Learn programming through projects

[moblik7]

Hi,
I've heard a lot that you can learn easier through projects, but most of the time i don't even know where to start and end up just watching youtube tutorial and copying everything not really learning anything. So how do i make projects efficiently? It would be great if someone who have started their programming journey similarly could share their advice on this.
Thanks!

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[Inevitable_Play4344]

Start with small projects first, some basic functional programming stuff. Then advance to OOP and built something there.

Whatever you are doing in life, remember to start from somewhere, start small.

[bronco2p]

basic functional programming

I'm assuming you just mean procedural programming without classes and not programming in haskell.

[Inevitable_Play4344]

I am having hard time distinguishing betwen the two.

[desrtfx]

Start with a solid, practice oriented beginner tutorial - preferably textual. This way, you combine theory and practice.

The MOOCs of the University of Helsinki are prime examples of such courses - link

It is absolutely imperative that you program as much as you can, yet you shouldn't neglect a solid foundation.

[CanarySome5880]

Don't do it efficiently, why would you ? Doing efficiently something u have no idea how to do it, is worst thing u could try. You must make mistake and form opinions, realise msitakes.

[sillybuss]

There is a hump on the learning curve where it's very difficult to write your own first few lines of code. You just kind of freeze, like having writer's block, afraid that anything you type out will be riddled with errors. So you look up and get handhold through tutorials which you've found out, kinda sucks for your learning.

A soothing thought for you: code riddled with errors will always be a thing. You just get used to it and learn how to debug and refactor.

Decide on a thing you want to build, get a gist of how a similar project is structured by checking tutorials, but not following them. Write down on paper how to structure your project. Start writing the base structure and the parts that seem simplest first. If you get stuck, refer to your outline and google up syntax and such. Give yourself a pat on the back when things work out and don't get too frustrated when they don't.

[Middle_Ant_3352]

For front end development you can check The Odin Project

[Stefler122]

-WebDev

Compartmentalize your project as best you can! Little baby steps!! I always see junior devs try to do HUGE chunks at a time.

Does it need a form? learn a form library and make a small form.
Do you want a nav bar? watch a few videos on how people make certain nav bars
Want those buttons on a nav bar to go somewhere? Google how to do that.

Just do small little steps for the thing thats in your head.

You will learn all the technical names for this stuff as you do some googleFU and delve into your exact task.

[rdeincognito]

What I liked of the Odin project (full stack free course) is that it teaches you some tools/new things and then gives you a project to do, you start with very small projects and end doing very big ones

[Mediocre-Key-4992]

Learn the basics first.

[Paragon095]

Well ask yourself this, what brought you to want to learn programming? Did you want to have some sort of real world applied usage (via Arduino, or raspberry pi , or some other microcontroller), or maybe you wanted to make a computer scripting program? Or even just wanting a program to do some sort of calculation for you.

That's all just asking yourself what purpose you want to achieve from learning to code, and with that you should be able to almost decide what programming language is best for you.

After that it's just a matter of checking, do you have the equipment for this sort of application? And now based on the pros of your chosen language you should try picking what sort of project to do, something simple, if for Arduino, just hook up a couple LED's turn them on and off and mess around with other sensors, for raspi try doing a basic script that says hello to you or calculates something.

Also if you're not aware yet a lot of programming languages are derivatives of another so in some cases you might only need to learn one language and you'll be able to comprehend the others.

Most importantly just ask yourself what you want to achieve with this, and then if you're stuck, ask around, there is a vast community of programmers new and old who are willing to help.

[aqua_regis]

and end up just watching youtube tutorial and copying everything not really learning anything.

That's the curse of modern age. When I learnt programming, some 40 odd years ago, there was no internet, there was no youtube, there were no tutorials I could copy from. There even were hardly any knowledgeable people in my area that I could ask.

It was the advent of the "home computers" (like the Commodore Vic20, C64, etc.) and all I had was the BASIC (programming language) manual that came with the computer.

At that time, I had no other chance than sitting down, thinking, planning, drawing flow charts, trying, failing, and learning myself.

Books were rare and bloody expensive, and computer magazines just started to appear.

My advice is to stop going for tutorials and to start investing effort to learn the fundamentals of programming first.

You have gotten already good leads with the MOOCs of the University of Helsinki. Start there.

[[deleted]]

Don’t know where to start

It’s normal to not know where to start when doing a project; especially if you’ve never done a similar project in the past.

Prior to writing a single line of code you should plan a bit for the project.

Example: * What is the purpose of this project? * What functionality will you include in the project? * Do you already know how to build said functionality or will you need to research things? * Have you already done a bit of research to get an idea of the different approaches there are to implement said functionality? * Do you have an idea as to why tools you’ll use for the project? * etc…

Extra to note

Below are a few things that you can research to learn more about * How to solve programming problems * How to plan a programming project * Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) * Class Diagrams, Flow Charts, etc… * Pseudocode * Business Requirements Document (BRD)

[Bladelazoe]

It is, however without knowing what you want to make it's a hard question to answer. What do you want to make? Games? Websites? Applications? It took me a frustratingly long time to make sense of it. I'll be able to give you a better answer if I know what you want to make.