PROGRAMMING IS NOT EASY
It has been well over a year since I wrote my first line of code. The output was something like “Hello world”, pretty simple like it is for everyone else learning how to code for the first time. I was learning Javascript for the purpose of becoming a better web developer. I remember telling myself how much fun and easy this would be. I still maintain my stand on the ‘fun’ part, but I learned the hard way that coding is anything but easy. A year later and I still face challenges I would expect only a person at the novice level of programming to face. Though I can come up with really impressive programs that do some really awesome things, I still have to rely on online resources because I tend to get stuck a lot.
Do not get me wrong I am not saying that it impossible to reach expert level coding and I know very well that it is a fact we all have different speeds at which we all take in information and retain it. I am just trying to stress the fact that you will not start learning how to code today and become Microsoft’s biggest competitor tomorrow. It takes time and I know this from a very optimum vantage point, my own. As I have discovered, you need as much help as you can get, be it online or from the people close to you who also happen to be practicing coding. I for one have been working closely with a couple of colleagues who are at a higher level of expertise in terms of staring at computer screens and juggling their fingers on computer keyboards to come up with competent and efficient computer programs. But even that is not usually adequate for you to sharpen your skills, there is always more to be done.
Yes, coding is a very demanding line of trade. I mean it is the core of technology and nothing, if you ask me, has more variance and is more dynamic as technology is. Just try to think back to ten years ago, anything that was being used then has highly developed or is obsolete altogether. The heart of it, therefore, which in this case is coding, is just as much of subject to change as it is. What you know today might be of complete irrelevance in the next few weeks, and trust me I am not trying to be cynical or anything, that is just how it is. The dependencies of a particular program might have drastically changed, say you wrote it a month ago and you will no longer be able to run it, just a month after creation. The programming languages themselves also are not spared from this constant evolution. A language syntax you have a mastery of might disappoint you with errors that will seem alien to you, for the mere fact they do not apply anymore.
Coding is hard, yes very very hard. I highly doubt I can stress that fact strong enough. So a word of caution, if you are not ready to face constant challenges, errors, and massive changes I would suggest you shut down your machine down and try out something else a lot more forgiving, this is not for you. Another word of caution if you do so, you will be missing out on this amazing thing, getting that incoherent but amazing feeling when a block code works without hassle, well, not really without any hassle per se, there will be a lot of those but they do not make the feeling any less incredible.
