👋 Hey DEV community!
When I was a beginner developer, I made some mistakes that cost me way too much time.
You don’t need to repeat them — so here are my top 5 (and what I learned).
1️⃣ Ignoring Documentation 📚
I thought docs were boring and skipped them.
👉 Instead, I relied on blog posts and tutorials.
Lesson: Docs are usually the most accurate and fastest way to learn. Trust them!
2️⃣ Over-Engineering Side Projects ⚙️
I wanted every small app to have “enterprise-level” structure: microservices, CI/CD, 100% tests…
👉 Guess what? Most projects never got finished.
Lesson: Done > Perfect. Build something small, make it work, then improve it.
3️⃣ Copy-Pasting Without Understanding 🔍
StackOverflow answers worked… until they didn’t. Debugging code I didn’t understand was painful.
Lesson: If you paste code, stop for 2 mins and ask: Do I know what this line does?
4️⃣ Avoiding Asking for Help 🙈
I thought asking questions would make me look “junior.”
👉 So I wasted hours (sometimes days) trying to solve things alone.
Lesson: Asking good questions is a skill, not a weakness. Communities (like this one!) exist to help.
5️⃣ Treating Git Like Dropbox 🗂️
My first commits looked like this:
git add .
git commit -m "stuff"
👉 Reverting mistakes was a nightmare.
Lesson: Learn branching, rebasing, and clean commit messages early — future you will thank you.
🚀 Final Thoughts
Every dev makes mistakes — these just happened to be mine. The good news? They’re also the fastest ways to grow.
👉 Now I’m curious:
What was YOUR biggest beginner mistake as a developer?
Drop it in the comments — let’s help the next generation avoid them!
✨ Thanks for reading my first DEV post — excited to learn, share, and grow with this community.
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