Just a quick one on a mindset that I have been trying to apply to the things that I have been working on, or committing to, in 2024. The concept revolves around two requirements to meet when committing to a project/client/etc. Those two requirements are, the project either has to be interesting, whether that is interesting to work on, an interestin…

Reflecting on Laravel vs. React debate that went down a few weeks back, got me thinking about Context. Context switching. The context that influences the decisions we make. Really, just about context in general. My focus has been to try to minimize the amount of context switching that I am doing, which is already difficult while managing multiple c…

The struggle is real-ish. In this episode I get into the tension I have been feeling as I am in my -1 to 0 phase, trying to figure out which project/product I want to place my energy towards (first), and some of the technical stuff I plan on incorporating in the projects I am planning on taking on. Some of those core technology areas include: Event…

In this episode I reflect on officially hitting publish on this podcast. The steps that lead up to the release, along with all the excitement and anxiety that builds up before pressing that button. From creating the cover art, to settling on the format—or lack there of—to writing descriptions, and deciding whether or not to pay the extra $5/month t…

In this episode I dig into why I decided to build a custom site for this podcast vs. using one of the templated sites that TransistorFM offers. Part of it is based on some of my ideas about utilizing platforms to push traffic back to sites that you own. The other part of it was I just had an idea of what I wanted the site to look like, and how I wa…

tl;dr I am not going to be editing these episodes, so please bare with me. Although, if you want me to reflect on it a bit more, there’s a reason for making the active choice to not edit these episodes. Part of that decision is based on efficiency, as I work through these episodes I am trying to take all the ideas swirling around in my head and plu…

CSS and component libraries, where to begin? Over the years I have used a bunch of different flavors including, css-modules, styled-components, CSS + Sass and a few other things. But, over the last 3 years or so, I have been primarily using ChakraUI, which is a component library that offers a really nice way to setup your theme—based on styled-syst…

On this episodes I dig into getting back into action and picking a stack to base the action on. In the past, I have built my products and prototypes in Laravel, using an SPA—typically built in React—for the majority of stuff, and I go into all the pros, and a few of the cons, I have experienced with that setup along the way. Well, now the year is 2…

Hey, I’m Ryan Hefner and I’d like to welcome you to the All Play podcast. On this show I will be sharing my experiences as I build products and open-source software, sharing the highs and lows that go into building a solid product, and hopefully leading to a successful launch and growth of customers. In this episode I share a bit of my background, …