Learning to Code: Reflections

Tuesday, December 24, 2019

Day 317: An Update, 3 Years Later, It's Been AWESOME!!! :)

Ok. It's been 3 years since my last post. Here's an update on what I've been up to.

Let's go back to the beginning. I started learning to code in 2014 for two reasons, one, because I enjoyed it, and two, because I was living in Asia and thought learning to code would open up opportunities for remote work.

It's 2019, 5 years after I started learning to code and 3 years after my last entry, "Day 316." So this entry, "Day 317: An Update, 3 Years Later" will go over what's happened in between.

In sum, I graduated from The Coding Bootcamp at UT Austin and then I was a TA for about two years. That was the most fun job I ever had and I'd totally be up for doing it again at some point, it was just super fun. I transitioned over time from that onsite role into remote roles, including remote tutoring, remote TA'ing, and being a remote interviewer for various tech roles.

The journey's been amazing, and over the last few weeks, I've been considering learning UI/UX. Why? Because I enjoy the field, I've got a lot of free time, and I love learning.

So yeah! I'm in the process of designing a study plan for this new endeavor, just like I did for learning to code.

Learning to code opened up so many doors for me, it's been awesome. I can say without hesitation that my coding skills improved my life much more than my college degree did.

Life is good.

The work I've been able to do since learning to code has all been extremely enjoyable, it doesn't feel like work at all. Since learning to code, I've basically had a series of dream jobs, from being a TA, to being a remote tutor, to being a remote TA, to my current remote gig, it's just been sublime.

I'm always learning new things, and I'm thinking UI/UX will be my new focus. As always, these posts are more for personal consumption, they were never really meant to be for the internet, but I put them on the internet simply as a way of keeping myself accountable.

So yeah, learning to code changed my life, it's been absolutely amazing, and now I'm going to build on that knowledge and dive into UI/UX.

I started off by getting six UI/UX books, and at the same time I dive into them, I'll be going over other online material, just like I did when learning to code.

Ok, ok, that's the update, and I'm excited, this is going to be awesome!!! :)

SUMMARY OF CODING & UI/UX SKILLS

Books on Shipping Product/Bootstrapping a Startup: Status
Getting Real: The Smarter, Faster, Easier
Way to Build a Successful Web Application Purchased/Unread

UI/UX Books:                                                                                     Status

Don't Make Me Think                                                                  Purchased/Unread

The Design of Everyday Things                                                   Purchased/Unread

The Elements of User Experience                                               Purchased/Unread

UX Design                                                                                  Purchased/Unread

Getting Real: The Smarter, Faster, Easier Way to Build a Successful Web Application

Coding Books:                                                                                    Status

"Head First HTML and CSS," by E. Robson & E. Freeman                      Complete

"A Smarter Way to Learn JavaScript," by Mark Myers                          Complete

"HTML and CSS," by Jon Duckett                                                        Complete

"JavaScript and JQuery," by Jon Duckett                                            Complete

Team Treehouse (Front End Web Dev Track Complete): Status

How to Make a Website Complete

HTML Complete

HTML Forms Complete

HTML Tables Complete

HTML Video and Audio Complete

CSS Foundations Complete

CSS Basics Complete

CSS Layout Techniques Complete

CSS Layout Basics Complete

CSS Selectors Complete

Responsive Layouts Complete

CSS Flexbox Layout Complete
Framework Basics (Bootstrap and Foundation) Complete

Git Basics Complete

Console Foundations Complete

Introduction to Programming Complete

JavaScript Basics Complete

JavaScript Loops, Arrays, & Objects Complete

AJAX Basics Complete

JQuery Basics Complete

Interactive Web Pages With JavaScript Complete

Object-Oriented JavaScript Complete

Accessibility Complete

Website Optimization Complete

Front End Performance Optimization Complete

Aesthetic Foundations Complete

Design Foundations Complete

Adobe Photoshop Foundations Complete

Adobe Illustrator Foundations 66% Complete

Other Courses: Status

HTML and CSS (Codecademy) Complete

Introduction to Web Dev (The Odin Project) Complete

Web Dev 101 (The Odin Project) 33% Complete

Free Code Camp (FCC) Status

1. Get Started with Free Code Camp Complete

2. HTML5 and CSS Complete

3. Responsive Design with Bootstrap Complete

4. Gear up for Success Complete
5. jQuery Complete
6. Basic Front End Development Projects Complete
7. Basic JavaScript Complete
8. Object Oriented and Functional Programming Complete
9. Basic Algorithm Scripting Complete
10. JSON API's and Ajax Complete
11. Intermediate Front End Development Projects Complete

12. Intermediate Algorithm Scripting Complete

13. Advanced Front End Development Projects Complete

14. Claim Your Front End Development Certificate Complete

The Coding Boot Camp at UT Austin Status (starts 4/19/2016)
Week 1-6: Mastering the Browser (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, JQuery) Complete

