Blurple's recent activity
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Comment on Resources for learning to code in ~comp
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Comment on What programming/technical projects have you been working on? in ~comp
Blurple LinkI would call myself a begintermediate programmer, been playing with it for a few years but really taking it seriously this past year. Currently I am building a python back end for a rather simple...I would call myself a begintermediate programmer, been playing with it for a few years but really taking it seriously this past year. Currently I am building a python back end for a rather simple budgeting program and a more complicated meal planning program which combines webscraped grocery deals, my current inventory, and my recipes to create the cheapest meal plan each week. I have picked up learning javascript in the past month, my programs need some level of front end and tkinter does not appear to advance my professional skills.
I have two projects sitting in the background. A discord bot that uses TMDB api to gather information on movies on my library and manage movie selection based on what users have seen before and genre preferences. The second is a disc golf program using RFID tags on the disc and a GPS module, one scan per shot allows me to recreate the score and distance information per disc. Both of these will get rewrites when I am relatively competent in hopes of a full time implementation and not just for funzies.
Programming has shown itself to be maybe the most fulfilling thing I have done, nothing else can keep me obsessed over a problem quite the same way.
Other technical projects I have going on are planning to switch my windows dominant dualboot into 95% Linux with a tiny windows partition for like 3 games. I am moving my phone from CalyxOS to GrapheneOS. I had a server running for game servers and disorganized tinkering. I have wiped it clean and am learning docker so I can get some usable server function like a file cloud and media server.
All of this is rather basic but it is all in the name of education and I'm having a good time with it.
I just posted in the weekly what are you working on thread displaying I am an amateur, I can only speak to staying engaged and not long term development.
You will need to learn the first floor of whatever language you choose. After that find something in your life that excites you, think of a way that code can change the way you interact with it. For me, my first two projects were about movies and disc golf. I have done chapter one of codeacademy maybe 7 times. Only when I could minorly obsess over revamping my experience could I keep learning month after month. Through those first two projects I fell in love with coding. Now I am working on budgeting and meal planning programs because its the problem solving that excites me.
What has worked for me is taking one of those ideas that excite me and simply googling the ever living hell out of everything preventing me from completing the project. Some of those googlings will lead to YouTube videos for a larger concept, some will be small details on stackoverflow. If you're improving your program then you are learning. This method is certainly haphazard and probably even slower than something structured. But it has kept me engaged and how I am learning JavaScript (started on python) and its actually pretty "easy" to understand because I built a foundation on a real world problem. IMO, worry about getting a feel for and a desire for coding, then break into a more structured learning pattern.