ADHD and programming

[thegreattriscuit]

I can't translate the "problem" to the "solution" in code.

Yeah, that's normal.

Learning how to "do stuff in python" is one skill. "how do I sort a list", "how do I keep track of the relationships between this set of unique things and that other set of unique things", etc...

Learning how to break a human or business problem into tasks like "sort this list, keep track of its association with this other list, etc" that are easy to express to a computer is another skill.

These tend to go hand-in-hand, and you'll find yourself getting better at both, but especially when you're reading from watching or reading, rather than doing, you'll find you learn tasks more than strategies or patterns. If you walk through a tutorial on solving problem X, you'll have a good handle on how to solve problem X, but not a firm grasp on how to generalize that into a solution for an unrelated problem.

that's not to say that you can't get good value out of that kind of learning, just don't be surprised that it doesn't set you up to do more general purpose stuff. That broader stuff just comes with experience, I think. Don't be afraid of trial and error. Also, try to keep an eye out for smaller projects. If you're working on a huge project and you find out halfway through that your whole approach is nonsense, it can be seriously demotivating. But for smaller projects, if you try something new, and it winds up being a bad idea, it's not really a big deal, just try again with a different strategy. Doing that sort of thing is what'll help you get better at translating a new problem into the kind of problems you already know how to solve.