I've kept a reading journal on GitHub for years 📚 (223 books and counting, here if anyone is interested, though I doubt it). Every time I finished a book, I was manually updating the file. Tedious, and I usually forgot to update the book count. So I asked Claude if we could automate it.
First we talked through what I actually wanted.
Then what language to use (Python, apparently 🐍).
Then whether I needed to install Python (yes ⬇️).
Then what a token was and whether it was safe 🔐.
Then why my terminal said python3 instead of python (totally normal, good to know).
Then why there was an extra blank line above the new entry 🧐.
Every step, I asked questions. I learned to do things I hadn't done before:
- Add Python to my machine
- Generate a fine-grained Github access token and use it in a script
Now I run one line in my terminal with my book entry, and the script:
- Automatically numbers the entry
- Adds it to the right year
- Updates my total count
- Opens the repo in my browser. Done. ✅
My first Python project works, and the whole thing took less than hour.
Moral of the story: If you've been putting something off because "that's not really my thing" … maybe give it a go. 💪📚
Top comments (0)