Indie developer's week: Moving life and projects forward a little at a time

Foreword

Last Sunday I wrote the first article in the “A Week as an Independent Developer” series.

A week has quickly passed, and it's time for another summary.

Apart from my regular work recently, I’ve actually managed to keep up with daily updates on my WeChat Official Account (公众号) for over a week straight! (Hands on hips)

This has also made me realize the incredible perseverance of those bloggers who manage to update daily for a year, or even several years 👍

Updating consistently while maintaining article quality is definitely not easy, but the effort has paid off. This week, I’ve achieved several milestones in my Official Account career—I’ll write more about that later.

As usual, let me start by recording this week’s work.

Keywords of the Week

Taro3, Granian, Content Publishing Workflow, First Time Watching a Movie Alone, Life Also Deserves a Bit of Exaggeration

Last Week's Plan Review & Project Progress

Let me first review the flags I set last week:

• Develop several main interfaces for the Y project
• Complete the Granian/Celery integration for the DjangoStarter project
• Watch a movie
• Re-evaluate whether to use AI for some improvements

I'm glad I have some self-awareness and didn't set too many goals, otherwise I'd be writing a self-criticism this week 😅

Overall, the completion was quite satisfactory:

• Y project (i.e., the mini-program) achieved about 70% of the original plan. This week, I initially created 6 interfaces and implemented 1 key function, which is moderately satisfactory.
• The Granian integration for DjangoStarter is already complete. For details, see: Performance Boosted 4x! Using Granian as the ASGI Server for Django Projects. However, the Celery integration hasn't been done yet, so this plan is only considered 50% complete 😂
• The movie-watching plan was achieved. I went to the cinema to watch "Demon Slayer" and also visited a pop-up store to collect merchandise, completing the plan 100%
• Using AI for improvement was also realized. I used AI to optimize my content publishing workflow, mainly related to the StarBlog Publisher tool, slightly enhancing the efficiency of content publishing.

Let me elaborate below.

Mini-Program Y Project

Previously, mini-programs had two major hurdles: filing & authentication, and pitfalls with the code framework.

This week, the filing is finally completed. I almost missed entering the verification code when the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (工信部) sent the SMS for the first time... After it expired, I had to resubmit. Fortunately, the second submission was quickly approved.

I remember receiving the filing approval message while on a bus 🤣

Regarding the framework, I saw some comments complaining about Taro in a post from last weekend, but I’ve decided to stick with Taro3.

The reason is that I’ve used this codebase to develop several mini-programs before, and I don’t want to spend time re-familiarizing myself with another framework—it’s too time-consuming.

Moreover, Taro3 seems sufficient for now. While uniapp is often recommended (I briefly used it a few years ago), it doesn’t support React, and it charges for builds exceeding size limits, so I decided not to consider it.

DjangoStarter Project

https://github.com/Deali-Axy/DjangoStarter

This week, besides the Granian integration, I also made a lot of optimizations, completing another version iteration after v3.2.1 and bumping the version up to v3.3.0. However, I haven't written the release article for the new version yet 🤣

I’ve realized that working on open-source projects like this is not only a labor of love but also a time sink.

This project doesn’t have many stars, but it sure has plenty of issues. On a daily basis, I have to abstract the needs encountered in work into general features, answer questions, fix bugs, write documentation...

It often happens like this: open the project → look up → it’s midnight 🥱

Next Week's Plan

• Continue working on the interface for the Mini Program Y Project and complete the frontend features planned for the first version.
• Finish the Celery integration for the DjangoStarter project.
• Set aside time to handle company matters & prepare for the ToB (To Business) project.
• Watch another movie (this project seems to be a permanent fixture now 😄).

Rambling Thoughts

The rhythm of these past two weeks hasn't been a single track like before: work → code → sleep.

Instead, I've been switching between work, projects, updating content, and life experiences. The rhythm feels clearer and I have a greater sense of involvement.

I increasingly believe:

Independent development isn't just a technical endeavor; it's also a way to tune life into a mode that you truly enjoy.

Watching a Movie

Went to the cinema alone for the first time,

The full name of the movie is Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle Arc - Part 1: Akaza Returns.

(The following content contains spoilers⚠️)

I thought the cinema would be empty on a Monday afternoon, but there was a girl sitting in the back row, sniffling throughout the entire movie... The film certainly has its emotional moments, but was it really that moving? 🤣

I heard that this time it was an uncut version, which is rare, so that’s why I decided to go see it. It was definitely worth the ticket price. However, since I hadn’t watched Demon Slayer before, I didn’t understand the story. At the start, I was totally lost, and the girl behind me was alternating between crying and laughing—I just didn’t get it. 😂

But halfway through, I could roughly figure out the plot. The first half is about the Hashira of the Demon Slayer Corps fighting the Upper Rank demons in one-on-one battles. (Poor Kanae Kocho 😭)

The second half is about Tanjiro and Giyu fighting Akaza, interspersed with flashbacks and skill explanations. This part lasts for an hour and a half and makes up the largest portion of the film. After all, the title is about this.

Akaza’s final scene was still quite tear-jerking.

Beyond the movie, I suddenly felt that I should spend more time experiencing life in the future. I used to just bury myself in work. If life were only about code stacks and queues, it would be too dull.

Picked Up Merchandise at the Pop-Up Store

After learning that movie tickets could be used to claim merchandise, I visited the pop-up store the very next day 😄

The ticket feels even more worth it now~

Though these merchandise items are still a bit pricey—I had to hold back my wallet with my rational side.

The merchandise from the movie ticket is in the form of blind box filmstrips. I haven’t opened mine yet, so I don’t know what’s inside. I’ll open it next week to find out.

Guess that’ll be another blog post (just kidding)

Tried the Public Bus in a Small City

Come to think of it, it's kind of amazing—I've actually never taken the bus in Shantou before 🤣

After discovering that my Yangchengtong card could be used, I tried the bus on my way to the pop-up store. My feeling? Well... next time, I think I'll just drive myself instead.

Effort Always Pays Off

One reason last week's plan completion rate wasn't high is that several ToB projects I had previously prepared for started progressing this week.

So I also spent a lot of time dealing with these matters, hoping to see some results by the end of the year~

Additionally, I achieved three new milestones for my official account this week!

I thought there wouldn't be any other achievements before reaching 5,000 followers, but it turns out I got three more 😄

Each milestone rewards a few exposures, which is quite good for an official account with a modest number of followers.

I feel the current official account ecosystem is greatly impacted by platforms like Xiaohongshu (Little Red Book) and short videos. The officials have probably been forced to make many adjustments.

The new recommendation mechanism is beneficial for official accounts that don't have many followers. Recently, my article read counts have increased. However, relying on an official account to make money is still unlikely 🤣, so I'll just treat it as sharing life~

Summary

This week didn’t bring any major achievements, but every small thing moved me a little forward.

Projects progressed, open-source contributions were made, life experiences grew, and content output remained consistent.

I’m becoming more certain of one thing:

Indie development isn’t about “what you’ve done,” but about “continuously pushing things forward.” A small step each week, and looking back over a year, it’s a significant stride.

Keep going 💪