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Project Wolfie: Honouring An Absent Friend With Music

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In this post, I discuss our late German Shepherd Wolfie and outline a project that utilises music data in his memory.

Table of Contents

Introduction

On 24 January 2025, our German Shepherd Wolfie sadly passed away.

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Wolfie was a long, fluffy boi with a big presence and a big mane. He enjoyed sniffing things, tilting his head and barking at foxes. He was loud, proud and bushy-browed.

Wolfie was also psychic. No one could leave the house without his knowledge, and no one could enter it without having a snout-first search.

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Wolfie struggled with various health issues throughout his life, including eating difficulties, muscle problems and genetic defects. Despite this, Wolfie was a cherished family member for four years before he sadly lost his battle with kidney failure and suspected cancer.

Our walks often involved music, and I regularly exposed Wolfie to my music library. He grew so accustomed to iPods during walks that he would bark whenever I picked one up!

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After he was gone, I found myself revisiting the songs we shared. Music became a way to cherish those memories, so I wanted to create something meaningful in his memory…

Project Wolfie

This section explores what Project Wolfie is, the music data it utilises and its goals.

Definition

This project has been on my mind for some time now, and I suppose this was the push it needed to take shape. Project Wolfie is a data-driven initiative that explores the patterns hidden in my music collection. It analyses track metadata, listening habits and technical attributes to find insights, trends and recommendations.

Here, Wolfie is short for:

Waveform Observations Library For Intelligence Engineering

Let’s break this down:

Waveform: A visual illustrating a track’s traits like timbre, pitch and dynamics. Time is represented on the horizontal axis, while the vertical axis reflects amplitude.

Here is a sample waveform:

Observations Library: A consolidated data repository containing information about my music’s properties and my listening habits. The data consists of various types, structures and formats, and will be stored, cleaned and enriched for further use.

For Intelligence Engineering: The AI and BI use cases for the observations library. Here, interactive data visualisation and machine learning services will use the data to uncover patterns, predict trends and generate personalised recommendations.

Data

Music files contain more than just sound – they hold layers of metadata that are crucial to Project Wolfie.

This section explores the different types of metadata related to my music collection, highlighting their functions and purposes. I have assigned these categories using my understanding and intended use of the data.

Technical Metadata

Technical Metadata refers to the measurable and technical attributes of a music file. It tends to include numerical values and audio properties, and is commonly found by analysing the track using applications like Audacity, foobar2000 and MixedInKey, as well as Python libraries like Librosa.

Examples include:

  • What is the track’s initial tempo and key?
  • What is the track’s duration, and how loud is it?
  • What are the track’s spectrographic and harmonic properties?

Descriptive Metadata

Descriptive Metadata refers to the contextual and identifying information about a music track. It tends to include text-based details and is commonly found both within the track’s properties and on websites like Beatport and Discogs.

Examples include:

  • Who produced the track, and what is it called?
  • What is the track’s genre?
  • Which label published the track, and when?

Interaction MetaData

Interaction Metadata refers to engagement and listening behaviours. It typically includes dates, integers and timestamps, and is commonly generated by digital music services like iTunes and Spotify.

Examples include:

  • When was the last time a track was played or skipped?
  • How many times has a track been played?
  • What rating has a track been assigned?

Deliverables

Here are the objectives I’m pursuing in Project Wolfie. Given their complexity, they will be divided into multiple epics and spread out over an extended period.

Data Lakehouse

So far, I have discussed the importance, types, and applications of data. To this end, I need to fulfil a few requirements:

  • Ingesting and storing data from multiple sources.
  • Transforming and cleaning data at scale.
  • Enriching and aggregating data for analytics and consumption.

In short, I need a Data Lakehouse. I’ve written about them before and have followed the Medallion Architecture through bronze, silver and gold layers. For Project Wolfie and moving forward, I’ll be using the well-documented and supported AWS reference architecture:

I find this clearer and more regimented than the Medallion Architecture. It also aligns with the points made in Simon Whiteley‘s Advancing Analytics video, which I agree with.

