I wouldn’t be true to form unless I wrote a new program this year as well for the Oasis conference.
The upside of writing new software all the time is that you get to stay on the bleeding edge of features. Anything you could possibly want in a program is just a few lines of code away. (And a few bugs away.) And you have the opportunity of tailoring the program specifically for the environment where it will work.
The downside of writing new software all the time is that funny feeling in the stomach five minutes before launch time. Will the darn thing work? Have you checked and tested everything? Will it suddenly freeze up in mid-session, to the endless surprise and amusement of the entire conference public?
I found myself reciting Al Shepard’s prayer: “Dear Lord, please don’t let me f— up.”
But the program worked. It’s a huge relief to find that the program performs flawlessly under intense circumstances. In the 10am meeting today, the worship leader suddenly decided to abandon the program altogether, which caused a brief panic over here in the computer group, as we scrambled to search for the songs he played. How lucky we were to have had the foresight to build a search function into the program. (Maybe God knew we’d need it.)
I’ve already decided to make a branch and start working on the 1.1 version. I have a lot of ideas.