Week in Review 2023-06-12
Climate change and FastAPI development in Mexico, plus interesting podcast, software, Twitter, and web links.
Took a few weeks off, but now I'm back.
On the development side, I have been getting more acquainted with FastAPI for creating web development APIs. Coming from Django, I have noticed some differences, but at the end of the day, a web framework is a web framework—they have similar things and approaches. One thing I miss from Django is how easy it is to create migrations and keep everything up to date with python manage.py makemigrations. On the other hand, it has forced me to think in a more structured way on how to develop models, the relationships between them, and the creation of those models in the database, including setting the constraints. It's always good to get to know another framework.
On the urban side of things, I'm currently in Mexico, and that has led to some car dependency (😔 I know), while also experiencing one of the warmest days recorded in Guadalajara, with temperatures reaching 40°C (104°F) 🥵. As we all know, climate change is causing us to experience these record-breaking temperatures more often. However, it doesn't seem like we are taking it as seriously as required, let alone working to reverse the effects, or even adapt or mitigate them. Guadalajara (the second-largest city in Mexico) is still growing rapidly, developing suburbs (which increases car dependency) and continuing urban sprawl. Of course, it's not all bad news—there are some good initiatives, such as the growing bicycle infrastructure network and other positive changes. However, we still need to pick up the pace, because the effects of climate change are here, and we are not doing enough.
One of my favorites fruits (pitaya), in one of my favorite public spaces
Now, on to some good parts—interesting links that I found during these weeks:
Podcast
- Nick Offerman on The War on Cars // Nick Offerman (Ron Swanson, Parks and Recreation), joins The War On Cars to discuss biking, masculinity, and cities. Give it a listen, great episode.
Software
Web
- Apollo will close down on june 30th // The new changes in Reddit's API pricing is forcing the shot down. I really enjoyed Apollo. This is a shame.
- How parking ruined everything