I’ve heard it said that Perl doesn’t have a strong connection to any graphical UI library because Perl people used the web and CGI as their GUI. This is very much me, but the places I have thrown my GUI toys out in the world are drying up. I could run them with Vagrant or Docker on my work box, knowing that I can get back via VPN, but I’m thinking that buying look-at-me-i-am-significant.com or something and making a page for the world to see along with the things I eventually build for myself, and maybe, on occasion, others.

So, this gives me some options for a me-centric web page.

Blog

This is a great choice if you’re actually a blogger, if you actually spend time to generate content. Most developers I know have jobs where their value is contributing and understanding the code in front of them, not writing text explaining part of what they did to themselves and others.

Therefore, most blogs for developer types run between six months and six years since their last update, which is not a good look. “Look at my thoughts about this project from before it either took over the world or was replaced by the thing that did” is stale and lame, and will become lamer as time and major version numbers accumulate.

Blogs, even old blogs, aren’t necessarily bad, but going directly into them, using a default theme that’s tied to the web at a certain vintage, is not what I want.

(Yes, I know that’s this page, too.)

Landing Page

Let’s start with my friend Amy and her words on Leaky Landing Pages:

First, a landing page is simply any web page that a visitor can land or arrive on. However, we typically refer to landing pages as being standalone pages on a website used for marketing purposes. For example, if you are running online ads (Google, Facebook, etc) and you want those people to land on a specific page related to that ad… that’s when you have a landing page.

I’m not looking to provide a good or service to the general public. I don’t have a call-to-action I’m trying to get anyone to move to. I’m flashing on Jon Lovitz’ “Get To Know Me!” sketches from back when Saturday Night Live was funny, and I don’t really know why most anyone randomly travelling through the Internet should get to know me.

If you’re a developer with questions or answers, or a hiring manager somewhere, this might be different.

Resume

As these thoughts were flying through my mind, a post from the Practical Dev called Resumé++ came up, with the first point:

Position your resume for the job you want, not the job you have.

Which is a good and wonderful point, except I don’t know what job I want. I have a collection of interests and would gladly follow any of several, which means that having a general resumé floating out there is poorly focused on any particular one.

Besides, isn’t “This is my resumé, world! Hire me!” what LinkedIn profile pages for?

Portfolio

This almost makes sense for me, and it would make sense for a great many people. If I was an artist or craftsman or even a designer or developer with a front-end focus, a website full of “Look at the things I can do” is exactly what the web is for.

This is not me.

I’m mostly a backend guy who knows just enough front-end to make it work, and the coolest modern Machine Learning work looks unimpressive when displayed in 1998-era tables layout.

So?

The Words of House Jacoby are “We Do Not Make Web Pages”. I make tools, often using web technologies. I am skilled and interested in this purpose. I am utterly at a loss for what to do.

If you have questions, comments, suggestions and affirmations, do so as an issue to my blog repo or find me on Twitter.