Sometimes You Go Back To Bed

In this week’s episode of Getting Work To Work, Chris Martin talks about owning your schedule and the importance of taking care of your physical and mental health. As creative professionals, it can be easy to push your needs aside for the sake of the work, but sometimes you go back to bed to hit the reset switch.

Listen now >

And I’m Back

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I’m delighted to be part of Clark College for another year. This marks my fourth year at the college teaching web development. Here’s a list of all the courses that I have taught:

  • Intro to Programming and Problem Solving with Python (CTEC 121)
  • HTML Fundamentals (CTEC 122)
  • JavaScript (CTEC 126)
  • Business Web Practices (CTEC 165)
  • PHP with SQL 1 (CTEC 127)
  • PHP with SQL 2 (CTEC 227)
  • API & Advanced Integration (CTEC 228)
  • WordPress Development (CTEC 260)

Why I didn’t Look at Your Resume

If you’re looking for a new gig or career, I wanted to share this list of hiring red flags publicly. These things to watch out for will vary by industry and company, but if you’re looking for a position at a startup, an agency, or something in the online industry, this list may help you avoid ending up in the immediate ‘no’ pile.

Read Mikael Cho’s entire article >

Generalists vs. Specialists

In this week’s episode of the Getting Work To Work podcast, Chris Martin talks about whether an artist should be a generalist or a specialist. As a creative generalist with interests in multiple subjects including filmmaking, web design and development, photography, teaching and more, Chris struggles with the advice of picking one pursuit and doing only that.

More >

I Do Not Agree

Going to shit

2015 is when web development went to shit. Web development used to be nice. You could fire up a text editor and start creating JS and CSS files. You can absolutely still do this. That has not changed. So yes, everything I’m about to say can be invalidated by saying that.

Read “The Sad State of Web Development” >

Using the Slack API with Python – A Simple Example

Here is a simple Python program that can be used to:

  • Test the API
  • Get a list of Slack Users
  • Get a list of Slack Channels
  • Get information about a Slack Channel
  • Post a message to Slack Channel

Students in my Intro to Programming and Problems Solving class at Clark College learn how to build this and other things using Python.

Have fun with it!

On Github >

# CTEC 121 / Intro to Programming and Problem Solving
# Lab - Using the Slack API
# by Bruce Elgort, 2016

# pip install slackclient to install SlackClient library
from slackclient import SlackClient
import json

def test_slack(sc):
    # use for debugging
    print("Testing API")
    print(80 * "=")
    print (sc.api_call("api.test"))

def get_channel_info(sc,channel):
    # get info about the channel
    print("Getting Channel Info")
    print(80 * "=")
    print (sc.api_call("channels.info", channel=channel))

def get_list_of_channels(sc):
    print("Getting List of Channels")
    print(80 * "=")
    # get list of channels
    channels = sc.api_call("channels.list")
    channels = json.dumps(channels)
    channels = json.loads(str(channels))
    return channels

def display_channels(channels):
    print("Display Channels")
    print(80 * "=")
    for i in channels['channels']:
        print("Channel:",i['name'])

def post_message(sc,text,channel,icon_url,username):
    print("Posting Message to Slack")
    print(80 * "=")
    # post a message into the #general channel
    print (sc.api_call("chat.postMessage",channel=channel,text=text,username=username,icon_url=icon_url,unfurl_links="true"))

def get_users(sc):
    print("Get Users")
    print(80 * "=")
    #call the users.list api call and get list of users
    users = (sc.api_call("users.list"))
    users = json.dumps(users)
    users = json.loads(str(users))
    return users

def display_users(sc,users):
    print("User List")
    print(80 * "=")
    # display active users
    for i in users['members']:
        # don't display slackbot
        if i['profile']['real_name'] != "slackbot":
            # don't display deleted users
            if not i['deleted']:
                # display real name
                print (i['profile']['real_name'])
def main():
    # define variables
    token = "your token"
    channel = "a channel id"
    username = "Username to use display for message function"
    icon_url = "icon url for message function"
    # connect to Slack
    sc = SlackClient(token)
    # test slack
    test_slack(sc)
    # get channel info
    get_channel_info(sc,channel)
    # get list of channels
    channels = get_list_of_channels(sc)
    # display channels
    display_channels(channels)
    # post message
    post_message(sc,"Visit http://slack.com",channel,icon_url,username)
    # get users
    users = get_users(sc)
    # display users
    display_users(sc,users)

main()