BenCodeZen Blog

My Journey with AI So Far (June 2026)

This is a post about that tries to capture my journey with AI as an early skeptic to my current thoughts on it now.

VueConfUS 2026 Recap

A recap of my experience at VueConfUS 2026 in Atlanta, GA!

My (Brief) Experience with Fable 5

My review of Anthropic's new Fable 5 model after a brief 3 days with it before it was pulled from public access

Weathering the Storm of AI

I wanted to share some of my thoughts on an easily overlooked topic with AI: how to navigate the chaos without letting it turn you into a shell of your former self.

RefreshDC Meetup Recap (May 2026)

After taking a step back from speaking, I decided to end my sabbatical to talk at RefreshDC about the methodology nobody wants to discuss in the AI era: Documentation-Driven Development.

The Quick Capture I Always Wanted

I was tired of losing blog post ideas mid-coding session, so I created an AI skill command to capture insights without breaking flow.

The Fallacy of Always Wanting to Do More

The productivity journey starts with "just do it" and evolves into "do more." But what happens when doing more becomes the obstacle? It's time to do better.

Reflections on 2025

Almost skipped this reflection—but pausing revealed the pattern. A look back at 2025's chaos, growth, and learning to appreciate consistent progress.

Stop forgetting to trigger workflows in Vue

As applications grow, manually calling workflow functions whenever state changes becomes fragile. It's easy to forget a call and introduce bugs. Learn how Vue's watch API automates this pattern by reacting directly to state changes.

Get Started with Obsidian in 5 Minutes

Want to get started with Obsidian without getting burned out or overwhelmed? This is the blog post you need to read.

The work is mysterious and important, but for who?

Can you unleash your best work if all of your time and energy is spent on others?

Immortal Finish Lines

As a lifelong productivity nerd and tech enthusiast, the idea of an "immortal finish line" stuck with me in a way that I didn't expect. When life is setup to be a series of goals and tasks to check off, what does it mean for there to be an "immortal finish line?"

Hello World v12

Hello there again. I've started this journey of trying to write more consistently so many times now I've lost count, but I need something to mark this decision to try again and so v12 is what I've landed on.

Starting My iOS Developer Journey...

This post marks the official start of my journey to deep dive into the iOS world and learn how to build iOS apps!

My Infrastructure (Jan 2025)

Most people kick off their new year post with resolution and goals, but I've decided to change it up a bit and just take an honest look at where my infrastructure at the beginning of the year.

GitHub Universe 2024 Recap

This year I was lucky enough to attend my very first GitHub Universe! It was a two day event filled with lots of great talks and more importantly, pretty incredible people.

How I Use Obsidian to Better Understand How I Operate (Sep 2024)

This is a snapshot of how I use Obsidian to better understand how I spend my time. (September 2024)

How Fixed Mindset Undermines Your Productivity

Why We Climb Mountains

Motivational quotes about proving people wrong can be inspiring, but there are dangers to solely being driven by this mentality. It shifts focus from personal growth to others, gives power to doubters, and relies on negative emotions.

How to Use Minimal Night Owl Theme in Obsidian

After many requests, I'm thrilled to finally have official documentation on how you can use the Minimal Night Owl theme in your Obsidian vault!

Embracing the Boring Solution

It's time to say good-bye to trying to build everything from scratch and hello to the beginning of a new era for my site.

How to Check Whether an Inline Fields Contains a Value with Obsidian Dataview

Recently, I came across a problem where I struggled to query notes with inline fields properly. And after searching high and low in the forums and docs, I figured out a solution and wanted to share it here.

My Favorite Underrated Vue 3 Feature

When it comes to JavaScript frameworks, it's common to focus on well... the JavaScript stuff. But of all the features in Vue 3 that I love, mine is actually on a CSS feature (with some JavaScript 😜).

Meeting Your Standards

You don't achieve your goals. You meet your standards. — Source unknown

Becoming a Meaningful Specific Again

When I first heard this phrase, "meaningful specific," I was a little perplexed by its wording. In my life, I've always heard of the word "specific" used in the context of an adjective and never as a noun.

Getting Back in the Arena

These last few months have been tough content creation wise for me, but this post is my first step to finding a way back.

The Battle of Personas

When creating something on your own, one of the most challenging aspects I've found is the number of personas competing for your attention.

Build with Ben (#25) - Trello Clone with Nuxt 3 (Beta) (Part 2) Overview

It's time to continue our journey of building a Trello clone with Nuxt 3 beta!

YAGNI For Now

One of the common acronyms taught to developers early in their career is YAGNI (i.e., you ain't gonna need it). And while it's a nice tongue and cheek to try and combat scope creep, when it comes to putting it into practice, it's a little more complex then that.

Productivity Power Hour #1 Overview

For the first "Productivity Power Hour" session, I'll be talking about my workflow for creating notes in Obsidian!

Build with Ben (#23) - VueUse + Vue 3 Overview

For my very first Build with Ben for 2022, I'll be kicking it off with a bang by checking out the amazing VueUse library by @antfu!

Is it redundant to include a base tag in Obsidian?

Obsidian's tagging system uses generational relationships, so child tags automatically include their parents — meaning the base tag is redundant.

Kicking Off Ship 30 for 30

In another effort to establish a better writing habit, I'm excited to be taking part in Ship 30 for 30!

2020 Retrospective

A look back at 2020 and the rollercoaster of a year that it was.

Export Variables from CSS Modules into SFCs

Did you know you could export variables from CSS modules into the rest of your component?!

Tutorial: Vue 3 Apps with DevTools

Since Vue DevTools is still in beta for Vue 3, rather than wait for the next publishing cycle to get the latest update, being able to setup DevTools locally can be a life saver. In this video, I'll be going over how to setup Vue.js DevTools from scratch.

TL;DR Speaking in a Remote World

With in-person events having transitioned to a remote setting, it can be challenging for speakers to adjust to this new world. In this post, I talk about some of my thoughts on the transition and some tips for dealing with it.

TL;DR What I'm Excited for in Vue 3

For the second episode of my TL;DR series, I'll be talking what I'm excited for in Vue 3!

TL;DR What is VuePress?

In the inaugural post for the TL;DR series, I'll be writing about one of my favorite tools, VuePress!

Hello YouTube

It's official. My YouTube channel is live!

Living by Design

In life, we have a choice to either live by design or by default. This post reflects on a turning point in my career where I was faced with this very choice.

Clearing Brain Cache

When your head is cluttered and overrun with tasks, it can be hard to make progress which adds even more stress to your overtaxed mental processes. As a result, it's important to find ways to clear your brain cache.

Iterating Day by Day

A brief reflection on how I'm implementing the iteration mindset as I continue to strive for progress in 2020.

DREW 30 Day Challenge

A look at the 30 day challenge I am embarking on for the month of January.

The Phoenix Protocol

A look into what the Phoenix Protocol is and its significance to the start of this new decade.

2019 Retrospective

A look back on the crazy year of 2019 and my outlook as 2020 marks the beginning of a new year and decade.

A Guide to Notion: Introduction

So you might have been hearing about this new tool called Notion. And if you've been curious but not sure whether to try it, this series is written for new and experienced users alike!

GitHub Contribution Graph Legend

Ever wonder what it takes to achieve certain colors in the GitHub contribution graph? Here's a quick post on what I found.

Speeding Up Videos

A handy trick to know in the event you ever need to want to watch a video faster than 1x on your machine with no plugins required.

Weekly Awesome Report #6

A review and celebration of my achievements and picks of the week for the week leading up to February 8th, 2019.