Words from the road and the terminal
Technical articles, personal essays, and dispatches from wherever I happen to be. Writing is how I understand what I think.
When I attended DjangoConUS for the first time in 2023, I was uncertain whether I would be able to...
March 17, 2025
Dublin has been on my travel list for some time, and now that my Django talk was accepted, it gave me...
December 7, 2024
Book reviews are delicate. You don't want to spoil it, but you also want to give potential readers a...
August 25, 2024
Last week in the Djangonaut Space, we had a session with Daniele Procida called Let's become...
February 26, 2024
I first heard of DjangoCon US in 2021. DjangoCon is a series of international conferences that brings...
December 30, 2023
I love playing vector because it features a free runner who is not held by the system who runs,...
August 31, 2023
Cloud computing is using technology that has five of these traits: Getting on-demand and...
August 7, 2023
I have always had a sweet tooth, which I partly blame on my late grandfather, Nyanya. I used to enjoy...
August 1, 2023
Testing is an integral part of software engineering, specifically for all the stakeholders involved....
July 31, 2023
In SaaS (Software as a Service) applications, auth (authentication + authorization) is a critical component that you cannot take shortcuts with. Authentication…
May 31, 2023
I enjoy fictional books about greek gods, demigods, the oracle, and prophecies. I am a huge fan of Rick Riordan's books. I recently came across Apollo's…
May 30, 2023
How To Build A User Settings Page In Five Minutes Humans inherently desire to tune our environment to our needs. This desire also applies to our digital…
April 28, 2023
When I was a young girl, we used to have sports competitions like running a hundred meters, relays, swimming, and basketball games. My strengths were swimming…
February 23, 2023
DevFest Nairobi picture I attended the Web 3 Roadshow this past weekend at the Movenpick hotel in Nairobi by Mara in partnership with Circle. It was amazing to…
November 8, 2022
Efficiency is the word of the day. As humans we strive to be efficient in whatever we do, from moving...
October 18, 2022
A structure is an arrangement and organization of related elements in a system. Data is translated...
October 18, 2022
Devfest Nairobi In the current world, before making a purchase, you always check reviews of previous buyers to confirm if the actual product matches the…
October 12, 2022
Call for Speakers Every year we have the annual Google Developer Festival where Google Developer Groups around the world host local tech conferences to fit the…
September 21, 2022
Product managers can be project managers depending on the setup of the organization. For fast-paced organizations, the roles may be similar and can be done by…
April 12, 2022
Software architecture is the organization of components in a system that includes how they interact with each other, the environment they operate in, and the…
April 4, 2022
Stacks I can neither confirm nor deny that when I was younger I was involved in an incident of breaking a stack of my mother’s treasured plates. Needless to…
February 15, 2022
‘Small but consistent habits’. My Atomic Habits Copy I always saw this book every time I went to one of my favorite book stores and decided to give it a read.…
February 10, 2022
Knowing a framework does not necessarily equate to knowing the language in itself. Case in point, knowing Django does not explicitly mean that you already know…
January 25, 2022
Image by Alexander Shatov. Twitter is a social media site whose purpose is to connect people and...
January 12, 2022
I really love dogs, in particular, the Siberian Husky. I do not own one yet but it's on my bucket list. I was on Instagram getting lost in the numerous…
November 23, 2021
Once, a mason worked on an outdoor building that was at the central position of an enormous Campus. The Campus had all sorts of beings, part humans, part…
September 14, 2021
Creating a product from an idea involves a series of steps and iterations to have a minimum viable product (MVP). The MVP evolves based on user feedback and…
September 13, 2021
Having a plan is an excellent way to start a habit. Through making a plan you implement intention. An implementation intention is knowing when and where to…
September 12, 2021
To build new habits we need to understand the current ones. This is difficult since habits are formed through actions by our minds consciously and…
September 11, 2021
Habits are mental shortcuts learned from experience. The brain recalls the past to better predict what may or may not work in the future. I remember there is a…
September 10, 2021
Changing a habit becomes problematic because we either try to change the wrong thing or we try to change the habits the wrong way. Motivation may lead to the…
September 9, 2021
I just started reading Atomic Habits by James Clear. I get why the book is loved. The first chapter is about "Surprising Power of Atomic Habits". The chapter…
September 8, 2021
This article is about the Tree Data Structure
September 5, 2021
Fibonacci heap is a collection of trees that follow two main properties min heap and max heap. Min heap is the property where a given node is always smaller…
September 4, 2021
Unique identifiers such as IDs, passports, and school registration numbers are real-life examples of how hash tables work. This is where a unique identifier is…
September 2, 2021
I really like memes and there is one for every situation. I remember trying to look for one recently that had something on "we do not do that here", luckily I…
September 1, 2021
Did you know an average adult makes 35000 decisions per day? The number is outrageous. We choose what time to get out of bed, to snooze or not to snooze the…
August 31, 2021
If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants - Isaac Newton, letter to Robert Hooke in 1676 (age 34) Leaders are people…
August 30, 2021
Experimentation is the act of testing out a hypothesis about a product. I have been reading the Lean Startup by Eric Ries and a concept that stands out is the…
August 29, 2021
Influence in product management is persuading others that your product vision is the right one. How Humans Deal With Persuasion Approach One: Natural,…
