What I’ve Been Doing on PTO: Learning, Side Projects, and AI Experiments
Taking a Step Back to Learn and Build
Taking some time off work has been a great opportunity to focus on personal projects, skill-building, and experimenting with new ideas. While studying for my Springboard bootcamp at UC San Diego, I’ve also dived into AI security, DevSecOps, and some fun side projects like game development and creative writing.
Using ChatGPT's Tasks Feature for Daily Learning
One of the biggest things I set up was an automated way to keep up with AI security and DevSecOps. I used ChatGPT’s new Tasks feature to schedule daily industry digests based on curated sources. I created two detailed prompts that pull from authoritative blogs, security reports, and real-time threat feeds. These tasks run at different times throughout the day, summarizing the top security updates, why they matter, and an actionable takeaway. It’s been a great way to stay in tune with the latest developments while keeping my learning structured.
Building an AI-Driven Prompt Filtering System
On a separate note, I’ve also been brainstorming and researching a robust AI-driven prompt filtering and reporting system. I've had the idea for how to build the architecture decided for quite some time, about 6 months now, but I've delayed getting started in favor of improving the skills I'll need to build it first. The idea is to build a tool that enhances security by monitoring and filtering potentially harmful or misleading prompts in AI systems, as well as filtering what returns from the system itself. This could be useful internally at my workplace or even as a standalone security product for other companies. It’s still in the early stages, but the concept is exciting, and I plan to iterate on it over time. I plan to have a functional prototype built before the end of 2025.
Game Development & Chess AI
For fun, I’ve been tinkering with some coding projects. I had Cursor AI generate the skeleton of an RPG side-scroller in Pygame—nothing too serious, but a cool exercise. I also revisited my chess game and finally got the computer opponent working. Right now, it’s a very weak player with no real strategy, but hey, it moves correctly! Maybe at some point, I’ll improve its decision-making with Minimax or another algorithm.
Experimenting with AI-Generated Writing
Another fun project I worked on was using generative AI to co-write a novella as a Valentine’s Day gift for my wife. Even though it was ~80% AI-generated, editing and shaping it into something meaningful still took over five hours for 50-60 pages. It needs more polish, but it was a cool experiment in using AI for storytelling. More importantly, it earned me some solid brownie points with the most important person in my life. 🙂
Final Thoughts
This PTO has been a mix of structured learning, creative exploration, and coding experiments. Between staying on top of AI security news, developing new ideas, and working on personal projects, it’s been both productive and refreshing. Looking ahead, I’m excited about the possibility of my company forming an AI department, and I’m eager to contribute with my growing skill set.
If you’ve ever used your time off to work on side projects, what was the most interesting thing you built or learned? If you're interested in connecting, don't hesitate to reach out on X or Discord. Let’s chat!
