Last month, one my book clubs finished reading Apprenticeship Patterns: Guidance for the Aspiring Software Craftsman by Adewale Oshineye and Dave Hoover. We started this book at the beginning of our co-op and met regularly to discuss each chapter. Published in 2009, this book describes a set of patterns to how to grow professionally as an apprentice on the journey to software mastery.
In this blog post, I'll discuss the book briefly, the importance of having a reading list, and my actual reading list, as of September 2026.
Since I last wrote my goals on this blog, a lot has changed with my life. In February, I was still finishing up my semester. Since then, I’ve started my co-op position in May and I’ve learned quite a bit in the four months since last writing.
In this blog post, I will reflect on the goals I wrote in February earlier this year, and then list my goals for this month.
For my science fiction course I took last semester, I wrote short story in the style of an author or filmmaker in the course materials. I chose to write a time travel story in similar vein to The Time Machine by H. G. Wells.
I've always had this concept in my head, but I never fully explored it in a story before. I chose to write a short story to force myself to conceptualize these ideas. While it's not a complete execution, I'm pleased that I've completed something about the idea that's been mulling in my head for a while
Over the past year and a half studying software engineering, I have created and refined a note-taking system that I’ve found a lot of success with.
First, I use Obsidian to store all of my notes for every course in one vault. I take advantage of features such as Markdown formatting, vault-wide search, and internal vault links that act as a “wiki” of my notes, where I store all of my consolidated notes on a particular topic.
The Markdown files created in Obsidian map well as sources for NotebookLM, an AI research tool developed by Google. I use NotebookLM generate quizzes and study guides on my notes, saving me time so I can focus on testing myself for more effective studying.
In this blog post, I go more into detail of how exactly I set up Obsidian and use NotebookLM to help with my studying, as well as some considerations should you want to adapt my system.
My current goals and projects, as of February 2026:
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This goes without saying, but finish this semester. Ideally I also maintain my GPA, although this has proven to be the toughest semester yet. Currently, I'm taking Advanced SQL, NoSQL, Microprocessors and Embedded Systems, Application Security, Windows Network Programming, and Science Fiction as an elective. It has been quite the workload!
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Revamp my portfolio. Right now, my portfolio has been slowly transitioning away from my old goals of seeking an advanced degree in bioinformatics and focusing on bioinformatics toward my current web application and web design career.