These monthly updates may be a bit technical. They’re written primarily for my future self—to remember how I spent the month and to motivate me to do at least something remotely interesting. They’re also for friends and colleagues (past and future), to give an idea of what I’m working on, and of course for potential clients of my C++ freelance business and fellow software developers.
The banner shows the new spotlights I installed in my office.
New year
I spent quite some time in January thinking about the future. The world is changing rapidly, and those of us who want to remain relevant need to keep up.
First of all, I don't see a great future in freelancing right now. AI coding assistants are dirt cheap, and they perform well enough for most use cases to keep corporations happy. That happiness will fade for some of them when they get fined a few billion euros for not handling personal data in a lawful manner—but that's the cost of doing business today. At least it seems so from my perspective.
Also, I have experimented a bit with "vibe coding." It's not as easy as some TikTokers and self-promoted experts on LinkedIn say. But done right, by someone who understands the technology and constraints, I can make things a lot faster than before with about the same quality. That gives me the opportunity to do some projects I have wanted for a long time, without spending man-years implementing them. That's pretty awesome.
I am steering my time now to make products rather than just writing code for money. The AI agents can write code—but they can't make great products—at least not yet. That takes human thought, creativity, gut feeling, and experience.
As part of this shift in priorities, I am preparing to be a lot more active on social media. So I borrowed some spotlights and a light mixer from the café to make my videos more professional.
Projects
NextApp
NextApp is a GTD/productivity application for desktop and mobile.
NextApp has performed perfectly since its third beta release in October.
I planned to make the first stable version in February, but there are too many small improvements I want to add, so it will probably not be ready until March.
Deldupes
Deldupes is a Linux tool that helps you find and safely remove duplicate files.
I wrote a short blog post about it if you want to know more.
Freelancing
I'm still open for freelancing gigs.
If you know someone who’s looking for an experienced and quite passionate C++ freelancer, please get in touch.