2022 Review & What’s Coming in 2023

I hope these these types of posts aren’t merely an exercise in ego and humble brag, but then I also like numbers, writing, and keeping track of what I’ve been up to. And maybe you’re curious how others are doing. I know I really appreciate Brent’s candor (and his car collections!) So let’s take a quick look at what happened with the ‘thatjeffsmith’ part of my life and try to do a proper 2022 review.

Career stuff

I’m now managing two product managers on our team, Chris and Zach. I’ve never set out to be a manager or leader, but it happened, and I’m enjoying helping them figure out the whole ‘product management’ thing. I’ve got a lot to learn when it comes to managing people, and so far they’ve been quite forgiving.

I also had the opportunity to hire an Intern, Layla, and she was quite the firecracker! We’re all really excited to welcome her back as an intern in 2023. We’re also going to be shipping the feature that Layla worked on in Summer of 2022, and it’s going to be awesome seeing that go live.

I want to also say that the support I received from my manager (Kris) and co-workers (Barry, Ashley, Colm, Kay, Maria, and so many more…) allows me to do what I do, so thanks to all for that – it’s noticed and appreciated.

With Oracle Cloud World 2022 in Las Vegas, I was able to make it back out onto the road and see real people, in real life! That was great, and hopefully will be able to travel more in 2023.

Products

We’re winding down our Oracle SQL Developer desktop product. We effectively had one release in 2022, 22.2. And we’re going to have a 23.1 come out in a few weeks – both of which will be comprised only of bug fixes. The flip-side of this is that we’re building a brand new desktop SQL Developer product which will launch this Spring. I’m very happy to have Chris and Zach be here from Day 0 – it’s not every day you get to help launch a net new product that will have millions of users as a product manager.

ORDS/SQLDev Web and SQLcl had many releases, updates, and new features launched in 2022.

Working on REST APIs, Web applications, Command Line Interfaces, and desktop tools all at once can sometimes be overwhelming. And then I remember we’re also building and supporting Oracle Cloud (OCI) Services as well!

There were approximately ZERO boring or dull moments last year. And having so many different creative outlets and platforms to work on really helps keep me motivated and not burning out.

I think Barry mentioned we had something like 36 product releases in 2022!

The blog

I enjoyed my Hashnode experiment. It’s a great platform, and if you’re starting out new as a writer, I would recommend you give it a look-see. It just wasn’t compelling enough for me to forsake a decade+ of work in my WordPress project.

In terms of the blog stats, I was a bit surprised that avg time spent per visit was so high. I was expecting more like a a minute or 2, not almost 5! Hopefully it’s because the content is engaging and not because it takes too long to find what you’re looking for!

My go-to quote for ‘search brings way more than social’ holds true. Less than 4% of blog visits originated from a Social Media source. I was surprised however, to see that the bonus visitors from LinkedIn won out over Twitter.

• 73 posts (including 4 on Hashnode)
• 880,000~ pageviews
• 4:30~ minutes spent per visit
• Top 5 Posts
  • ORDS & REST APIs Best Practices
  • Our new Explain Plan Viewer
  • Definitive Guide for REST APIs doing a TABLE INSERT
  • Help My SQLDev is Crashing
  • SQL Dev/Data Modeler 22.2 is available
• 78% Visitors came from Google (Search)
• Top Social Referrals
  • LinkedIn (11k)
  • Twitter (8k)
  • YouTube (666)
  • Reddit (624)

Socials

Twitter is still here. I keep acquiring new followers, somehow. Nearly 15,000 now, but engagement can feel quite limited and I’m NOT interested in sending a billionaire $8/mo to get eyeballs on my content. This same ‘pay to play’ to interact with your own audience is what led me to abandon Facebook. That being said, I’ll continue tweeting as long as there’s someone to tweet to. I still love Twitter.

I did sign up for a backup plan on Mastodon. It seems very similar to Twitter. And a lot of people on there talking about what’s happening on Twitter.

LinkedIn has become a powerhouse for sharing content and getting the good word out. Don’t overlook it!

2023 Predictions

This is all subject to change, but more or less, what we’re working on includes:

• Updated SQL Worksheet in our OCI Database Tools Service (February?)
• SQL Developer Next Launch (Spring)
• OpenID AUTH support in ORDS
• APEX 23 to support SSO access directly to SQL Developer Web (SQL Worksheet and REST Workshop)
• Database 23c Product launch/Tools Support
• More, much much more

Speaking of 23c, my next blog will be a preview of what you can do with ORDS and the JSON Duality Views feature available in the current 23c Beta offering.

Life Stuff

I seem to have gotten my plantar fasciitis and tendonitis under control. But, apparently the gout likes me. So two steps forward, and one step falling down. I’ve stopped running and given up any hopes of picking obstacle course racing back up. But that’s Ok, I’m stubborn and am still doing CrossFit 3-5 days a week. I remembered to hit the ‘record’ button for Strava 113x in 2022, but feel like I made it to the gym at least 200 sessions.

I really, really need to drop a few lbs this year. I’ll start 2023 off by doing Dry January, so hopefully that will help. Not running and still eating like I’m running 15k a week has not been good for me. The beers probably didn’t help any either.

We got my daughter a dog about a year ago. Which means that I got a dog. She’s mostly ok (the dog.)

My daughter also decided to try out for her middle school’s basketball team, and made it! So I’ve been enjoying going to her games and trying to help her out with her game. She listens, strangely. If I can get her to gain confidence in herself, she’ll be a monster.

My son has developed a love for rock climbing. Or at least, climbing fake rocks indoors. He’s gotten very good at it, and it’s a 90 mins block of time each week that he’s not on his Roblox account.

My wife is now a full year into her new career as a civil servant, working for the city of Raleigh as a stormwater engineer and project manager. It’s nice to see her not working the ‘consultant life,’ and it’s even nicer to meet her downtown for lunch or beers. Living in Cary is great, but downtown Raleigh is a fun place to visit.

My brother has been working for Amazon (I know, yuck!), and he did his first speaking session at the annual AWS bash this Fall in Vegas. It’s nice to know that I’m not the only one available to provide IT support to Mom and Dad.

18 of us Smith family members will be headed to Europe for a 7 day journey around the western Med in July. Yes, I know how how it is in July. My niece is turning 18 and headed to Uni, and my mom wanted a trip to Europe to celebrate turning 70. But, Covid delayed that for 2 years, so better late than never! I’ve been to Spain and France, but never Italy, so that’ll be cool. And my two kids will hopefully appreciate the opportunity to see how the rest of the world works.

And that’s it! If you made it this far, you must really, really like me. Thanks for that, and come back sometime!