Hello World:
Where do the bootcampers get a drink after a full day of coding? You guessed it, foo bar!
On a more serious note, I began my programming journey a measly four months ago. Other than learning the very basics about programming on sites like codecademy and Khan Academy I knew little to nothing about the culture.
I attended a programming bootcamp and learned a lot throughout the process but here are a few things I wish I knew when I started the bootcamp:
You are not limited to the resources the bootcamp has to offer. This seems like a given, right? It might be, and I'm sure my instructors probably told us this; however, I probably could've heard that a few more times. It took me twelve weeks to realize some of the best introductions to a new technology are simply the official documentation for the technology, scouring GitHub for any juicy documentation, or just going to the handy dandy youtube.
Star sindresorhus/awesome on GitHub. Don't forget to thank him for all the effort he put into this repository. Before I start learning any new technology I go the above mentioned repository and drink all the information from the firehose. There is not much more to say here, but this was something I wish I learned about before I started programming.
Take breaks, and take them often. When I first started programming, I would catch myself typing away till two in the morning. I would get stuck with error message after error message searching Stack Overflow for answers I'd never find. Eventually I would tire out, not solving the issue at hand, wake up in the morning look at the code for 5 minutes or less and solve the issue. This happened countless times, and admittedly still does, but I am starting to understand the importance of taking breaks.
Attend Meetups. Dive into the community, learn to embrace the uncomfortable, and make friends while you do it. When you first start programming there is a lot to take in and it may be hard to jump into meetups not sure of what to say or what is going on. I wish I would've known that it's perfectly fine to show up to a meeting, listen, and not be sure of what is going on. Eventually you'll be participating and making connections that may lead to future job opportunities.
Make an effort to help others to solidify your knowledge. Moving information from short term memory to long term memory can be achieved by teaching a recently acquired skill to someone else after learning it. I wish I would've known how effective this can be when starting to program. Talking your code out like you eventually will in an interview will give anyone a leg up.
During my process of becoming a software engineer there are many other things I wish I would've known but these 5 tips would have had the greatest impact on my learning experience.
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