This page was last updated on August 23, 2025 at 2:36 p.m. from my computer laboratory.
# Currently
For one reason or another it has taken me eleven months to get this web-based project deployed. It's still very much in the early days, and there is a lot of work required to get the foundations laid. But the ball is now rolling, and things are beginning to take shape.
## Working On
I'm currently wrapping up the development of my blog. From the coding point of view I just have to tidy up my css file. Then I need to add copy to the legal pages in the footer. Once that is done, all that remains is to write my first blog post.
## Writing
The first blog post always seems to be the hardest one to write. I've spent a lot of time deliberating whether to jump straight into the blog by writing about one of the many things floating around in my head, or to write an introductory post. In the end I settled on jumping straight in, and I'm currently editing the first draft. Hopefully, I'll be able to get it polished up in time to deploy the blog in the next couple of weeks.
## Reading
To unwind in the evening, I am listening to "The Phoenix Project: A Novel About IT, DevOps, and Helping Your Business Win" by Gene Kim, Kevin Behr, and George Spafford on my smartphone. I can't remember how many times I've read this book, but suffice to say, a lot, but I still enjoy it every time I read it.
## Learning
With no formal training in system administration, and my desire to become a well-rounded and compentent SysAdmin, I have decided to work my way through the three volume course "Using and Administering Linux" by David Both.
I'm current half way through the first volume "Using and Administering Linux: Volume 1: Zero to SysAdmin: Getting Started". Volume one is elementary, but I have decided to still work my way through all the exercises nonetheless. It's David's workflow that interests me most at the moment, and I'm aware that the three volumes follow on from one another.
To keep things interesting until I reach the point where David is teaching me how to be a SysAdmin I have decided to do things a little differently as I follow along. Mostly, because not everything David recommends is accessible to me as a screen reader user.
One such change is how I've implemented VirtualBox. In the book David walks the reader through the graphical user interface of VirtualBox. This might be the easiest for to get most readers setup, but the GUI isn’t accessible with my screen readers. Instead I am using the command line interface with VBoxManage.
Another change I have made has been my choice of distro and desktop. In the book David, recommends using Fedora with the Xfce desktop. Fedora is accessible, but the Xfce desktop isn't. So I've decided to spice things up a bit and use my preferred distro, Ubuntu, and an accessible desktop, GNOME.
# Next
There is plenty of things I want to work on, books to read, and things to learn, but these are the things that I will be doing next.
## Working On
Once I have deployed my blog, the next thing on my action list is to start developing my wiki site, which will be deployed to the subdomain: wiki.librepaul.org. Once the wiki has been deployed, the foundations of my web-based project will have been laid and I can then turn my attention to other projects.
## Writing
The biggest challenge to deploying my online wiki is preparing the hundreds of documentats that I want to share publicly. This will be a mammoth undertaking for me. To help manage my time efficiently, I have decided to only spend two hours, twice a week, to prepare, format, and upload to the wiki, until it is done. So the wiki will be updated regularly once it has been deployed.
## Reading
When I have finished listening to "The Phoenix Project" I will start listening to "The Unicorn Project: A Novel about Developers, Digital Disruption, and Thriving in the Age of Data (The Phoenix Project)" by Gene Kim, on my smartphone. This is my favourite of the two novels, and have read this book countless times before.
## Learning
I will continue working my way through the remaining two volumes of "Using and Administering Linux" by David Both. I know from the contents page of the second volume "Using and Administering Linux: Volume 2: Zero to SysAdmin: Advanced Topics", that there'll be some chapters where I will start learning new skills. The same goes for the third and final volume "Using and Administering Linux: Volume 3: Zero to SysAdmin: Network Services".