Professionally, I’ve made it a point always to choose a project with a new tech (my last three projects were in C for PowerPC and for STM-32, React (web) UI project, and the latest one was a big AWS serverless backend project). While it is very motivating for learning, I don’t think it is optimal for someone dreaming of someday building a somewhat independent software business (of some kind). I need to standardize something for my stuff. Trying to narrow it down with the following parameters:
I know I like Python. I love playing with CSS. I have respect for good old HTML. I am almost sure I would enjoy iOS development (I know I’m not too fond of Android development), and I love the AWS serverless stack (also stuff like Vercel/Netlify). I’ve written a lot of Java and SPA Javascript in my life, but I feel like both these technologies are more useful for a consultant (that I will continue to be as well). Things that I don’t know yet I am fascinated by Swift, Kotlin, and Rust.
Then, I have dabbled with data science stuff and machine learning but not sure I want to take a deeper dive there, it would almost certainly mean a lot of studying, and I still wouldn’t be the 30-year-old math PhD the field is full of.
I also have a lot of thoughts on what else needs to change in my career. I am somewhat frustrated with the limited capabilities of software professionals to make an actual, meaningful impact on customer business. In many cases, I come to projects way too late to make anything else than put out fires. I am unsure how I will change this, but I feel that I could make a much more significant impact doing the things I am good at if I only talked to different people in organizations. Lots of boring biz dev work ahead