My take: As a programmer, it can be easy to think that our current abilities are near perfect in the areas we excel at. This is hardly ever the case. There’s always more to learn and in most areas, there are even people just as good or better than you. Be humble and learn from others. Strive to do even better. It’s not about how good you are but what you do. Do not disregard other things simply because you do not do them or other arbitrary feelings. Or else, it would be like resenting Linux without knowing the first thing about it.
I’ve been programming since I was a kid and I think I have attained fairly high levels now, judging by my ability to answer questions. How I went about becoming a good programmer was, I believe, a highly inefficient path. I’ve mostly just been learning by doing things that seemed fun. The downside with this was that there was a lot of repetition, plenty of life-altering knowledge not at my disposal, and overall a general lack of significant improvement.
To improve faster, I suggest:
- Read through the language documentation to get an idea what there is. You do not need to memorize everything but glance over the material every now and then and look up the things you forgot.
- If you are new, get a lot of practice, ask questions, and look at code written by more experienced programmers.
- Learn big-oh notation, and basic algorithms and data structures.
- Work on projects with other good programmers.
- Improve your exposure to techniques, knowledge, tricks, problems etc.
- Document your work/write comments in your code.
- Take courses or read books.
- Try to find libraries or reuse code for parts that offer little in terms of learning. Learning to use the library or the code is often more useful and you can always return to implement your own functions later on (but once you know a library, you will usually appreciate it).
- Join one or more forums and participate.
- Learn programming techniques and pattern.
- Avoid excessive chatting and various forms of procrastination.
- Do not think too little or too much. It is usually better to work iteratively than to aim for something perfect the first time.
- Refactorize before adding more features.
- Get others to comment on your algorithms or code.
- Be humble but industrious. Welcome new information with open arms.
- Actively choose your projects and tasks to maximize learning. Avoid repetition without significant improvement.
- Take pride in and have fun learning.
Jul 29, 03:34PM PDT | 0 comments
There is only so much school can teach you… There comes a point where the individual needs to learn to think within the code…. I’ve reached that point. The language is not crucial to success here, but rather gaining the ability to gracefully make a computer do what I want. This should be interesting, when will I have reached the goal?
Jun 19, 02:59AM PDT | 0 comments
Programming..
5 months ago
Hey I have basic knowledge of C-sharp programming language
just tell me how can i do this
1-Imrpove my Object Oriented Concepts
2-Imrpove my logics
3-Learn to make use cases
4-Flow charts , Algorithms…
5- how can I learn loads of these things.. I had the basic knowledge of all
But i forgot .. a lil bitl… so now i wanna become an expert.. I was busy in my other life .. now i am back .. so tell me how can i get normal.. and get all my previous knowledge :) please do tell me
tell me the sites .. or any other resources which can help me ok
May 23, 07:22PM PDT | 0 comments
WaheedAzad is thinking that worrying does no good.
What is required is work on the core, so i’m working now on algorithms and data structures..
May 15, 09:21AM PDT | 0 comments
1033simona is procrastinating on packing for my vacation
I want to improve my skills and get back all my previous knowledge.
May 09, 07:07PM PDT | 0 comments
Learning Perl
9 months ago
I’ve always fancied learning to program in Perl so got myself a copy of the above book and am currently ploughing through it.
Not quite sure how useful it will be in my day-to-day programming tasks but I am hoping that it will give me a different perspective on solving programming problems.
Feb 08, 03:08AM PST | 2 cheers | 0 comments
Im a young guy, and I do not have any formal CS or engineering education, so most of my programming has been from the hip. As a result, I have picked up and maintained a few habits that I wish I hadn’t, and skipped a few steps that would have probably saved me a lot of trouble. I also have a bad habit of abandoning projects when my ever changing train of thought derails or starts running backwards.
I would like to become the type of programmer that is able to apply himself efficiently and consistently, so that I may someday beable to look back on the countless hours of cathode ray tube induced radiation therapy I have undergone, and say “Hey, that was a productive and meaningful obsession”.
Oct 20, 2008, 01:10AM PDT | 6 cheers | 3 comments
So you'd think
13 months ago
I graduated with a computer science degree this year, you’d think I’ve be awesome at it by now? Nope, still learning everyday at my job… This is just the nature of it, always something new to learn. This will always be on my list.
Oct 10, 2008, 08:29PM PDT | 0 comments
I program as a hobby, but I want to master Quick Basic and if I ever get my hands on a manual, GFA-BASIC. I love Profan2, but my German is terrible, so I can forget trying to master it. But it’s cool to mess around in… I can do windows easily than I can in GFA. I just dislike the Windows environment so much…
Oct 07, 2008, 08:38AM PDT | 0 comments
I am Dot Net Programmer, and I want to improve my programming logic.
Sep 06, 2008, 02:06AM PDT | 0 comments