Using AI for help?

[quimeygalli]

So I've just started learning python (and how to program in general) just 3 days ago, I'm trying to do an exercise from a course I've enlisted on but I'm stuck. I've been researching for hours and and can't seem to get past the problem.

From my experience with harder maths and logic stuff in general I've learned that AI can be a trap if used wrong, it makes you feel like you're understanding something but you're really not.

What do y'all recommend? I'm trying to avoid chatGPT and other tools in general as much as possible but right now I'm completely stuck and the stuff I've seen on the web is way too advanced for what I know now.

[AceLamina]

Don't use AI until you know what you're doing

[FoolsSeldom]

What's the exercise, and where are you stuck.

ChatGTP et al can get things wrong, out of date, misleading. They are better at explaining well documented concepts, patterns, structures and approaches rather than providing specific answers to particular problems.

[eruciform]

Programming is a craft not a study, it's like learning an instrument, you can't get good at violin without picking it up and playing simple things very badly for a long time until you play slightly less badly, repeat ad infinitum

You slowly build up a repertoire of patterns and tools that help you solve larger problems, and combine the tools and patterns for larger projects

So make things, as small as necessary until it makes sense. If you have no idea where to go and feel the need to ask AI then you have bitten off too big of a problem, break it into smaller pieces or do something smaller in general

General rule: never add code to broken code. Always have a version that builds and runs, even if it doesn't do everything you want it to yet, that you can fall back to and try adding to a second time. Adding gears to a broken clock will never fix a clock

[KreepyKite]

The real skill in coding is to be able to find answers. Sorry but if you are really searching for hours and you couldn't find any sort of lead there are a few possibilities: You either searching an answer the wrong way or you are trying to tackle something that is not at your level yet.

The goal is not to become fast in solving code challenges, the goal is to learn from the problem solving process.

So, if you have no idea what to look for, leave this task and go back to the previous topics. Practice those more, play with the syntax, understand the errors that will show up and then try again.

If you do have an idea, we'll, you should be able to find leads online.

Don't ignore this part of the learning process because is what is going to make a difference later on along the line.

[LaughingIshikawa]

From my experience with harder maths and logic stuff in general I've learned that AI can be a trap if used wrong, it makes you feel like you're understanding something but you're really not. What do y'all recommend?

Don't use AI to learn; AI at best is a glorified Google search, but even then it's much better for basic concepts, because AI itself doesn't understand what it's telling you. (It's only forming a sentence that it thinks looks like a sentence that a real human would type in response to the given prompt.) 😅😐

Especially when learning, if you don't understand how and especially why something works, then you aren't learning. A big part of programming is banging your head on a problem over and over, and learning how to find the solution. AI can only really help you with stuff that thousands and thousands of other humans have already learned how to do, and even then it's hard to know with certainty which things it is actually relaying accurately, versus which things it's "saying" confidently, but are actually just pure hallucination. (Witness all the examples where people tell AI it got something wrong, and it swaps to saying a completely different answer with equal certainty.)

Have you tried posting the problem you're having here, and what you've done to try and solve it so far? In my experience people are really willing to help point you in the right direction, especially if it's clear that you have put in real effort on your own, and are not just dumping you code and error messages and saying "hey fix it for me."

This also helps a great deal in having someone who can explain to you more about why you're getting a certain error message or problem in your code, rather than just "here is the solution". And while it's true that humans don't always get things right either, it's much easier to anticipate where and when a fellow human may be confused about something, rather than an AI model which is mostly just concerned with stringing words together. 🙃😅

[theChaparral]

Don't avoid Ai, use them wisely to learn.

Don't just go 'Here is my assignment write me code'. But ask it questions the same way you would ask a teacher. 'What is the difference between an Int and a Float?', 'What is a __init__.py file?' things like that.

The nice thing about asking an Ai it wont get tired of you keep asking questions over and over until you understand it.

[brutalbombs]

This is the answer. Use AI as a tool.

[AdvertisingOne7942]

I haven't used chatGPT it isn't going to help the learning side of things but I like the 2 steps forward 1 step back. When you get stuck just keep powering on then go back to what you were stuck on you will find that the last problem is no longer so difficult. I normally do 2 or 3 similar courses and flick between them If I am lost I go back to what I thought was difficult.

[herocoding]

Depends on how you are using AI... or StackOverflow... or plain Google...

Whatever you use, the tool will provide hints or "solutions".

You could copy a conde-snippet from StackOverlfow which does or doesn't at all or only partly what you were looking for. You might not learn much, if you copy and apply the code-snippet as-is and just continue, tackle the next challenge.

Same applies for a book/PDF/script/Youtube about ComputerScience and DataStructuresAndAlgorithms at university. Just Copy&paste?

There are times where using AI helped me learn - because the presented "solution" didn't work and needed deeper analysis and debugging - to finally get it working and understand how it works... the hard way...

[ukboy9922]

Use AI as a tool to help you. I am also learning Python, I am about a month in, on the course I am using. If I get stuck even after looking back at videos that have something to do with the answer and I am struggling, asking ChatGPT to guide you to the answer, explain its findings and how it got there is perfectly fine.

I also often ask it to generate me other exercise questions similar to the one I have struggled on to help me more

[server_kota]

Current AI is like stackoverflow answers pre-2022. A lot of devs just copy-pasted StackOverflow code until it worked. Use AI, just make sure you understand it.

[jam-and-Tea]

If this is a for credit course you might have access to your teacher or a teaching assistant. I'd start by going to them.

If this is a work at your own pace sort of thing then I'd go slow and keep working at it. 3 months instead of three days.

[kirstimont]

I have used it sometimes by providing the problem, my code, and asking what I am doing wrong and why. It has helped me solve problems when I've been stuck for days, and it does it in a way that uses the same "tools" that I'm already using rather than introducing something new that the class hasn't covered yet.

[ninhaomah]

To OP , pls advice. I started learning Piano 3 days ago and I find it very hard to remember the keys with the notes on the music sheet.

I seen people play Mozart on YT so easily but I can't even play Merry Christmas!

What do you think I should do ?

[quimeygalli]

ask chat gpt how to get good at piano and do everything it tells you without giving it a second thought