DEV Community: Kasey

Debugging to Confidence

Kasey — Sat, 11 Mar 2017 22:50:44 +0000

And all of a sudden, I went from treating my code as delicate and afraid to mess it up to ripping entire pieces off to see what would happen.

I had been stuck on this checkpoint in my coding bootcamp…

Where I left off in my last post was that I had spent time trying to figure it out myself, finally went to my mentor but he couldn't figure it out either so he had another mentor look at it and still nothing. Finally my mentor was taking it to the “team leader”.

Well he couldn't make sense of why I was getting this error either, it seemed like some odd fluke. Since I was at the beginning of the project my mentor and I decided I would just start over.

So I started over and everything worked perfectly. Of course that's not what happened. When I got to the same point I was at before, I got the same damn error!

I was pissed but not in the same way as before. When you get stuck as a student/beginner you're not sure where to go next and have no experience in how to fix it but you have places to turn to for help . That kind of felt like a helpless frustration, which was even more frustrating. But at this point there was no guarantee in getting an answer from anyone else, so it was more of a determined pissed than a helpless frustration.

I turned that anger into action and all of a sudden, I went from treating my code as delicate and being afraid to mess it up to ripping entire pieces off to see what would happen. Finally I ripped off the right piece and the error went away, of course the project wasn't working like it should so I just started adding pieces back until I had it working with no error. I felt like God.

Ok, maybe that's a bit dramatic but I did feel amazing. I felt confident. I have resources I can turn to for help but now I also know how to dig deeper, research an error, take things apart and put them back together until they work. That feels good.

Stuck and Growing!

Kasey — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 20:07:17 +0000

I'm working through a checkpoint for the coding bootcamp I am in and am stuck.

Just like all the other times I've been stuck, I got frustrated, took a step back and regrouped, did research, took a break, tried something new, did more research, tried more things, took another break and then I tried things I knew wouldn't make a difference but “just in case”.

I repeated this process for about 6 hours. Finally I went to bed, only to do the same the next day. After about 5 or so more hours the second day I was questioning my decision to go into tech and my ability to write or understand code, clearly I had no idea what the hell I was doing.

But then something great happened. No, I didn't figure it out. I emailed my mentor, asked a direct question, summarized all the things I had tried so far and realized I kind of knew what I was talking about. Then he responded and said all my code looked correct or pretty close and he couldn't figure out what the problem was either. So he had another mentor look at it, and he couldn't find the problem either. Then we had our weekly 30 minute meeting and spent a hour pouring over the code and trying different things, still nothing. After that I went back to my last commit and started fresh, but I still kept getting this damn error. Now he's taking it to the bootcamp's mentor “team leader” to see if he can find anything.

While I'd normally be pissed that I'm stuck and wasting time, I actually feel really good. Partially because life is busy this week and it's kind of nice to be in a holding pattern. But mostly because I'm no longer questioning my ability. I kind of know what I'm doing, there is still a TON more to learn, heck more than I'll ever probably be able to learn in one lifetime. But the obstacle that has me stuck also has developers with years of experience stuck too, so I must be doing something right…even though something is wrong.

Eating My Words

Kasey — Sun, 29 Jan 2017 01:38:38 +0000

At one point this week I had to have a sit down with one of my team members (I'm in management for my day job) to discuss how he's been “putting in the effort to get things done instead of putting in the effort to get things done right”. He understood my observations and agreed with some suggested changes I had.

Fast forward three days and now I'm sitting here realizing I've wasted at last 6 hours today doing almost exactly that with my coding project. I caught myself putting in the effort to get things done instead of putting in the effort to figure things out and learn.

I've recently shifted from the initial “learn by information overload” part of the bootcamp to completing my first project with only direction, not directions. BIG difference. But I was still trying the “just keep moving forward and it will make sense later” approach that helped me survive so far. It's not helping me anymore.

So now I'm sitting here, eating my words and couldn't help but chuckle…and cry a little.

Bloc Coding Bootcamp: The First 4 Months

Kasey — Fri, 20 Jan 2017 02:35:41 +0000

Today is exactly 4 months from when I started the part time web developer track at Bloc, so what was the first four months like?

I signed up about a week or so before my start date, I used that lead up time to do some free coding tutorials to make sure I wasn't crazy and this is what I actually wanted to do.

Once the bootcamp started I chose a mentor and got acquainted with their setup. In the first week I was introduced to HTML, CSS, the command line, Git and Github. I was on the shorter 27 week track but slowed down to the 57 week track so I would have time to absorb the information and keep my sanity as I'm also working full time.

From there it has been a roller coaster of being stuck, of not being able to figure something out and feeling like “I suck at this, what the hell was I thinking to that special moment of hitting refresh and seeing my work come together and then feeling like “I AM THE MASTER OF THE UNIVERSE!!!!”. That process is surprisingly addicting.

As I've gained more experience I've become more patient, accepting where I'm stuck and taking the time to take a step back to look at it differently or completely stepping away for a break so I can come back with a fresh mind.

One of the hardest parts for me is wrapping my head around the idea that looking up answers on the internet IS the right way, it's hard to let go of the idea of that being “cheating”. I don't have to memorize every bit of code and recall it all from memory. I can use the information available to me and trust that as I gain more experience with it I'll recall more information but with how quickly things update and change, I'll always have to look things up.

The other struggle has been not yet knowing what exactly I want to be doing when I complete the bootcamp. Being new to web development, I'm not sure if I want to focus on the front end or the back end. The way this bootcamp is designed you're exposed to both then spend the final third of the course specializing, so I know I'll figure it out along the way.

One of the best parts of the bootcamp so far has been working with a mentor. I couldn't imagine going through this process without a mentor, someone to turn to when I've spent hours trying to figure something out or am questioning whether or not this process actually makes me job ready at the end. His experience in coding and especially in guiding other students through the bootcamp has been an invaluable resource.

So far in the first four months I've been introduced to command line, Git, GitHub, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, jQuery and most recently AngularJS. I feel comfortable with command line, Git, GitHub, JavaScript and am loving AngularJS. I'm entering into an Angular project that isn't guided, more self sustained than the guided modules I've done so far. After that I'll begin Module 3: Backend Foundations.

The Startup of My Career in Tech

Kasey — Thu, 19 Jan 2017 21:11:02 +0000

The decision was so clear and happened so fast I almost didn't trust it. I was driving home from a meeting with a recruiter and realized it wasn't my job I was bored with, it was my career. I casually asked myself if I was back in college and doing it all over, what would I want to do? Coding erupted like it had been the kid in class waving it's hand in the air begging to be called on.

Do I even know what that actually means? Is that something that is just “cool these days and is on my mind? Does that mean I have to go back to college and get another degree? Do I even know a single person who “codes”? Do women code? Am I too old to learn something completely different? Would that be wasting the business degree I already have?

As I perused through the questions that started to arise I remembered building my first ever website in middle school. My family had evacuated for a hurricane, I sat at a family member's computer writing HTML and creating a website about the hurricane that was heading our way. I smiled at the joy I got from creating something and instantly seeing it pop up on the screen. Then I realized that was almost 20 years ago!

For the next few weeks I did extensive research on switching careers into web development, discovered coding bootcamps, used Code School and Code Academy to see if I actually enjoyed “coding and attended meetups to speak with people in my own community who have completed career changes through coding bootcamps.

Within a month from that moment in the car I had started the online web development bootcamp with Bloc and the startup of my career in tech had launched!