5 Easy Hacks in Becoming a Better Developer

Hi Guys Good Day!

It's almost two years that I've become a web developer since I graduated from college. I learned a lot about how to prioritize my time in which problem to solve first, how to solve the most intimidating software problems that I haven't encountered and the importance of communication between teammates and sometimes doing nothing at all even the deadline is near cuz I'm lazy AF. I'm not comparing myself to anyone or something like that. I'm comparing myself to the programmer that I was 2 years ago.

1. Read and Understand Error Messages.

I can't emphasize how important this is in becoming a better developer. So I'm gonna make an example for JavaScript because of the reason that I always use this language.

  const obj = { 
    a : 1
  };
  console.log(obj.b.a);
  //Uncaught TypeError: Cannot read property 'a' of undefined

The Error object in JavaScript has two properties stack and message.
The stack tells you where in your code the error occurred.
The message tells you why the error occurred.
These two are really helpful in how to solve the error problem so understand them. In our example, we're accessing a property b which returns an undefined value and we're accessing an a property on that undefined value. So obviously there's no a property in an undefined so it throws this error.

2. Sometimes the answer is in the Docs and Read more code.

Stack Overflow is a great place to find an answer to our problem but sometimes we can't find answers there so better check out the docs first they're really helpful and really informative. Reading other people's codes is a great thing because of the reason you have a chance to learn how other people think in what way or ways they solve a particular problem.

The best docs that I've read.
React
Vue.js
Vue Router
Reach Router
Express.js

3. Ask Advice or Help with your Superiors or Senior Devs.

Don't be afraid to ask them questions. They have more experience than you so they know a lot and be respectful to them.

4. Give time to Practicing. Improve your critical thinking.

Practice makes perfect. So they say. Let's face it solving a problem that you haven't encountered before is hard unless you're super smart or something. But the important part is that it makes you think or analyze in what ways you could solve the problem. Divide a problem into multiple problems and make solutions for those multiple problems. Solve a problem like a Lego Set. Solve it piece by piece.

Go to one of these sites and try.
Hacker Rank
Code Wars
Free Code Camp
JS Checkio

5. Compete with Yourself.

Be a better programmer or developer today than you were yesterday.
Don't be afraid to face new Errors.
Read more Documentation and Code.
Learn from your Seniors and respect them.
Practice a problem for 30 mins a day. It will help you in the long run.

Thanks guys for reading this post.

Have a Nice Day 😃!.

Comments

[Ramon Ramirez]

Thanks, excellent tips, and if everithing fails you can use the ducks method too, is a powerfull debugging method, one thing that nobody tells you is that while more stronger your programing skills are, more dificult is the debuging beacuse the errors are more related to human side, like an inverted bollean check or mispelling a variable name, things that you dont notice beacuse you suppose to be done rigth, or crossed mismatching logic, just in case make sure you have a plastic duck to explain your logic, the error will popup, even explaining the behaiviour of the error helps you to see the bytes from another more global perspective

[Mark Abeto]

Thanks, man!. Yea sometimes I messed up my logic because I was not thinking properly and forgetting variable and function names. We all messed up sometimes but that the beauty of being a developer we become better because of our mistakes.

[alokz diptim!]

Good one

[Mark Abeto]

Thanks man! Glad you like it.