How to Show Your Work

by Brad

I read Austin Kleon's book Show Your Work a few years ago. I really liked the idea, but I haven't followed his advice. The problem is, I don't know how.

If I were a painter or a furniture builder, I could take photos at the end of each day. If I were building a Truckla, I could create a documentary. Even if you didn't understand the details of the craft, you could follow along. How does this apply to software developers? Screenshots of code that doesn't work sounds boring even to me.

Do you know any good examples of software developers showing their work?

Brad

posted to

Building in Public

on February 27, 2021

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Hey Brad,

I created the Building in Public Definite Guide and I put in lots of examples there, so maybe that can help.

Showing your work is actually straightforward. Think of your life as a lesson, every day you're learning new things, you're getting new thoughts.

Document the thought process:
- What was bothering me today
- How I thought about it
- What I did to resolve it
Then write it out. That's it.

I came across @allison blog lately and I think you'll learn a great ton from her :)
https://allisonseboldt.com/
kevon

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5 years ago
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  Thanks for the shout out Kevon :)
  
  Brad -> Similar to what Kevon said, building in public doesn't have to be visual. You can just log what you did that day. https://getmakerlog.com/ is a great example of this. It's basically a newsfeed of people building in public.
  
  For me personally, I like to do monthly blog posts reflecting on what I got done and my goals for the next month.
  
  allison
  
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  5 years ago
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