Of course, a good Data Lakehouse isn’t possible without good data…

Quality & Observability

A Data Lakehouse’s effectiveness depends on data quality and observability. Project Wolfie must address factors like:

Veracity & Validation Checks: Verify data accuracy. Checks such as schema validation, null checks and data quality rules can identify issues early, stopping incorrect data from propagating downstream.

Anomaly Detection: Identify patterns often missed by validation like volume spikes and missing periods. Timely anomaly detection shields downstream resources from requiring remedial measures and lowers unforeseen cloud and developer expenses.

Lineage Tracking: Track the data’s journey from ingestion to consumption, documenting all transformations and processes. Vital for debugging, auditing and validation.

Governance & Security

A Data Lakehouse must balance accessibility and control. Governance and security protocols protect data while encouraging responsible usage.

I own all Project Wolfie data, so I have permission to process it. Additionally, there is no sensitive information or PII. However, there are other factors to consider:

Access Controls: Establish guidelines for who and what can access Project Wolfie resources. This safeguards data and services from unauthorised access, misuse and malicious activities.

Data Controls: Establish criteria for availability, backups, and structure. This aids in managing costs, ensuring disaster recovery, and maintaining schema consistency.

Monitoring & Logging: Track access patterns and record changes to data and infrastructure. This improves visibility into both potential threats and cost-related opportunities and vulnerabilities.

AI & BI Use Cases

Finally, I want to extract value and insights from Project Wolfie using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Business Intelligence (BI). I have data from 2021 onwards from a music collection I started in the early 2000s, so I have lots to work with!

BI Use Cases (Dashboards, Analytics, Insights)

Listening Trends: Identify traits of my collection’s most frequently played and best-represented music. Analyse listening patterns over time to find trends.

Library Optimisation: Find rarely played tracks to add to playlists. Recognise songs that are often played and recommend alternatives for variety.

Distribution Analysis: Analyse my collection’s main genres, publishers and record labels, and investigate the connections between different elements (e.g., “The most popular tracks are typically in the 120-130 BPM range”). Create reports that show diversity and spread (e.g., “90% of house tracks are in five minor keys”).

AI Use Cases (Machine Learning, Automation, Predictions)

AI-Powered Personalised Playlists: Create playlists using the existing library based on properties like BPMs, keys and previous listening patterns, similar to Spotify Wrapped.

Smart Music Recommendations: Use collaborative filtering to suggest search criteria for new music based on my existing collection and listening habits (e.g., “Try G minor tracks at 128 BPM from the early 2010s”).

Predictive Analysis: Use Technical and Descriptive Metadata from new tracks to predict how they will be rated based on my existing library’s metadata (e.g., “This track has harmonic similarities to 70% of your highly rated tracks.“).

Summary

In this post, I discussed our late German Shepherd Wolfie and outlined a project that utilises music data in his memory.

Wolfie enjoyed scent games and retrieving toys, making Project Wolfie’s mission to find and return data and insights a fitting tribute. As the project evolves, I will strengthen its capabilities using new architectures and technologies, honouring Wolfie’s spirit – one track at a time.

Wolfie was more than just a pet; he was a companion and a guardian each day. I miss you big man. Take care out there.

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If this post has been useful then the button below has links for contact, socials, projects and sessions:

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Thanks for reading ~~^~~

Categories
Me

YearCompass 2024-2025

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In this post, I use the free YearCompass booklet to reflect on 2024 and to plan some professional goals for 2025.

Table of Contents

Introduction

It’s time for the customary retrospective post! Previously, I’ve written these in December. From now on, I’ll post them on amazonwebshark’s birthday in January because:

  • It gives me more time to consider my goals.
  • If I’m going to write about a year, it makes more sense to write after the year is over.
  • In previous years, I’ve felt personal pressure to produce both a December YearCompass post and a January birthday post. My YearCompass post can cover both of these instead.

