About Me
My name is Josh Young. I am a mobile developer living and working near Nashville, Tennessee. I enjoy all things tech related. I am not a huge blogger, but I enjoy writing small posts about what I am currently working with or technologies that I am using. Maybe something I say here will help someone in their journey, or at the very least provide a central place for me to document what I have learned when working through new projects.
My Job
For my day job, I develop mobile applications for my employer, National Federation of Independent Business. In a typical day, I work primarily with .NET Maui, C#, and ASP.NET Core and their accompanying technologies such as build tools, testing frameworks, and the like. I primarily write "Line-of-Business" Applications (Enterprise Software Development).
In the past, I have had the opportunity to work with many technologies including, but not limited to: PHP, Laravel, Objective-C, Ruby, JavaScript, and Python. On the resume portion of this site, I have listed some of my job duties in more detail.
Hobbies
Many of my hobbies relate to technology and development. I enjoy coding and designing web applications and web sites. When it comes to web development, I enjoy the whole stack from front end to back end. Therefore, I spend a significant amount of my free time keeping up with and learning the latest languages and frameworks. When possible, I try to implement this additional knowledge into the software stack that I use at work.
I also spend some of my free time maintaining my home network, firewall, file server, git server, among other open-source applications. I enjoy Linux and FreeBSD so I spend time configuring these systems in my free time as well. As evident by some of my certifications and training, I also dabble in computer security. A good working knowledge of computer security and specifically web application security is very helpful as a web developer. If I am not working on servers or code, I spend my time playing my harmonica, biking, reading, or researching nutrition.
Recommended Podcasts
Below I have listed the tech podcasts that I currently listen to or have listened to in the past. Podcasts are a great way to keep up with the latest changes in development. Hopefully this list will introduce a good podcast to someone who enjoys learning and keeping up with the latest changes in tech.
Great Podcast Episodes
Books I've Read
Frequently, I try to delve deeper into specific aspects of tech that I want to learn more about. I find that buying a book about a particular technology can be a beneficial deep-dive experience. Below I have listed some of the books I have read over the years, which have contributed to where I am today (listed in alphabetical order and categorized below).
CSS
- SASS for Web Designers by Dan Cederholm
- CSS3 for Web Designers by Dan Cederholm
- HTML and CSS: Design and Build Websites by Jon Duckett
Programming
- Kotlin: An Illustrated Guide by Dave Leeds
- Docker for Rails Developers by Rob Isenberg
- Practical Object-Oriented Design: An Agile Primer Using Ruby by Sandi Metz
- Design Patterns in Ruby by Russ Olsen
- PHP and MySQL Web Development by Luke Welling and Laura Thomson
- Rails 5 Test Prescriptions by Noel Rappin
- 99 Bottles of OOP by Katrina Owen & Sandi Metz
- Clean Architecture by Robert C. Martin
- Learning PHP and MySQL by Michele E. Davis and Jon A. Phillips
- The Elements of C# Style by Kenneth Baldwin, Andrew Gray...
- Learning Perl by Randal L. Schwartz, Brian D Foy, and Tom Phoenix
- Easy Laravel 5 by W. Jason Gilmore
- The iOS 5 Developer's Cookbook by Erica Sadun
- Build Your Own ASP.NET Website Using C# and VB.NET by Zak Ruvalcaba
- The Well-Grounded Rubyist by David A. Black
- Clean Code by Robert C. Martin
- The Pragmatic Programmer by Andrew Hunt and David Thomas
- Object-Oriented Analysis & Design by Brett D. McLaughlin, Gary Pollice, & David West
- Phparchitects Zend PHP 5 Certification Study Guide by Davey Shafik
Mobile
- .NET MAUI Cookbook by Alexander Russkov
Process
- Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time by Jeff Sutherland (Author), J.J. Sutherland (Author)
Design
- On Web Typography by Jason Santa Maria
- Building a Story Brand by Donald Miller
- Thinking with Type by Ellen Lupton
- Designing the Obvious by Robert Hoekman, jr.
- The Design of Everyday Things by Donald A. Norman
- Don't Make Me Think by Steve Krug
Security
- Counter Hack Reloaded by Edward Skoudis
- Penetration Testing with Kali Linux v1.0.4
- CEH Certified Ethical Hacker All-in-One Exam Guide by Matt Walker
- Nmap Network Scanning by Gordon Fyodor Lyon
- The Hacker Playbook: Practical Guide To Penetration Testing by Peter Kim
- Penetration Testing: A Hands-On Introduction to Hacking by Georgia Weidman
- Metasploit by David Kennedy, Jim O'Gorman, Devon Kearns, and Mati Aharoni
Networking
- All-In-One: CompTIA Network+ by Mike Meyers
- CompTIA Network+ by Mike Meyers
- CompTIA Linux+ by Roderick W. Smith
- CompTIA A+ 2006 in Depth by Jean Andrews
JavaScript
- JavaScript and jQuery: Interactive Front-End Web Development by Jon Duckett
- JavaScript: The Good Parts by Douglas Crockford
- ppk on JavaScript by Peter-Paul Koch
- JavaScript Patterns by Stoyan Stefanov
- O'Reilly Web Studio: Designing with JavaScript: Creating Dynamic Web Pages by Nick Heinle, and Bill Pena
- Learning JavaScript by Ethan Brown
- JavaScript Specialist Instructor Guide
Web Development
- Smashing Book 5 by Smashing Magazine
- Content Strategy for Mobile by Karen McGrane
- Web Form Design: Filling in the Blanks by Luke Wroblewski
- The Elements of Content Strategy by Erin Kissane
- Mobile First by Luke Wroblewski
- Responsive Design: Patterns & Principles by Ethan Marcotte
- HTML5 for Web Designers by Jeremy Keith
Databases
- Developer's Library: MySQL by Paul DuBois
- Database Design Specialist Instructor Guide
Miscellaneous
- Learning the Vi and Vim Editors by Arnold Robbins, Elbert Hannah...
Books I Recommend
Of the software engineering, networking, security, and design books that I listed above, these are some of the books that I highly recommend.
CSS
- HTML and CSS: Design and Build Websites by Jon Duckett
Programming
- Kotlin: An Illustrated Guide by Dave Leeds
- Practical Object-Oriented Design: An Agile Primer Using Ruby by Sandi Metz
- Rails 5 Test Prescriptions by Noel Rappin
- 99 Bottles of OOP by Katrina Owen & Sandi Metz
- Clean Code by Robert C. Martin
Design
- Building a Story Brand by Donald Miller
- Don't Make Me Think by Steve Krug
Security
- Penetration Testing with Kali Linux v1.0.4
- Penetration Testing: A Hands-On Introduction to Hacking by Georgia Weidman
Networking
- CompTIA Network+ by Mike Meyers
- CompTIA Linux+ by Roderick W. Smith
JavaScript
- JavaScript and jQuery: Interactive Front-End Web Development by Jon Duckett
- JavaScript: The Good Parts by Douglas Crockford
- ppk on JavaScript by Peter-Paul Koch