Caktus Blog

My Dearest HTML,

Shall I compare thee to another Markup language? Thou art more foundational and more essential to how we consume web content!

Ronard’s Recap

“It takes a village” the African proverb goes. Nowhere was this as apparent as in DjangoCon. It was my first technology conference and my experience could not have been better. People from the most senior developer to fellow juniors and even one of the co-creators of Django made the experience feel warm and inviting. Perhaps knowing that you are surrounded by introverts alleviates the social pressure, knowing that everyone has a common interest, or perhaps even love for programming also brought a soothing feeling to the experience.

With all of the global changes from the past few years, some of us have been thinking a fair amount about the way that folks at our company, as well as in web development, grow in their careers. Initially, this conversation began with the desire to attract new developers to our company. However, as we continued discussing, we realized that it would also be beneficial to think about how to help people at our company grow in their careers. As a result, Kel Hanna and I have worked together to come up with a structure for more junior folks at our company to grow in their careers. I’m sharing some thoughts about it here, since we’re excited to see it in action, and in case it may allow others to implement similar ideas at their workplace.

As a research project this year at Caktus, we decided to build our own private cloud. Some of Caktus' clients prefer or require that their data and workloads remain on premises, which begs the question, "How can we bring a modern, cloud-like experience to an on-premises data center?"

Image by Colin Copeland

We’ve made it…the final category description! Welcome to the Developer’s Playground. This is where the developers run wild and free. They have absolute free reign on the monkey bars, swings, giant slides, and may spin the merry-go-round as fast (or slow) as their hearts’ content. This is that underground lair the aliens have yet to find. That place with the cave drawings full of acronyms, drawings, algorithms, and codes the likes most of us have no way to decipher. So we’ll only hear the voices of developers here. DEVS UNITE…and geek out at will!

Artwork by Myk’l Hanna

Café Rouge was busy today. Servers bustled about, taking orders and delivering food. The design reminded Morgan of a cafe he had frequented in London. The floors were shiny and clean, gray-flecked white tile. Booths lined every wall, standing out from the white floor in stark contrast with vibrant red vinyl seats and red and white backrests. A crowded bar occupied the back third of the cafe, with gleaming silver stools packed in closely. Between the booths and the bar, tables were arranged like a checkerboard, leaving enough space for several servers to flit from table to table.

Image by Jeanette O’Brien

Through all of your Caktus Universe exploring, set your sights high but keep your expectations at sea level. We’re here to explore and experiment, share a couple of laughs, and live as humans just trying to make it from one day to the next. Some pieces will be silly and inane, many will be our bread and butter technical works, others will serve hard-hitting topics with wide-ranging social implications, and still others will be somewhere in-between.

Welcome back, let’s jump right in! Since we’re painting this picture of a Caktus universe, it comes to mind that perhaps we’ve left some people behind down on Earth. Some folks have journeyed along with us, of course, but for the remnant–well, things may seem a little alien to them. So, this category will hold posts that bring those folks into the loop. And when I say ‘those folks,’ I mean me. I am that alien anthropologist (thanks to my liturgy professor for that term), venturing into this new-to-me universe of technology, and I’m pretty sure the air has a different molecular make-up than I’m accustomed to. But of course there are hundreds of others out there like me who use, but do not understand, technology. For myself and all the other alien Earthlings, let’s take copious notes and learn what makes this technology culture and Caktus society unique.

Welcome to the Caktus universe. If you read our opening piece New Worlds, you’re already aware that when you enter our blogosphere, the air is a little bit different than normal. (If you haven’t read it, don’t delay!) Sure, we’ll be talking about technology and the super cool, agile, sharp web applications that Caktus builds. AND…guess what else? Behind all of those applications, codes, and tech lingo are very real people. Folks with whole lives who are interacting with culture and society, raising families, spending time with chosen family members, and engaging in hobbies and side hustles. Basically, human beings who are breathing, eating, laughing, grieving, thriving, and making their way through each day. This blog will live into the fullness of this reality.

One of my favorite parts of working at Caktus is the community of developers who share knowledge within and outside our teams. Many of us work on different projects, but still take time to come together, share what we've learned, and apply those learnings to other projects.