Firstly, I’ll examine YearCompass itself. Next, I’ll discuss how 2024 went. Finally, I’ll examine my 2025 YearCompass goals.

About YearCompass

From the YearCompass site:

YearCompass is a free booklet that helps you reflect on the year and plan the next one. With a set of carefully selected questions and exercises, YearCompass helps you uncover your own patterns and design the ideal year for yourself.

YearCompass offers a free alternative to New Year’s Resolutions. Available as A4 and A5 PDFs in several languages, the booklet can be completed digitally or by hand.

YearCompass PDFs contain two sections: reflecting on the past year and planning for the next. Each section features prompts to help users assess priorities and prepare for the future.

There are no rigid guidelines for completing YearCompass. Although the book recommends taking breaks between sections, many people choose to complete it in one go. I often focus on specific sections rather than the entire document, as I usually have what I need by a certain point.

2024 Retrospective

In this section, I reflect on my 2024 goals and evaluate my progress with them.

Build Technology Projects

As a cloud enthusiast, I want to complete valuable project builds so that I can develop and validate my knowledge and skills, and have subject matter for future session abstracts.

Exiting 2023, I felt I had done much theory but little practice. I had completed online learning, attended events and recertified my AWS SysOps Administrator certification, yet I still felt lacking in hands-on experience.

Well no more! Throughout 2024, I worked on my WordPress AWS Data Pipeline series, which greatly enhanced my understanding of several AWS services and cloud architectures. Also, I explored the AWS CloudFormation IaC Generator and DuckDB-WASM in February and June respectively.

Separately, in July, I joined Steamhaus as an AWS Consultant, where I build, scale, and optimise cloud solutions for clients. This role involves unique projects spanning diverse organisations, requiring creative problem-solving and offering many opportunities to learn and grow. And 2025 is already shaping up to be an interesting year!

Additionally, I earned the AWS Certified Data Engineer – Associate certification in August, validating my skills in areas including ETL, orchestration, model design and quality assurance.

Learnings from this certification have already found their way into my blog posts, sessions and client projects.

And speaking of sessions…

Build My Personal Brand

As an IT professional I want to build my personal brand so that I improve my soft skills and define my public image.

And to think that, at the start of 2024, I had no idea how this was going to go…

Having done my first session at 2023’s New Stars Of Data online event, 2024 was the first year I stepped onto an actual stage! After presenting my Building And Automating Serverless Auto-Scaling Data Pipelines In AWS session at AWS Community Summit London in April, I went on to present it at several user groups, a paid event and even internationally!

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This year, I also launched a YouTube channel, primarily intended to practise and enhance my speaking skills. Although the channel has been somewhat dormant, I’ve been kinda busy!

Recently, I began a series of shorts to boost my spontaneous speaking ability. It appears to be working for me, and there’s still plenty to film!

Finally, in September I met Cat Mawdsley and Dan Knowles at Northern Reach for the first time. Northern Reach focuses on providing technology and innovation-driven business engagement initiatives for partners in both the public and private sectors across Northern England.

I was born and raised in Lancashire, and quickly discovered their ambitious plans for the region. We got chatting, one thing led to another and, well, I’ll have some exciting news to share soon about something I’m part of!

Build A Second Brain

As just a normal man I want to build a second brain so that I can organise my resources and work more efficiently.

So this is the goal with the least progress, but only because the first two goals blew up beyond anything I could have envisaged! Having read Building A Second Brain in January, I started putting some of the ideas into practice.

Firstly, I’m a big fan of the CODE information consumption method:

  • Capture
  • Organise
  • Distill
  • Express

In some ways I was already doing this, but lacked a framework or set of steps to follow. I now use CODE in several areas of my life, and while it’s not yet fully embedded everywhere it is starting to make a difference.

