The latest articles on DEV Community by Sara (@sara). https://dev.to/sara https://media2.dev.to/dynamic/image/width=90,height=90,fit=cover,gravity=auto,format=auto/https:%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Fuser%2Fprofile_image%2F11710%2FqVWgJ8wq.jpeg https://dev.to/sara en Sara Thu, 24 Sep 2020 01:17:48 +0000 https://dev.to/sara/how-to-avoid-feeling-overwhelmed-when-starting-in-it-38jc https://dev.to/sara/how-to-avoid-feeling-overwhelmed-when-starting-in-it-38jc <p>Some people feel frustrated when they start in the field of IT, due to amount of existing technologies and the feeling of confusion when they trying to choose the best one to start. The Internet is full with information, which is a blessing, but sometimes it might be overwhelming as well. In this post I would like to talk about my personal experience and give some small tips that have helped me with this issue:</p> <p><strong>1. Find your interests.</strong> Think about the area or areas in IT that interest you the most. Are you fascinated about IOT? Machine learning? Or maybe you would like to learn to do web applications? Having in mind in which area or areas you would like to focus will help you find the best technologies to learn.</p> <p><strong>2. Choose the technologies.</strong> Once you have decided in which area you would like to focus first, take your time to do some research in the different technologies in that area. This is probably the most overwhelming part (Java, Kotlin? Flutter, Xamarin? Vue.js, React.js?). Make a list of all the technologies and inform yourself well about them. Choose one of them to start with. </p> <p><strong>3. Find resources to learn.</strong> Look for online courses or good articles about the technologies you want to learn. Try to put in practice the things you learn, maybe making a small project.</p> <p><strong>4. Don't be afraid to go back.</strong> You started learning a technology and didn't like it that much... No problem! Go back to number 2 and find some alternatives.</p> <p><strong>5. Be constant.</strong> Finally, be constant with your learning, and set realistic goals. Eventually, you will master that IT area!</p> beginners overwhelm Sara Sun, 18 Mar 2018 01:45:17 +0000 https://dev.to/sara/google-hashcode-2018-my-experience-3g61 https://dev.to/sara/google-hashcode-2018-my-experience-3g61 <p>I would like to share in this post my experience participating in the Google HashCode for the first time. It's an experience I recommend to every person that loves challenges. Although it is hard to win, it's really exciting to take part on the competition!</p> <p>It was my first big hackathon and I was really excited. The Google Developer Group in my university organized a hub and me and my teammates decided to join. We were so many people that we had some troubles with the internet connection, but somehow we managed to get the problem text.</p> <p>My team was composed by 4 people, counting myself, and we were going to use an online platform to work on it together. However, due to the bad internet connection in the place, we had to work offline. So first we talked about how were we going to approach the problem. When we had the design of the algorithm, we decided to divide the work in groups of 2, each group would solve one part of the problem. Also, we decided to use Java as the solving language, since we all had good skills with it.</p> <p>Using Java for that problem wasn't maybe the best idea, though. When we tried to mix the code we had been working on, we encountered some unexpected problems. The bad internet connection wasn't helping at all.</p> <p>After solving the problems, we ran out of time, so we didn't have time to improve the algorithm. The hackathon was 4 hours long, but it seemed way less.</p> <p>We didn't win, of course, however I had a really nice time and now I feel more prepared for the Google HashCode 2019! </p> hackathon hashcode