barkmimo.pet: mimo's home on the internet!

well. here we are. yippee, v1.0 is finally done!!!

a lot went into the development of this site. while it's not technologically complex, this was a massive learning effort. webdev in general, php, photoshop, file systems, deployment, all stuff i never really worked with. it's also the first time i have tried to express some sort of coherent package and identity for myself; scary, and also i am bad at that!

from the start, i had a fairly lofty goal for what i wanted: my own version of em's website. well, her site is massive and a creative feat. like, please just look at the aminals tab... please...

naturally, expectations were tempered, but this new, toned-down version still involved a lot of new, scary stuff... shudder, front-end...

i started from the simplest elements first, and decided that once these were done and somewhat presentable, then it was time to publish. no ifs or buts. crazy stuff can come later

so, i created the initial page layout, code framework, and a list of key features:

• back catalog, for archiving music
• blog page, for waxing lyrical
• projects page, for showing stuff i've done

the art direction was developed simultaneously. a scattered inspo-doc where screenshots, notes, and sketches grew in entropy, got trimmed down, then applied to the website, before this process got repeated again. the site evolved greatly as time went by, moving towards its final appearance alongside the code

these key features all depended on a feed, which ended up making the development pretty easy. same concept, different executions

for the blog feed, i valued having as minimal friction as possible, so i opted for simplicity over flexibility. in the end, all these blog files were nfo files containing a few lines of metadata, a simple tagging system for placing images, and the text itself in paragraphs. a simple system with minimal formatting interruption allows me to focus and flow while writing

the music feed operates like a back catalog with some added functionality, so it didn't have to be too different if i wanted the simple way out. but seeing as ~future plans~ piggyback off of this feed, a sql database and more abstraction/permanence in data storage seemed wise. so far the database contains simple metadata, file paths, and info to link entries in tables to each other. wasn't super hard to pull together, just tedious

somehow, the projects feed ended up being the most aggravating. it works like a hybrid of the previous two, which really made me debate a large refactor. i decided to leave that for later, i just wanted the site's first iteration done at this point. i also tend to do things better when i let them simmer up in my noggin subconsciously for a bit before resuming

in the end, nothing ended up being all that overwhelming. yes, it took time a lot of time, but it never particularly felt like i was beating my head against the wall, which is a success in my book!

something that took complexity out of the initial prototypes was the fact that only i would be adding content to the site. i felt this decision removed a lot of complexity and frustration, maintaining my momentum for actually finishing

another thing i am proud of is managing to do the final deployments in a single evening. probably not that monumental in the grand scheme of things, but an accomplishment for me. despite doing coding a lot, i am relatively technically challenged...

the future is bright for mimo's home... if i can get around to focusing lul. anyways, some features that i plan to implement include:

• dedicated streaming platform for selected works
• chat box for messaging users
• live stream for live jazz
• webgl/wgpu visuals
• a sona page (sorry, em... i keep copying you)

there's probably more i'll stumble upon and want to create, but for now that's the long-term plan. it's ambitious enough anyways. thank you for visiting my latest project!