Week 7-10: API & JSON (RESTful API"s, parsing JSON, AJAX) Complete

Week 11-14: Server Side (Node.js, MySQL, MongoDB) Complete

Week 15-18: Frameworks (React, React Native) Complete

Week 18-21: Full Stack Coding Complete
Week 22-24: Final Project Complete

My Web Dev Portfolio: www.adamcamacho.com
CodePen Projects: http://codepen.io/Adancode/

GitHub Projects: https://github.com/Adancode

LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamcamacho1
Team Treehouse Profile: https://teamtreehouse.com/adamcamacho
Free Code Camp Profile: http://www.freecodecamp.com/adancode

Hours Spent on Coding or UI/UX During This Blog Entry: 0

Total Hours Coding: 1,717 (I stopped counting coding hours at 1,717, I landed a role as a TA later, and the coding after work never stopped, it's MUCH higher than 1,717 now)

Total Hours of UI/UX: 0

Sunday, September 4, 2016

Day 316: React

All right, I've got today, tomorrow, and the first part of Tuesday to dive deep into either React and the MERN stack or PHP/Laravel. I could go either way, as I'm open to learning PHP, and Laravel looks really powerful, but at the moment, I decided to dive deeper into React and the MERN stack the goal being to get myself up to "employable" level in that stack, and also, to become pretty good at at least once stack before I start diving into a completely new stack.

I figure if I can get several MERN stack projects up (MySQL is cool too, I like both MongoDB and MySQL), I'll be in a strong position to start applying to Jr. Dev positions.

So, first on the agenda for today is a Team Treehouse course on React. It's supposed to take 183 min (about three hours), but we'll see, the estimated course completion times on Treehouse are sometimes very optimistic.

Now, I've already completed one React project, but I want to grasp React at a very high level, so I'm starting from the basics today, I'm not afraid of putting in time learning the fundamentals of anything! :)

Ok, I just had an issue with the React tutorial, the tutorial wasn’t using a server and the page would render on Firefox, but not on Chrome due to the CORS error, so I asked in the forum about that and a fellow said that Chrome is more finicky than Firefox on that, so I should set up a local server and run it that way. Before the boot camp, I would have been like, “Set up a local server with react-router? Huh?” Now, I was like…it’ll be just a few minutes…got it up and running using react-router and all those dependencies. Moving along.

Not going to lie, that feels pretty sweet. :)

That said, one of the forum members said, "Adam, using React Router to set this project up is like using a bazooka to kill an ant." Hahaha, he's right, and as a minimalist, I normally avoid doing things like that, but I just wanted to be able to do the course and happened to get that done in a few minutes. He suggested I download an npm package, http-server, which, after being installed globally (you can do that by entering npm install http-server -g into the command line) allows you to run a server with this simple command (while in your project's root directory):

hs .

That's it. It worked, and it's great.

You can find the package here if you want to check it out: https://www.npmjs.com/package/http-server

SUMMARY OF CODING SKILLS

Books:                                                                                               Status

"Head First HTML and CSS," by E. Robson & E. Freeman                      Complete

"A Smarter Way to Learn JavaScript," by Mark Myers                          Complete

"HTML and CSS," by Jon Duckett                                                        Complete

"JavaScript and JQuery," by Jon Duckett                                            Complete

Team Treehouse (Front End Web Dev Track Complete): Status

How to Make a Website Complete

HTML Complete

HTML Forms Complete

HTML Tables Complete

HTML Video and Audio Complete

CSS Foundations Complete

CSS Basics Complete

CSS Layout Techniques Complete

CSS Layout Basics Complete

CSS Selectors Complete

Responsive Layouts Complete

CSS Flexbox Layout Complete
Framework Basics (Bootstrap and Foundation) Complete

Git Basics Complete

Console Foundations Complete

Introduction to Programming Complete

JavaScript Basics Complete

JavaScript Loops, Arrays, & Objects Complete

AJAX Basics Complete

JQuery Basics Complete

Interactive Web Pages With JavaScript Complete

Object-Oriented JavaScript Complete

Accessibility Complete

Website Optimization Complete

Front End Performance Optimization Complete

Aesthetic Foundations Complete

Design Foundations Complete

Adobe Photoshop Foundations Complete

Adobe Illustrator Foundations 66% Complete

Other Courses: Status

HTML and CSS (Codecademy) Complete

Introduction to Web Dev (The Odin Project) Complete

Web Dev 101 (The Odin Project) 33% Complete

Free Code Camp (FCC) Status

1. Get Started with Free Code Camp Complete

2. HTML5 and CSS Complete

3. Responsive Design with Bootstrap Complete

12. Intermediate Algorithm Scripting Complete

13. Advanced Front End Development Projects Complete

14. Claim Your Front End Development Certificate Complete

The Coding Boot Camp at UT Austin Status (starts 4/19/2016)
Week 1-6: Mastering the Browser (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, JQuery) Complete

