2015 Roundup - Credo: Teaching changed my Life

This is the final part in a series discussing the projects that shaped “my” 2015.

After the success of Inch, a documentation analysis tool for Ruby, and giving a talk at EuRuKo 2015 about building this rather unconventional tool, I decided to create a similar tool for classic code analysis.

To understand where this came from, you have to know that I have spent the last two years teaching at local universities (next to my day job). Teaching has proven an unexpectedly krass and rewarding experience. I would not have believed it if you told me beforehand, but preparing lessons for students has led me to think very differently about how people approach problem solving.

So, with this background, the feedback from EuRuKo and my personal passion for Elixir, I decided to build a code linter that does not spout “YOU’RE WRONG!!!11” but instead teaches you why you should probably reconsider your code here and there. This effort to create a less dogmatic code linter soon got a name: Credo, announced in November.

It is really too early to tell, but my gut tells me this project will occupy most of my time in 2016. As far as I am concerned, Credo is off to a phenomenal start. The initial reception by the community was an absolute blast. I worked on it for two months and wasn’t really sure if people would dig the concept. And then I kind of tanked the initial release, since I had some wrong ideas about how Elixir applications across Hex packages work together.

It was an emotional rollercoaster. ;-)

We’re now at version v0.2.5 and I am super happy with the response on Twitter and elsewhere. There is a steady stream of bug reports, new ideas and PRs on GitHub. And last but not least, Credo will probably have surpassed Inch in terms of internet points (a.k.a. GitHub stars) as you read this.

That’s it for 2015. It was a pleasure, being in Open Source, giving my first talk, coding Ruby, really focusing on Elixir during the last quarter. I really can’t thank people enough for their kind words, constructive feedback and encouraging me to do all this and try seemingly crazy stuff.

Thank you all and see you in 2016.