August 28, 2021
To build a product that solves a real-world problem and has an impact on the users is to first understand how the users are using the product. To understand…
August 27, 2021
A product manager acts as a representative of the user in the production process. This means that product managers need to be actively in sync with our users…
August 26, 2021
Consumers have needs and wants. Needs are things that consumers cannot live without while wants are secondary items that humans can live without. Through the…
August 25, 2021
A sprint is a short time period which a scrum team takes to complete a specific task. Scrums use sprints to manage projects which allow the teams to produce…
August 24, 2021
Scrum is continuously shipping value to customers. Scrum and agile are mainly thought of as the same though they are very different. Scrum is a framework for…
August 23, 2021
The first books I read were mainly fiction. A series I actually followed from the first book to the last was Heroes of Olympus. The story revolves around Greek…
August 22, 2021
Queues use FIFO (First In First Out) principle, which means the first one to queue gets to leave the queue first. The act of queueing in data structures is…
August 21, 2021
In my early years, when I was learning how to use a pen instead of a pencil we had a swimming instructor called Bill. He would tell us stories when the weather…
August 20, 2021
A stack is a linear data structure that follows the LIFO(Last in First Out) principle. This basically means that the last item to be placed is the first one to…
August 19, 2021
The first community meetup I ever attended was a Dev Fest. The event was held by the Google Developers group in Nairobi. I was anxious at first but as I got to…
August 18, 2021
I recently started in-depth learning Data Structures and Algorithms (DSA) and all I can say is it is tough, but I am actually getting the hang of different…
August 17, 2021
It is always said that people have already written everything that can possibly be said. That was the main barrier I faced, like what would I write, and would…
August 16, 2021
After hearing about ship 30 for 30 from Twitter I decided to try their email course and it was eye-opening. My takeaways from the course: 0. Writing Time…
August 15, 2021
Masterclass is an online platform where masters of their craft give curated video lessons, allowing you to learn from some of the brightest minds in the world.…
June 23, 2021
It's the little things that matter most and make us feel alive. The sand on our feet, the smell of soil after rain, the feeling of wind rush through our face,…
March 30, 2021
Todocode is a task manager for Developers who want to plan their day with personal items or work items in a simple and intuitive way. How It Works As…
February 5, 2021
As a Software Developer, the main goal is to create and build products that make life a little bit easier for others. Whether through creating cash apps like…
September 26, 2020
My Experience Commandeering DSC JKUAT DSC email When I got the email congratulating me on becoming a DSC lead, I was filled with a lot of joy, surprise, and…
August 31, 2020
This is an article on Django.
April 24, 2020
Riddle time. For there to be sound one must hear it. A tree fell and no one heard it. Did the tree make a sound? Think about that and tell me your thoughts on the comment section. In the meantime let’s talk about My 21 lessons in 21 years. Ageing is natural and a reminderContinue reading “My 21 Less
May 20, 2019
I learnt at an early stage that anything that comes after the word but is vile. No worries though I got you covered not all buts are negative. A few days back I had the pleasure of getting to listen to a story about a peace painting contest I don’t quite remember where, but theContinue reading “The
February 11, 2019
2018, well this was one epic ride. This was the year I gave to God, He is my supreme being, and I told Him that we were going to work on our relationship. Trust me I know this sounds weird but it gave me a certain balance. My perception of certain things changed, I becameContinue reading “2018”
December 28, 2018
I know right, what is going back? In our context we are going to talk about remembering that is going back. And when we do this I want us to be all in, no excuses, no omissions I want us to talk about all of it. You remember that time when all you felt inContinue reading “It’s worth going back”
October 5, 2018
In my social media handles, I expressed the need of educating people of what being an intellectual means since it was proving to be a basic need. A promise is a debt which I am currently paying. Enjoy. Some days ago we had a family issue that involved an argument between someone who had aContinue re
September 14, 2018
In a world filled with everything wrong and disgrace. Moral standards declining as we make advancements in technology, how ironic. How everything taught to us that was wrong becoming right because everyone is doing it. How dignity has become something to be disgraced and whoever chooses to do right
August 13, 2018
Sometimes I think we ask God for the right things at the wrong time.For example when you ask Him for growth and He starts revealing and removing people from your life.Then after sometime you are like “hold up,why did he or she or they have to go,I don’t like this”And my answer to you is,HeContinue r
June 21, 2018
My current read was How To win Friends and Influence People By Dale Carnegie. I chose that book by then because I was really failing when it came to handling people.I would say things that were not really appropriate and then I would try to fix it but it always ended the wrong way.I knowContinue re
June 9, 2018
They tell you trust but not too much They tell you feel but not too much They tell you love but not too much The problem is we all end up feeling too much and we get hurt so bad And we have to build ourselves up all over again and start the procedure allContinue reading “Not Too Much”
April 10, 2018
Read more of my past work across the web
All photographs on this page were taken by V.Kiara — if you'd like to use them, please reach out first.