One year later...
Itās been a year since my last post, and while most days feel like groundhog day, Iām worrying less about the covid numbers these days and finding more time to read, write and pick up the guitar.
Speaking of reading, I spent a lot of time this year creating TLS certificates and debugging connectivity issues, which led to my purchase of the bookĀ TLS Mastery: Beastie Edition.
At just over 200 pages and targeted at Unix system administrators, the author takes a practical approach to teaching you all you need to know about TLS and OpenSSL. I fixed the connectivity issues I was working on and improved what little knowledge of SSL/TLS I had accumulated over the years.
In the golden age of Google, itās rare for me to pick up a book once shelved but Iāve reached for this one a few times recently. Money well spent!
I recently finished Terraform: Up & Running: Writing Infrastructure as CodeĀ (another excellent book) and after reading theĀ Terraform 1.0 announcementĀ I spent last month preparing for theĀ HashiCorp Certified: Terraform AssociateĀ exam.
I wasnāt planning to take any exams this year, what with so much going on in the world but if thereās one thing Iāve learnt, itās that thereās no better way to focus the mind than a scheduled exam, paid for out of your own pocket.
TheĀ documentationĀ for Terraform is rock solid and all you really need to pass the exam, however I found a discount for the HashiCorp Certified: Terraform Associate 2021 course on Udemy.
I highly recommend the course. The exam preparation section (including practice tests) was more than worth the price, and I passed on the first attempt.
Having spent the first half of the year in the world of tech, Iām going to switch tack and focus on the creative side of my brain for the rest of the year. I think Iāll pick up some poetry or maybe finish a track one of these days.