I agree with Steve.

The keywords here are
Reliability
Maintainability

Whatever else you dont do, you NEED to document every little step.

There's nothing worse (even as a hobbyist) than a system that performs erratically. Or a system which, when it malfunctions in 1 years time, is completely un-understandable.

// KNOW what you want it to do.
// Block it out on paper
// pseudo-code it

while(!Finished)
{
// code it (including docs)
// test it (including docs)
}

// Release it


regards, dm v2.5.2