However, I’m no fan of the PARA organisational system:

  • Project
  • Area
  • Resource
  • Archive

Tiago Forte and I define Project very differently, and I dislike using Archive to describe anything. Archive always feels like a nondescript collection of stuff, which is what a Second Brain should not be. Even Tiago defines Archive as:

Anything from the previous three categories that is no longer active, but you might want to save for future reference.

https://fortelabs.com/blog/para/

Nah. Not for me.

Ultimately, my Second Brain isn’t where I want it to be right now. But to be fair, a second brain is never really finished as it constantly grows and evolves like a human brain. In 2025, I’ll be examining some Second Brain-related AI and SaaS tools and might make some related content if I think it’ll be helpful.

2025 Goals

In this section, I use YearCompass to decide on my 2025 professional goals. For each goal, I’ll explain my reasoning and then write a user story.

Community Investment

I am deeply grateful for the tech communities that supported me throughout 2024. They offered me opportunities to learn, grow and connect with like-minded peers who share my passion for technology. I was invited to speak at several local and international events, and I strongly believe that my journey to Steamhaus began at AWS community events.

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In 2025, I plan to build on these experiences by continuing to contribute through speaking engagements, writing, and social support, as well as giving operational user group support. In this way, I hope to strengthen and grow the communities that played such an integral role in my 2024 successes.

On a personal note, I look forward to continuing the growth journey that the communities have nurtured. This includes enhancing my confidence, refining interpersonal skills, strengthening relationships and expanding my experiences. Just like any solid investment – everyone benefits.

As an active tech community member, I want to support and grow these communities through content, involvement and participation so that both the communities and I thrive.

That said…

Gestalt Cycles

I did a lot in 2024, and looking back I didn’t allow much downtime. Feelings of ‘I should be doing something’ constantly ran into evenings, weekends, and annual leave, and I increasingly noticed disrupted sleep, diminished health and fitness and heightened anxiety as a result.

I’ve burned myself out before so I recognise the signs. And as keen as I am to continue on this unexpected, wild and incredible journey I’m currently on, I also don’t want to end up utterly cooked.

Turning this into a goal was hard as nothing really fit. The closest match I’ve found so far is Gestalt Cycles. This describes the natural rhythm of completing an experience, from identifying a need to achieving closure.

Each cycle involves several stages:

https://www.animascoaching.com/blog/gestalt-cycle-of-experience/

The idea focuses on completing each stage fully to maintain balance and well-being, avoiding lingering stress while creating space for rest and renewal. This aligns closely with what I need. My challenge hasn’t been starting or finishing tasks – it’s been allowing enough recovery time between them.

This aligns with Animas Coaching‘s Withdrawal stage definition:

Finally, after the satisfaction of the need or desire, individuals withdraw, returning to a state of relative equilibrium. This stage offers an opportunity for rest and reflection before the cycle recommences with a new sensation.

https://www.animascoaching.com/blog/gestalt-cycle-of-experience/

And with Shea Stevens‘ comments based on the works of Rosemarie Wulf et al:

…the goal is to find relief and meet needs in a way that they are assimilated, such that the organism is truly integrating what it takes in, and what is taken in is a good fit for the organism.

https://www.gestalttherapyblog.com/blog/gestalt-cycle

I have 2025 ambitions around fitness, home improvements and landscaping. To enable these, I’ll need to ease off the accelerator occasionally. So with all this in mind:

As an individual with multiple workstreams, I want to apply Gestalt cycles to recognize when a task is complete and take intentional breaks, so that I can improve my wellbeing and maintain consistent energy and focus.

Be The Change

Definitely the most LinkedIn-sounding of the three. But hear me out. This goal stems from Mahatma Gandhi’s quote:

Be the change you wish to see in the world.

Mahatma Gandhi…erm…

Expect that’s not what he said. But I digress.

“Be the change” is about taking personal responsibility to embody the values and actions you want to inspire in others. It emphasises proactivity and self-empowerment over simply waiting for change to happen.

Throughout my career, I’ve had ideas I wanted to share and a strong desire to contribute. However, I have constantly struggled with self-confidence, self-doubt and articulating my thoughts.

