Rant: My friend told me to skip the basics and just build something. Bad idea.

My buddy Jake, who's been coding for a few years, kept telling me to just pick a project and start. He said tutorials were a waste of time. So I jumped right in and tried to make a simple game in Python. I didn't know what a function was or how to use a loop. I spent two whole days just trying to get a character to move on the screen. I was copying code from forums without understanding it. It was a total mess. I got so frustrated I almost quit. Finally, I went back and did the first 10 lessons on Codecademy. Now things actually make sense. Has anyone else tried to run before they could walk? What's a good first project after learning the basics?

3 comments

3 Comments

milessmith16d ago

That Jake advice is a classic trap. I tried to build a web scraper with zero basics and it was a disaster. A simple to-do list app is a solid first project after the tutorials.

terryk108d ago

Jake's the guy who tells you to remodel your kitchen before you've ever held a hammer. I spent a whole weekend staring at a terminal because of that scraper advice, and all I got was a headache and a bunch of error messages. The to-do list is like learning to build a solid shelf first. It holds your stuff, you finish it, and you don't want to set it on fire by the end.

mia_hart9016d ago

Totally agree with you @milessmith. Jumping straight into something complex just kills your confidence. My first real project was a basic weather app that pulled from an API, and even that felt huge. Building something you can actually finish teaches you way more than a half-done scraper. Starting simple is the only way it ever stuck for me.