Team Meeting, Code Reviews, and Organizing My Workflow

TL;DR

• First functional team meeting felt underwhelming; questions asked were more for clarity than sparking discussion
• Reviewed Agent 1486’s MR on schedule triggers and left a knit comment that was actually wrong
• Went through a code review with Bricklebrit Fizzlebang and noticed I take about an hour vs. his half hour
• Talked through a 3-part process (procuring/understanding work, doing the work, reviews) to help with organization and time management
• Figured out a GitLens/VS Code workflow to view full cumulative diffs instead of using the GitLab UI

First Team Meeting

Started the day around 9 and had our first functional team meeting by 10:45. Felt a little underwhelmed - Agent 1486 has this broad awareness and mental acuity that’s a bit intimidating as a new engineering manager, and Bricklebrit Fizzlebang also seems to have the right things come to mind quickly. I asked some questions I think were good, but they felt more like clarity checks than things that sparked conversation - as if everyone already knew the material and I was just catching up. It is what it is.

Code Review Mistakes and Session with Bricklebrit Fizzlebang

Finished reviewing Agent 1486’s MR related to cron/schedule triggers for flows. Left a knit comment that was completely wrong - a code-level mistake I should have caught, which was disappointing. Later had a good first code-review session together with Bricklebrit Fizzlebang. Definitely felt a bit like a child sweating while being watched code. Noticed Bricklebrit Fizzlebang gets through reviews in about half an hour while I’m taking around an hour, so I need to find ways to speed up.

Organizing Myself - Process Thoughts

Been getting a lot of feedback from Agent 6451 and Bricklebrit Fizzlebang about organizing myself, and with Agent 3621 joining the team there have been more general process changes prompting this reflection. I’m also joining a smaller team and want to accelerate my review speed, which requires better organization to deliver on time. Time management has always been a challenge - my mind tends to hyperfocus and dive down rabbit holes rather than mode-switch. Talking things through out loud helps me create coherent structure and makes things stick better than reading does.

To keep my process simple, there are three things I need to work on: First, understanding the context around my work - talking more with Agent 6451 about his simple process flow, since I currently rely too much on browser tabs (though I’ve started building a small dashboard). This includes how I procure/curate work, especially with Agent 3621 on board - being aware of high-level epics and planning issues, and having processes for assigning follow-ups to the correct epic. Second, actually doing the work in two phases: feature delivery on epics/issues, and planning that work into discrete, actionable parts rather than jumping in and hyperfocusing before realizing it should have been split up. Third, reviews - a full mode switch into unfamiliar code. This starts with talking through the MR description to understand intent, then practical testing (spinning it up, checking in browser or GraphQL Explorer, comparing with/without the change), and clarifying repro steps. Then comes the code review itself - during the session with Bricklebrit Fizzlebang I noticed the diff in GitLab wasn’t complete, which reinforced wanting to review in VS Code where I can see the whole file and search more easily.

Solving the Diff-Viewing Problem

Decided to use GitLens to see a full cumulative diff in VS Code rather than dealing with GitLab’s UI, which can be a pain when expanding files. My efficiency might also be limited by not knowing all the key commands for something like Neovim, which Bricklebrit Fizzlebang uses fluently - not sure if it’s worth learning or if I should just keep solving problems in VS Code. Also heard Agent 6625 suggested another IDE, and thought about asking her about it. Later figured out a workflow: right-click the feature branch to review, select for compare, then compare with the commit that’s the merge base with master. This gives a full breakdown of changed files and a proper diff to review in VS Code, showing the whole file instead of needing to expand things in the GitLab UI.

Hot Sauce Recipe for Agent 6451

Medium spicy, green and vibrant sauce recipe: 2 yellow hot peppers, 6 finger hot peppers, 3 green thai chiles, 2 scotch bonnets, 2 peaches, 25g ginger, 5 cloves garlic, 1/4 a spanish onion (about 10cm across), zest of one lime (save juice for later), 3% salt brine. Chop everything and submerge in salt brine. Ferment 10-21 days, add lime juice to taste (might not need much, if any). Blend everything up. Can pasteurize and bottle (aiming for pH around 3.5, definitely under 4.0), or just bottle and refrigerate to stop/slow fermentation.