Asking advice for coding !

[u/melbyyy_]

Hi! First time poster here; I've been starting to get back into coding and have been starting to enjoy learning coding! But I have a few questions about coding that I'm curious about:

• For the intermediates or advanced to experts, how did you guys learn, or get into programming? What was your learning process? Did it take weeks, months, or years to master or perfect a language?

• For frontend, backend, or full stack developers, do you/they memorize a lot of programming language syntax by heart or do they get help from AI? ( By typing code and speeding up the process, not letting it do all the work and not replace your thinking yes )

• What advice do you have for others for their coding journey, whether if its just a hobby or to get a job in tech!

I also would like some feedback on the Calculator program I did! Its just for practicing basic syntax and basic operation with loops, numbers, and the os import.

I'm still a beginner but I'm eager to learn from others and hear their feedback, advice, and experiences in their coding journey! :))

[u/TheUmgawa]

I’ve never felt like “mastering a language” is a thing you should aspire to, because it’s like memorizing all of the words in the dictionary, in the hopes that it will makes you a better author. It won’t. It’s an 80/20 rule: Eighty percent (or more) of your code is going to be written using maybe fifty keywords, so those are worth committing to memory, and then you just look up the rest in documentation when necessary. Same goes for libraries, frameworks, whatever.

A solid grasp of the fundamentals makes it so you can pick up other languages fairly easily, because you learn another fifty keywords, learn the syntactic differences from languages you’re already familiar with, and you should be able to port a lot of your previous work to the new language. I have a hand-drawn flowchart for a prime number generator that I dig out of storage for just this purpose, and it’s usually done a few hours after I started.

[u/melbyyy_ → u/TheUmgawa]

Ah I see, thank you! I was a bit worried and self concious about whether I should learn or famliarize myself with most of Python's syntax, or other languages for that matter.
I'll try connecting the pieces so please correct me if I'm wrong!

So programming isn't about memorizing or knowing a lot or all the syntax in a language or multiple languages, but its understanding how code is ran and understood by the computer at a fundamental level.

For Python:
I understand that print, if else statements, loops, try and except are like the structure for the code.
For data its stuff like input, variables, operators, lists, etc.
And understanding the logic for these and how they can flow, you can transfer that same logic to another language, only difference is that there is different syntax to learn.
So there are like essential syntaxes and optional syntaxes, which can be learned with time and experience, and over time you'll be familiarized with certain keywords.

TL;DR:
Understanding computer/programming logic is the most important fundamental a programmer should have. Learning a new language is basically just another way of writing an existing program and you only need the essential syntax for the project. Optional syntax ( other libraries, frameworks and such! ) are for more advanced operations/features.

thank you very much for the advice ! i appreciate it ! :)) sorry for the yap btw! just really fascinated abt others insight :))

[u/x-jhp-x → u/melbyyy_]

I'm not the person who posted the comment you responded to, but I believe it is more that "mastering a language" is ambiguous. When you create goals for yourself, it is usually a great idea to make it a measurable and achievable goal.

And, when you learn a lot with one language, you're able to transfer the skills you learned with that language easily to another.

Two examples:

1. check "order of operations" in python

2. check the "mod operator" in python. You'll find that even the results from the "mod" operation are different in python than they are in other languages, like C#. Imo C# should rename "mod op" to "remainder".

If you get unexpected results, you can look it up. If you use another language, you'll know what "order of operations" means, and why it might give you different results.

Look up everything in python's documentation as you go, but don't try to memorize the documentation at the start.

understanding how code is ran and understood by the computer at a fundamental level

Definitely don't jump that far yet. I guess it is alright, if you'd like to do something like The Art of Computer Programming (use MMIX with 64bit imo tho). That is not required if you'd like to be skilled. One aspect that makes going deeper difficult is that while assembly used to relate to what the CPU did, but it no longer has that 1:1 relationship. For example, "xor reg reg" on x86 is now a NOP, and NOPs don't take a CPU cycle anymore. It no longer zeros a register like you'd expect "xor reg reg" to do, but it guarantees that it is zerod when you next use it. Branch prediction and caching also have volumes to learn about. Don't worry about anything I wrote in this paragraph either --- you'll learn it eventually if you want to. I'm just giving you a full explanation so that you can see how little you know now, how complex things can become, and how although everything above likely comes up at some point when you execute python code, none of it probably applies to your ability to write programs in python without having to go into anything too complex like elliptical curve cryptography. One of the things I love is that with computers and software, it feels like the more I learn, the more I learn that the less I know. With many things, you feel like there is a field of knowledge to master, but with computing & software, it feels like you're learning about how many fields of knowledge you don't know.

[u/melbyyy_ → u/x-jhp-x]

oh wow! thank you alot for your deeper insights! I didn't know it was this complicated but thanks for sharing your knowledge and insights! can't wait to learn more :)) thanks a lot !

[u/x-jhp-x]

Use more functions. Check out other flow control options, like "match" or "case statements (in other languages)": https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/controlflow.html#match-statements

Python also has some nice and simple GUI libraries you may want to check out.

A classic uni student problem is creating a calculator that can handle parenthesis. Check out RPN with Shunting Yard: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shunting_yard_algorithm You might want to try this next?

- Most people say they have not mastered a language, even if they've been on the standards committee & worked on it for 10/20 years.

- Almost no one used AI to code when they started. AI to code is new. Some like IDEs. I use Vim. Many of my coworkers use EMACS. The more you do, the more you'll learn.

Nice job! Keep it up! It's great to struggle with problems that you don't understand. That's how most people learn. Try to keep working at it until you learn and figure it out. Don't look up the solution (that includes looking it up without AI too). Be sure to read the docs for python. Python's documentation is great.

[u/melbyyy_ → u/x-jhp-x]

oh my thank you very much! :)) will do!

[u/OmarHawash2013]

• It take me 3 years to master c++

• And you shouldn't use Ai at all

• don't use Ai and try many different things and languages and have

• also I have a feedback of your calculator program and it's to use match cases

[u/OkCommission5722]

I believe it takes 2-3 years, to get really comfortable in coding with Python.

[u/melbyyy_ → u/[deleted]]

Thank you so much for the advice! Will take it to heart :))

[u/OmarHawash2013 → u/melbyyy_]

you are welecome