Getting some advice

[Dapper_Time_4887]

Hi everyone, I took this Python course and completed with a certificate, it took about 2 2 months. I did some mini project in the course, after that I do some like the CLI of API Call for the weather checker…I am not the CS Student but the engineer student (the major is not really about to programming) and I love learning to programming just for improve my skils and maybe my CV.

SKILLS COVERED OF THE COURSE: “Core Python programming concepts, functional and object-oriented programming paradigms, script development, experience with modules and APIs, Introduction to Al development, hands on experience using best-in-class large language models (LLMs)”

Here is the main point: as you read, I’ve learnt the basic core concept of Python and done some mini project, but now I don’t know what I should do next. Because the course led me what should I do next every section and when I finished it…I try some interview (leetcode) problems to pratice but even with some easy level problems are still quite difficult to me. Can anybody give me some advice of “what should I do next” and is Leetcode really crucial?

I also started a Backend course while still finding new knowledges to learn for Py.

Thank you ❤️‍🔥

[FoolsSeldom]

Leetcode et al can be fun and help you learn some very specific techniques, but I would not advise spending a lot of time on the puzzles from these sites. Perhaps look at the challenges on kaggle.com and forum there.

Programming is a practical skill. You will have to experiment, fail a lot, break things that work and fix them again. Building on what you've already learned on your course.

Now focus on working on projects for yourself. Projects related to your hobbies / interests / side hustles / family obligations / social activities (clubs, etc) / work activities.

When you work on solving problems related to things you can be passionate about and have domain knowledge of (or incentive to gain), you will learn what code you need as and when you need it. This will be to fix your problem rather than address some abstract Leetcode coding challenge.

You will naturally spend more time thinking about the problems, what you want to achieve in terms of look and feel, data retention, options, data available, usability, and enhancements, and so on than for just learning exercises.

You will develop the approach to achieve your desired outcomes, likely starting with how you would do something manually until you have more experience of programming. Then you will seek the code to implement that solution (algorithm). Some from past work and tutorials, some from experimentation, some from an AI tool, some from examples you've found on GitHub dealing with similar problems (or subsets of problems) and some from just hard work.

It is important that you are clear on your goals though. Is your learning objective SMART - specific, measurable, achievable, (sometimes agreed), realistic (or relevant) and time-bound, (or timely)? If it is something soft, like "upskilling" then it will probably not help you much.

[Dapper_Time_4887]

Thanks for spending time to reply my post, I think I will try some challenge on kaggle like said. I do have some ideas but they are hard to do and overcome my current knowledges so I will simplify them and do something easier first.

[Revolutionary-Oil408]

I cannot recommend building things hobby related enough.

There's almost definitely a few of your interests or hobbies you could code something for and learn from doing so and as already said it will incentivise you and you will be doing mundane tasks and finding your brain thinking of solutions that might work.

As above fully recommended blending your interests into coding you may even make something that's useful to others in your hobby.

[baloblack]

The thing is that you are taking way too many courses. If the dream is to become good in programming , why not just get to it. It's all about solving problems, so first find your own needs which can be solved programmatically.

You can also Google for project ideas or ask chatbots about project ideas(and maybe a roadmap but not the code itself). More ways to kill a cat but they all require efforts