This changed in 2024. Through my professional role, speaking engagements and involvement in the AWS community, I gained the confidence and ability to express and implement my insights and ideas. This let me enhance my skills and uncover new opportunities, leading to beneficial outcomes for myself, my colleagues and clients and the wider tech community.

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In 2025, I’m committed to embracing this newfound confidence to present and support ideas and changes that matter to me. By doing so, I hope to build stronger relationships, deliver impactful projects and advance initiatives that reflect my values and passions.

As a hard working dog dad, I want to confidently embrace and act on my ideas and opinions so that I can make meaningful contributions and changes to myself, my peers and clients and the wider tech community.

Summary

In this post, I used the free YearCompass booklet to reflect on 2024 and to plan some professional goals for 2025.

Reflecting on 2024 has highlighted key lessons and opportunities for growth, helping me shape an exciting vision for 2025. I’m eager to see where the new year leads and to share progress along the way! I’ll post updates here and via my social, project and session links, which are available via the button below:

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Thanks for reading ~~^~~

Categories
Me

Video Thrilled The Dataflow Shark

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In this post, I debut both the amazonwebshark YouTube channel and my first demonstration video and shark shorts.

Table of Contents

Introduction

So, this is amazonwebshark’s fiftieth post! It’s also my first post as a consultant! I joined the Steamhaus team this month and am looking forward to what the future brings!

In my last YearCompass review, I committed to building my personal brand. So far 2024 has seen this shark presenting at AWS Summit London and AWS User Group Liverpool, and making video content seems like the logical next step.

Before this, the amazonwebshark YouTube channel held playlists for videos I’ve referenced in previous posts. And as of July 2024 I’ve joined the video content creator ranks with some humble contributions of my very own!

So what’s this post about? Firstly, I’ll examine my motivation for making video content. Then I’ll link my current uploads, and finally I’ll set initial expectations for the channel.

Why?

So why am I doing this? This section explains my motivation for recording videos and what I hope to achieve.

Practice & Improve Speaking

Generally, doing something more often reveals improvements, efficiencies and optimisations. And I want to improve my speaking. So I need to do more of it!

I got some great advice from Laurie Kirk a while ago on this topic. She has a habit of filming herself daily and reviewing the footage for improvements. By her own admission, this has improved her confidence and quality.

Besides this, speaking practice draws parallels with training runs. Becoming an optimal runner involves various types of training. Want to build endurance? Run slower over distance. Want to improve speed? Focus on faster, shorter bursts.

And it’s the same with speaking. Want to practise lightning talks? Make short videos. Want to improve sessions? Film a demo. My work so far made me more confident at AWS UG Liverpool earlier this month, so I hope to see more improvements in the coming months by practising different types of speaking.

Audience Diversification

In addition to improving my current abilities, I want to upskill my ability to communicate with people outside my field of expertise.

It’s well known that technical people love speaking with technical people. Getting into the weeds about operating systems, functions, architectures and paradigms regularly see hours fly by at meetups.

This is, however, inherently limiting to those less knowledgeable in those areas. I was originally going to label this as ‘non-tech’, but on reflection this extends in all directions. For example, I won’t understand an architectural discussion that turns to von Neumann architectures. I then have equal potential to confuse if I start talking about Lakehouse architectures. This can even happen with people sharing a speciality: I had no idea what instantiate meant when I first heard it from another Data Engineer.

Amongst the best sessions and videos I’ve seen are ones where topics are made accessible and inclusive to a diverse audience with ranging skills and experience. Some viewers will have years of experience in the field and are looking for the latest insights. Others will be hearing about the topic for the very first time. Appealing to both ends of the spectrum is the ideal scenario.

This is the skill level I’m aiming towards. Creating sessions and videos that appeal to a diverse range of viewers will make me a more inclusive and effective communicator. And it’s not just about audience diversification…

Content Diversification

Next, producing videos will let me make different kinds of content.