Week 7-10: API & JSON (RESTful API"s, parsing JSON, AJAX) Complete

Week 11-14: Server Side (Node.js, MySQL, MongoDB) Complete

Week 15-18: Frameworks (React, React Native) Complete

Week 18-21: Full Stack Coding Complete
Week 22-24: Final Project

My Web Dev Portfolio: www.adamcamacho.com
CodePen Projects: http://codepen.io/Adancode/

GitHub Projects: https://github.com/Adancode

LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamcamacho1
Team Treehouse Profile: https://teamtreehouse.com/adamcamacho
Free Code Camp Profile: http://www.freecodecamp.com/adancode

Hours Spent Coding During This Blog Entry: 6

Total Hours Coding: 1,717

Sunday, July 31, 2016

Day 285 - 315 (All of August): Express Review and Working with Sequelize, Building a Scraper, Reviewing MongoDB, and Diving into React

August has been extremely busy for me. It's Sept 3, and I've put in 215 hours of coding this past month. Here's my Rescue time screenshots for the last 5 weeks:

Week 1 of August:

Week 2 of August:

Week 3 of August:

Week 4 of August:

Final week of August/first few days of Sept:

The number in the upper left of the screenshots is the amount of time I was actually on my computer that week, which doesn't mean anything, the actual productive time is right at the bottom of the circle. This month (plus the first couple of days of Sept.) I racked up 215 HOURS of web development. The vast majority of that time was time spent on the ATOM text editor, coding.

I'm not going to count the extra hours I spent coding in July, because I had my Rescue Time time tracking app turned off at that point, and I've not gotten into the habit of using but It had to be an extra 40 or so, at least.

I dove really deep into the back end this month, and I'm at the point now where I just want to dive deeper into web development, both front and back end. I enjoy creating these apps. Here's my group's app, Spare Space:

Here's a Redesign of it that I'll keep working on if I redo that app in MERN, which I may decide to do as my final project for my boot camp:

And here's a MERN stack project I created that pulled data from the New York Times API:

I know the UI is super simple on that one, but it's my first crack at a React project, I'm going to dive much deeper into it, that's actually my plan for the next few days.

As an aside, my group won "Best in Show" for Spare Space, the project we built for the boot camp. :)

So that's my update for August, it's a high-level update, I'm not getting into the details so that I can use that time instead to dive into React and keep leveling up my skills on the entire MERN stack.

SUMMARY OF CODING SKILLS

Books:                                                                                               Status

"Head First HTML and CSS," by E. Robson & E. Freeman                      Complete

"A Smarter Way to Learn JavaScript," by Mark Myers                          Complete

"HTML and CSS," by Jon Duckett                                                        Complete

"JavaScript and JQuery," by Jon Duckett                                            Complete

Team Treehouse (Front End Web Dev Track Complete): Status

How to Make a Website Complete

HTML Complete

HTML Forms Complete

HTML Tables Complete

HTML Video and Audio Complete

CSS Foundations Complete

CSS Basics Complete

CSS Layout Techniques Complete

CSS Layout Basics Complete

CSS Selectors Complete

Responsive Layouts Complete

CSS Flexbox Layout Complete
Framework Basics (Bootstrap and Foundation) Complete

Git Basics Complete

Console Foundations Complete

Introduction to Programming Complete

JavaScript Basics Complete

JavaScript Loops, Arrays, & Objects Complete

AJAX Basics Complete

JQuery Basics Complete

Interactive Web Pages With JavaScript Complete

Object-Oriented JavaScript Complete

Accessibility Complete

Website Optimization Complete

Front End Performance Optimization Complete

Aesthetic Foundations Complete

Design Foundations Complete

Adobe Photoshop Foundations Complete

Adobe Illustrator Foundations 66% Complete

Other Courses: Status

HTML and CSS (Codecademy) Complete

Introduction to Web Dev (The Odin Project) Complete

Web Dev 101 (The Odin Project) 33% Complete

Free Code Camp (FCC) Status

1. Get Started with Free Code Camp Complete

2. HTML5 and CSS Complete

3. Responsive Design with Bootstrap Complete

12. Intermediate Algorithm Scripting Complete

13. Advanced Front End Development Projects Complete

14. Claim Your Front End Development Certificate Complete

The Coding Boot Camp at UT Austin Status (starts 4/19/2016)
Week 1-6: Mastering the Browser (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, JQuery) Complete

Week 7-10: API & JSON (RESTful API"s, parsing JSON, AJAX) Complete

Week 11-14: Server Side (Node.js, MySQL, MongoDB) Complete

Week 15-18: PHP (CodeIgniter, Laravel) In Progress

Week 18-21: Full Stack Coding
Week 22-24: Final Project

My Web Dev Portfolio: www.adamcamacho.com
CodePen Projects: http://codepen.io/Adancode/

GitHub Projects: https://github.com/Adancode

LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamcamacho1
Team Treehouse Profile: https://teamtreehouse.com/adamcamacho
Free Code Camp Profile: http://www.freecodecamp.com/adancode

Hours Spent Coding During This Blog Entry: 215

Total Hours Coding: 1,711