outline

perhaps a format of "this is what your supposed to do, and here is an example of how I did it in my project" a "theory -> example" pattern as it were

intro
  - why I am doing this.
  - an outline of my process
    - picking a project, 
    - designing a project
<p>
When I was but a lad learning to program, I would have all these idea's of things that I would want to make, and then I'd try to make them, I wouldn't usually get too far. Looking back on it now, the thing that stopped me from completing anything was the fact that I didn't know exactly what I was building. I would think "I'm going to make a game" and then I'd start with coding and research. I would look for a library to use and then try and make my game. After some time I'd have a little dude going around my screen, butquickly after that point I would stop working on my project.
</p>
<p>
My game project would fail every time. Looking back on it I realize, I didn't have a plan, I didn't know exactly what game mechanics to make. The idea's I did have were in my head only. Sometimes I wouldn't have any idea what to research.
</p>
<p>
There is a saying "minutes of planning can save you hours of coding" and it's truth. Back when I was first learning, I didn't really understand that planning was important, let alone how to do it.
</p>
<p>
When you plan, you take big tasks and break them into smaller tasks. When I plan, I often make a checklist.
</p>
<p>
In order to write about what I've learned about planning, I thought I'd start a new project and document the things I do in order to complete the project. This article covers project selection, planning, and design
</p>

<h2>Choosing What to Do</h2>
<p>
For me, and probably a lot of people, planning and working on a project consists of a perpetual cycle of asking "What do I do?" and then answering it, over and over and over again. Sometimes you know the answer so fast it's like there was no question. Sometimes you find out later that you should've questioned that instant answer more.
</p>

searching for a project idea
 - that article
   - how to stay motivated for a project
 - blog manager
<h2>Searching for a project idea</h2>
<p>
If you don't know what you're building... How're you going to build it? I needed an idea and thought I'd find some inspiration. So I hit the internet. I found various lists of things (many of them had good ideas) I eventually found an article on a website called <a href="http://www.programmingforbeginnersbook.com/blog/what_should_i_make_beginner_programming_project_ideas/" target="_blank">programmingforbeginnersbook.com</a> that I found particularly insightful. The TLDR (according to seth) is that picking your project is to pick a project within (or just barely out of reach) of your skill set. Pick one that you might use, or your friends or family.
</p>
<p>
I decided to make a manager for my blog. Currently I manually edit a json file when I add a new post. I think it would be nice to automate it.
</p>

<h2>Planning your project</h2>
<p>
</p>

designing it
  - describe what you want it to do
    - break it down into piece's
    - If you work on a piece and you don't know what to do, describe that piece more fully.
    - hours of coding can save you minutes of planning.
  - my design
    - first - what it should do
       - manage my blog
         - update my posts.json file
         - create posts
         - edit posts
    - second - how I want to interact with it
      - cli
      - gtk
    - third - design the interface
      - cli first because it should be a little easier
        - I decided not a TUI. Because commands more scriptable

Next blog
  - beginning coding