JavaScript is getting scarier for Beginners
A lot has been written about JavaScript Fatigue in the last few months. Medium has been filled with authors writing for and against JavaScript fatigue. Meanwhile others rejoiced to have a boring stack to work with.
Let’s get this out of the way. Fatigue is not my talking point.
I was a beginner to JavaScript in 2016 and this is a first hand experience of how scared I was with my first interaction. These are some stats that got me going for JavaScript:
Also comes the fact that by learning JavaScript, I could develop for the Web (Websites), Mobile devices (Web Apps, ionic, React-native) and even software (Electron). One language and I was practically everywhere.
So googling Learn JavaScript in mid 2016, my first stop was at Code Academy. They promised a no bullshit course on JavaScript basics and I have to tell you, it was just that. But there was something wrong, it did not match the stats that inspired me earlier. What I learned looked in stark contrast to anything that existed. This really got me thinking. Later, I heard Bill Sourour talk about how a Magicians course that showed a card trick differed from one that promised to teach how to make the Statue of Liberty disappear, I knew the problem.
That time of the year, I landed a project where I was to build a mobile application for both android and iOS. What did I say? Of course I said yes, Let’s go Ionic! Because I knew Javascript. What could possibly go wrong?!
This is where my problems began. I ventured once into the world of ionic which went into Angular. This was especially a bad time to do this because ionic v2 was on the verge and it used Angular 2 which had all tutorials written in Typescript and what the hell was Typescript?! I decided to go with ionic 1 for now and hoped this solved the issue.
Of course, it didn’t. In came the style guides. Airbnb’s Style Guide, Google Javascript Style Guide, Angular Styles guides: John Papa, Todd Moto. They wanted to change the way I wrote my code. There was something similar among them though, they all talked about Module Bundlers or Loaders or Binders or whatever. This ventured into Webpack.
That is one complicated API you have got, Webpack! I somehow got it running and then came test driven development. Enter Jasmine, Karma, Mocha and I wanted to get Moksha and what not. Everyone wanted to change the way I code and it worked, I wrote no code.
With its dozen frameworks, transpilers and bundlers, a lot of beginners adapting to JavaScript ecosystem are losing their way.
The Ending
However I did not end my 2016 just like that, in despair. I landed at Free Code Camp that winter and polished whatever I knew about JavaScript. I worked on FCC Projects and felt that rush of accomplishment rushing up my vein. I had some pretty good pointers from some real people on medium that helped me up my game.
There may not be a right horse to bet on right now, but that is not really a bad thing. JavaScript gives us choice more than what anyone else has, to choose our horses. And I learned this the hard way, We don’t have to change our stacks just because something new and shinier is on the horizon and everyone else is using it. Change because the change will provide you with something better. If you are using gulp and loving it, don’t chase Webpack, Webpack will come to you when the time comes.
Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.
-Albert Einstein
Granted! This is the story of some bad choices, but I believe they are the stories that need to be told. I still can’t make the Statue of Liberty disappear, but I’m not scared to try.
Fatigued, non fatigued. Scared, Not Scared. There is never a better time to be a JavaScript developer than now, Let’s Code. Create. Worry Later.
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