Programming Tips

I have heard over and over again that being a professional programmer involves more than just spending time watching coding videos. It is important to learn how to take code and break it down so you understand what it is doing.

This video really goes into explaining how this works and has helped me to appreciate that figuring things out is a must.

Having a strong foundation in whatever language you choose to learn is important because with a strong foundation in the basics you are not just copying and pasting code you actually learn how to craft solutions from scratch.

The video goes on to explain that the true challenge of programming lies in a programmer’s mindset, problem solving and logical thinking.

It’s not just about knowing how to code it’s about knowing what to code to develop a new feature or fix a bug.

Being able to break code down into smaller manageable pieces then systematically addressing each part is an important skill to develop and it isn’t a skill that can be taught.

Getting better at this is where I need to take my Python skills next and it seems the best way to do that is to just keep building. Build something of my own.

On my developer course we were always encouraged to figure things out on our own and I didn’t appreciate what they were trying to do. I just saw it as not being supported in my learning. When you are new to coding being left to figure things out is frustratingly scary but necessary it seems.

To get to this level takes practice and time.

“…This is why people end up in a situation where they know all this theoretical knowledge but they have no practical knowledge they know everything but they don’t know how to use it. It’s one of those situations where you did too much tutorials and not enough things on your own and this is when people start entering tutorial hell and unfortunately they may never escape it. Tutorial hell is a place where endless tutorials are watched and countless examples are followed yet the ability to solve new or unique problems doesn’t seem to improve. It’s easy to fall into, this is why the learning curve in programming is notoriously steep because you need a balance of tutorials and doing things on your own. It’s important to recognize that in order to escape tutorial hell it’s not about abandoning tutorials altogether it’s about how you use them. Tutorials are like training wheels eventually they’re meant to be removed the real learning begins when you start applying what you’ve learned in different situations when you start cooking without the recipe so to speak…”

The Coding Sloth

His tips for getting into the programming mindset included:

1. Break down problems into smaller more manageable tasks. It can provide you with a clear starting point plus makes the problem manageable.
2. Build your own projects. Project based learning is effective because you will solve problems as you build stuff.
3. You can only truly say you understand something if you can explain it in simple terms to another person. So explain something to someone, or yourself. It will highlight what you know and where you need to study more.
4. Embrace failure as a learning tool because it will help you understand where something went wrong. So start failing more. First Attempt Is Learning (FAIL)
5. Practice regularly for an hour or more every day.
6. Stop comparing yourself to other people. Just focus on where you are at and how far you have come. Celebrate the bug you solved or the tutorial you completed or the error you made (see number 4).

This video ended up in my YouTube recommendations list and I am so happy I took the time to watch it because right now, as I take off my training wheels, I know where my focus needs to be.

Here is another video with the same message. It seems the universe really wants me to get this message. Just write and build. Accept your mistakes. Deal with the coding programs. Build and solve problems.