are services that should have their own little spaces. I have used Clubs for this in the past, but I am not 100% sold on that setup yet, even if clubs absolutely will be a prominent part of that setup.
The landing page of each section is divided into two subsections. I am doing this for consistency, but also because I feel all areas have at least two subsections that make sense. I will start with Development, where I will divide into backend and frontend on the landing page. As my area of expertise is in the frontend aspect, I will then focus on that area in particular. The frontend section will in term be divided into two new subsections: HTML/CSS and JavaScript.
Since there are plenty of products and services that are frontend focused rather than HTML/CSS or JavaScript focused, I will need to find a good way to present this and also to create focused areas where needed. Bootstrap for example is a framework that includes all frontend, so it should be at the frontend level. Same thing with IDE's like Visual Studio Code or IntelliJ that even works on the Development level since both frontend and backend can use them. This is where it would be useful to be able to add a product or service to multiple categories...
I do plan on focusing on one area each month, which should mean that all nine areas will be updated by the end of Year 3.
Writings
Writing is an important part of the site and although I am not unhappy with the way things are set up, I want to encourage more guest blogging. So there needs to be a page that describes this and a set of benefits that fit that as well. So I am going to create a new page for guest blogging and promote it with a block on the articles section. This way, I can at least add some attention to the fact that you can guest blog here.
The second thing I want is to drive in some attention to the site itself by posting on other websites. Medium is a popular area and I might look at that, but I am more interested in guest blogging on other websites. Since I am planning on building a new links section, it makes sense that I also reach out to prominent bloggers as I find good websites. I will try to write at least one guest blog each month as part of that month's Section focus.
It has been slow lately on the writing front. It is not that there is nothing to write about, quite the opposite. It's more that life in general has been a bit challenging and I have not had the calm that I need to sit down and write. Not only that, but it has also been very hot and more troubling with my SHR that has caused some issues. I do think that once the sections are more in place, I can find more focus on writing as I can focus on the products and services that I define myself.
Databases
On the database side, I don't feel any rush to extend the databases I have so far. The exception would be the Roles database that I need to update and get setup properly. I will create two new databases as well: The Atlassian add-on database and the Profiles database.  The Profiles database I will take some inspiration from the About Me section to build up a database where you can present yourself. The idea here is to provide a connection between people and companies, but also with products and possibly even articles and more. It is still early in the ideation phase for Profiles, but it is a focus area for Year 3.
Contact and Jira
Right now I have a setup with customer support in Jira and I want to move away from that I think. Not that it is a bad thing to have Jira setup for that, but because I want to focus things on this site. I also will attempt to make some videos based on Jira and Confluence, and it is best if that can be done without live data. So I will change this setup and use a forum instead. At least until I decide I want to make a custom solution based on Pages in the future.
Year 3 is also Year 0
Starting today, I am also making a fresh start in regard to health. I am getting older and I have gained a lot of weight lately since I am just sitting around all day. I need to address this and since my son is very keen on training I will get back to that again. Like the site, this is not a quick fix or a short term solution, but a long term one with focus on losing weight and increasing flexibility. I have a big belly that needs to be tightened as well.
How this will play out depends a lot on the way the pandemic will affect life. Travel time is always a factor, but I have found a way to get things done before, and I can do it again if I put my mind to it. So it is time to get back to the gym and to get the adrenaline flowing again.
 
Year 3 is here and it is full of marvels!

Yesterday I got some deliveries from Amazon with the latest upgrades for my home office. It was not a lot of things, but it made a big impact. Two new screen raises, a monitor arm with laptop tray and a little foot-pillow really made a big difference. Not only that, but it was also very cheap for the improved experience.

The main screen raise is a three part black wood version and it was pretty easy to put together. It also fit very well on the desk and since it is adjustable in width, I can play around with it to see what width I like. The monitor arm on the other hand had more parts than a small car, and I needed less than a third of it. I still have the option to add a second arm if I like, but I don't have any plans for it at the moment.
The idea behind the laptop on the side is that I will use that for presentations and streaming. I do have an extra camera as well, but it looks a bit nicer when I can look into the camera while I also show things, as opposed to showing the side of my head, or top of it as my main monitor is so huge. I can easily switch the settings on my keyboard to work on either computer, and I am getting an apple trackpad to use as a secondary mouse for the mac. I will of course also use it for design work on  the PC when needed.
The second screen raise was pretty much just the tray and four legs. I assembled it in 30 seconds or so, and I use it to get my PC off the ground a bit. It is a bit short, but I managed to get the feet of the PC on the edge on each side, so it works pretty well. The foot-pillow was surprisingly good and I feel the effect right away.
With this second upgrade, I now feel very good about my setup. Next step will be to get the walnut desk top from Ikea. I am not sure if I will get the second desk top for building my own screen raise just yet. The reason for that is that this screen raise actually worked very well and since it is black it will still work well even on a walnut desk. There is also a pretty big cost involved.
I do feel I need some LED to illuminate the back of the desk a bit so I can see a bit better what I have below the screen now. I also spent some time yesterday looking at something to add to the wall behind the screen. It will probably be some form of canvas or MDF, so I just need to find the right motif that fit not just my home office, but also the bedroom where the home office is located.
So, step 3 will be the new walnut desk top and then during the fall I will add some items from Grovemade as step 4.
So far so good.

The sections have received a first update in Figma. This is the first step to make Sections the natural landing hubs of the site. It is a part of the planning process, and it feels so good to have the tools needed to make new designs with ease now. In both light mode and dark mode.
Sections was always the intended nodes for content. Everything is actually built around that concept, but it never turned out the way I wanted it. So to get a good start now feels very good to be honest, and I will focus on the Development section first this summer. This is because I feel that this is where my passion is at the moment. I think it will be Atlassian next if the Martin & Servera project get a go for phase 2 in September.
For the Development section, I am going to split into frontend and backend. Since I am a frontend developer, I will focus on that section first. The Frontend section will focus on two sections: HTML/CSS and JavaScript. Since I suck at JavaScript I will again focus on HTML/CSS and for that area I want to make resources for people who are new to this field. So some starting guides and probably a list of tags, like on W3Schools, are things I consider.
I have still not decided if I want to focus sections to different products, like Code Editors, or specific code libraries such as Bootstrap or Angular. I think I need to consider the possibility, but not focus on it right away. It might become more interesting down the line when I have had a chance to get some help with content.
This is something I will try to expand upon in Year 3, adding more admins to help with certain areas that they are passionate about. Not sure if it will happen in year 3, or if I need to add more content first, so it might happen in year 4. I will still add it to the sections and I will dedicate a whole page for guest blogging, just to make things more valuable for others to contribute.
So, sections are starting to take form. It's still a long way to go, but it is moving slowly, but surely.