Occasionally, I become attached to a certain area of programming and build stuff primarily for fun and for the learning experience. One thing in common with most of these projects is that they each solved one of my own problems.
Compiler Design
For a period, it was compilers and programming language theory (OP55NO1, Tiny Compiler, Crucible).
Learning about compilers and language theory provided an understanding of programming languages that most people don't have or aren't interested in. I find I'm able to reason about the generated code easier than just the high-level syntax. I've been exposed to a lot of programming language theory along with less common data structures that I feel more confident jumping into new languages and getting a running start immediately.
Web Dev
Then it was web dev with Next.js (Chronos, Canada Debt Clock, Color Convert, neohn).
My short journey into web development gave me an outlet to get creative and visualize things I was interested in in the spur-of-the-moment. For example, Chronos is a visual representation of how much time remains in the current year used as a motivator. Currently, 2025 is 15% complete. Each dot representing a single day -- potential that shouldn't be taken for granted. I had seen similar visualizations on Twitter and thought I'd throw something together myself with my own design choices.
CLI Tools
I've also always been interested in CLI tools as well (Ellm, Aria, URL Sentry, Sentinel). These tools directly solve problems I was able to identify in my flow.
Ellm gave me terminal access to LLM APIs, but most importantly, allowed me to implement features I felt lacking in current offerings. Ellm lets me switch between models on the fly to save tokens, and lets me branch a conversation if I want to take a tangent without cluttering the conversation.
I just worked on Sentinel, which automatically executes arbitrary commands when file changes are identified. I code in neovim for the most part and found myself manually running tools like mypy, ruff, or prettier. I created Sentinel to monitor file changes in a directory, and execute commands specified in a config file depending on the file extension. There's likely a native neovim way to automate this, but where's the fun in that?
Joy of Programming
It was only recently that I came to the realization of how satisfying it is to be able to solve my own problems. I always admired programming as a skill for creating anything I can imagine, but it feels different to create something I can personally use. Not only do I learn a lot by building the tools which solve problems I've identified, but my workflow becomes enhanced by code that I understand deeply and can quickly modify as limitations are identified. This is what I love about programming. Identify a problem, solve the problem.