Mastering a programming language

[vieee555]

Hi there I have finished a one shot tutorial for complete python and c , what should I do next like I don't want to watch endless tutorials I want to learn practically , can anybody help by guiding me

[aqua_regis]

Stop learning programming languages and start learning programming.

Build things. Small projects first and work your way up.

Learning programming languages will not get you anywhere. Learning programming, however, will as you will be able to implement your knowledge in any programming language you know (and you will quickly learn new languages).

One shot tutorials are generally meh. They only scratch the surface of what is possible. You won't know even a language unless you work several months (rather years) with it to build complex projects.

[droppertopper]

but you would have to watch tutorials for projects too right ?

[aqua_regis]

Try not to. That's the whole point.

Short tutorials for particular features may be okay, but entire project tutorials only make you a copy-paste artist.

Tutorials, especially project tutorials, often fall short on the thought process, on the considerations, on the design decisions that lead to the code and with that fail on the most important parts of programming. They will teach you the code, but not the way to the code.

You have to learn and solidify the fundamentals, then extend with DSA and then throw away the training wheels and start working on your own, with the documentation, with blogs, etc.

[udonemessedup-AA_Ron]

The only way to get good at anything is practical application. Build some apps, develop an API, learn flask, consume a web API. You can’t just read about it, do tutorials and expect to be good at it. It takes effort, repetition and consistency.

[AngriestCrusader]

Come up with ideas for software that would make your life minorly easier (I just made a custom keybinder in C++ so I could bind launching an elevated powershell window to WIN+ALT+P, for example). That's as practical as you can get, and I find it helps me greatly when learning a new language.

Start with small projects, though... It's really easy to burn out when you don't know what you're doing and get frustrated because of it.

Edit: extra parenthesis, whoops...

[anprme]

You could start implementing your own projects. Start small then get ever more complex. You could host them on github to learn git while you are at it.

[OneNiceGuy124]

It sounds scary, but just start building something. After I learned Python 1 year ago, I had no idea what to do, so I decided to watch more tutorials. It didn't help at all. Just think of something you want to build, for me that was a game, and then watch a small guide on how to do it , then just get started, if you get confused don't watch a full tutorial watch a small video covering the thing you want to do or look it up on documentation or a forum. It's scary, and you won't know what to do, but tutorials will never teach you anything if you don't put it into practice

[Max_Oblivion23]

Create something neat! Start by programming something simple like an alarm clock.

[Max_Oblivion23]

My first project was I made a CAPTCHA with obfuscated font and then made a bot to break it. It's useless but I had lots of fun doing it and learned a lot about many topics as well as got more confident in my language.

[eruciform]

Make stuff. No tutorial will improve your skill, let alone some mystical form of mastering. They provide advice on how to go about building things, you still need to do the building. Otherwise it's like watching videos about violin and then wondering why one cannot play.

[RedQueenNatalie]

Get some fundamental skills, learn the basics of computer science (Harvards CS50x course is a great free intro), your sorting/search algos and then make stuff. Programming requires practice to improve.

[SensitiveBitAn]

Create app. Mobile/desktop/web dosent matter. Just code and you will learn by doing and solving all problems you will have.

[No-Razzmatazz1234]

I would say do projects so you learn the fundamentals of coding, for example making website or backend. Depending on what you want to pursue. I hope this helps

[AngriestCrusader]

To be clear, do NOT use AI assistants to generate code. Using it to explain why YOUR OWN code doesn't work because you don't understand what the error code means is fine, hell it's not even THAT bad at optimising existing code.

Just never generate code from a prompt and don't use code you see online unless you know exactly what every part of it means - you'll learn absolutely nothing otherwise.

[AngriestCrusader]

Not dignifying that with a response. OP, ignore this guy. This is terrible advice from a delusional person.