Applying the Diátaxis framework, my blog posts lean more towards Tutorial than the others. This is intentional, as I’ve always preferred practice over theory and like sharing cool stuff that enables people.

That’s not to say I don’t get curious about the other Diátaxis ‘needs’ of How-To Guide, Explanation and Reference. While past exploration of these with text hasn’t worked out, videos offer new opportunities here such as:

  • Trying out new AWS services and features.
  • Running through concepts and architectures.
  • Exploring unfamiliar and less common settings and parameters.

In short, content ideas that lend themselves better to video than text. And speaking of ideas…

Failing Fast

Videos may save a post idea that has promise but isn’t working out.

I am never stuck for blog post ideas. There’s always something to write about – from services and architectures to current events. I probably have more potential post topics than I can ever write.

This isn’t to say that every post I start is completed though. Some ideas begin well but start to unravel. They might meander, lack cohesion or simply become uninteresting. And while I’m getting better at seeing the early signs of this, occasionally some still slip through.

I’m a big believer in avoiding the sunken cost fallacy. So in those situations, I admit defeat and defer to the Cult of Done Manifesto’s fifth principle:

“If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it.”

The Cult of Done Manifesto – Bre Pettis

There are several interpretations of this principle. NoBoilerplate‘s advice is that:

“Ideas in your brain are like a pipe full of random stuff. Some of it will be good; some not so good. If you’re not feeling it, don’t try to make a bad idea better – try the next idea.”

The Cult of Done: How To Get *Started* – No Boilerplate

I agree. But it’s still disheartening sometimes to delete something that still feels like it has legs – just not for the body you’re trying to stitch them to. More recently, I found Jason Fladlien‘s interpretation which has a different take:

“The longer you go not getting something done the more baggage you create around getting it done. “Abandoning” an idea simply means throwing this version of it in the trash. You can start it fresh later.”

The Cult of Done – The Drive-Contentment Connection

This applies very well to situations where an idea loses traction as a blog post but is still worth pursuing. Instead of deleting everything, post material could be repurposed into video material.

Additionally, I’m likely to have session abstracts that either don’t work out or aren’t accepted. If I consider the idea to be sound, videos are ideal solutions to these situations too.

Chasing Internet Stardom

Yeah ok not really.

Current Uploads

So what have I produced so far on the video and shark short front?

Firstly, I’ve filmed a pair of data-themed YouTube shorts. The first examines one of the functions of an AWS Glue Crawler:

The other considers one of the differences between Parquet files and CSV files:

Future shorts will be uploaded to YouTube, Instagram and TikTok. I’ll see how this goes over the coming months.

I’ve also uploaded an extended demo for my Building And Automating Serverless Auto-Scaling Data Pipelines In AWS session:

The demo I use in this session begins with some existing AWS resources. This keeps me within the session’s time limit, but at the cost of an incomplete picture of what the Step Function workflow is doing. This extended version starts with a blank workflow and shows the Glue and Athena setup behind the scenes.

I’m not holding these up as works of art! They are rough around the edges, and I’m sure I’ll improve over time. In the meantime, a different Cult of Done Manifesto principle applies:

“Pretending you know what you’re doing is almost the same as knowing what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you’re doing even if you don’t and do it.”

The Cult of Done Manifesto – Bre Pettis

Expectations

So what are my expectations for the video and shark shorts?

This is all very much early days. There are no grand plans or ambitions, and I don’t have an upload schedule planned. I already have lots going on personally and professionally and don’t want to burn myself out. Much like this blog, it’s something for me to experiment and upskill with.

That said, I recently bought some streaming gear and a posh microphone in the Prime Day sales. So let’s see where this goes!

Summary

In this post, I debuted both the amazonwebshark YouTube channel and my first demonstration video and shark shorts.

As I said, there’s no grand vision for any of this and I’m totally winging it. It’s a bit of fun and I’m interested to see where it goes. In the meantime, the button below has links for contact, socials, projects and sessions:

SharkLinkButton 1

Thanks for reading ~~^~~