DEV Community: Laura OBrien

Don't Give Up

Laura OBrien — Wed, 05 Jun 2024 10:36:01 +0000

“Dude, sucking at something is the first step towards sorta being good at something.”
Jake the Dog

Learning to code is hard.

There is no way about it, learning to code on your own is hard. Thankfully there are a ton of excellent resources out there on the wonderful interwebs. Here are some of my favorites (this is not an exhaustive list):

Community is important

Having a good community of devs has been intregal to my learning consistancy. These are my favorites:

In sum

I hope someone finds these tips helpful.

Want to learn programming? Contribute to open source.

Laura OBrien — Thu, 02 May 2024 12:27:48 +0000

I contributed to my first open source project in 2 years yesterday.

Open source is hard if you don't know what you're doing.

I didn't know what I was doing.

I made several mistakes including but not limited to:

Screwing up my package management and not having the proper version of Node for the project.
Getting lost in the Git workflow, which is one of the only easy things about Git that I have encountered.
Getting discouraged to the point of tears.

Thankfully I am part of an awesome online community of developers: https://virtualcoffee.io

I know I would have given up if it hadn't been for the kindness of the people involved with this group.

Incidentally this months challenge for Virtual Coffee is Community Kindness.

I would say throughout my ordeal this quality was exemplified.

This is to say, open source contributions are about more than all the crazy esoteric steps involved. It is a real chance to build community and connect with others.

Thanks, VC, you the real MVP.

Guess who's back...

Laura OBrien — Tue, 30 Apr 2024 16:09:17 +0000

..back again. - Eminem.

It is time for me to take myself seriously as a front-end web developer. It is time to start putting myself out there...

I have been learning to program since 2018, and that hasn't been for nothing. Despite my snails pace, I managed to learn quite a bit. One of the biggest take aways from that time is I have found I really, really enjoy developing! This has been pretty huge; I thought I was too stupid (so mean) so I always sold myself short on my knowledge. I felt like a fake. I believe I was doing it for reasons that are untenable. My marriage fell apart in 2019, and the emotional/physical fall out from that did a number on my self image, as well as my ability to actually learn! Now that I am in a healthy relationship and getting help for my mental health learning is such an enjoyable, inspiring experience. I'm officially hooked.