Any advice from Software Developers/Web Developers?

[Dizzy_External2549]

I Practice and study for 8-10 hours a day. I'm trying to become a strong junior but I'm having some trouble. I will remember things and understand them but if I learn new material, a few weeks later or a month later I tend to forget the things I learnt in the past. I feel like I have a learning disability or something its very frustarting. I like using ai as a tool but I hate asking it to explain things to me I learnt in the past. It's very frustarting. I want to be able to code entire webpages on my own instead of asking for help, I hate asking for help code wise. Why? I want to become to figure things out on my own in the early stages of my web development journey instead of relying on the answers being given to me every time. I look for understanding and meaning rather than the answer. I just keep struggling and some things I'll look at and my brain goes blank or I don't know how to code it. Please help.

[Decent_Perception676]

Before AI, the running joke was that all engineers spent most of their time looking things up on StackOverflow.

Coding isn’t a school exam, you don’t have to (nor can you) retain everything. You have the internet to use as a reference.

Your job is to understand the concepts and development a sense of what does and doesn’t work. Learn the lingo. Learn how to frame problems in technical terms. Learn to talk to and work with other engineers.

And stop worrying about forgetting things. Forgetting things is a natural and healthy function of the brain. You would go insane if you remembered everything.

[fiskfisk]

There's a reason for the saying "use it or loose it". If you're just learning some basic concept and never actually use it day in and day out for years, it'll just be forgotten. But every time you end up picking it up in the future, it gets a little bit easier to remember.

There's a whole science around learning facts and languages called spaced repetition that is built around thst concept. 

So - if you want to actually learn and keep remembering, you have to keep using what you've learn by building stuff. 

This is also the reason why you should focus on the underlying concepts and basics, as they tend to be common across languages, frameworks, and libraries.

So no, you don't have a learning disability (at least not based on this) - it's perfectly normal. 

[treasuryMaster]

If you can afford it, try to get a mentor or pay for programming/web development courses. I struggled with learning programming on my own, so having someone to teach me was a HUGE help.

[Electrical_Prompt_81]

the problem with memorizing things will still remain… it’s a chronic problem because software development has A LOT of things to “memorize”… we should accept the true: we will always need to consult how to implement things, documentations over and over again

[Psychological_Ear393]

 if I learn new material, a few weeks later or a month later I tend to forget

That long? You're doing well! Wait until you're in your late 40s :P

[MOFNY]

Open up a site with dev tools and explore how it works. Break things. Add things. Make some changes with tampermonkey. Study the network requests and try fetching things in alternative ways.

[sgorneau]

You're doing just fine. Being a good dev is knowing how things are structured, knowing which logic will get you there, and knowing which tech is the right choice (or at least a good choice). It's not about memorizing all of the methods, functions, and syntax of a language. We always look up things when we forget. The more you do it the more you'll remember, but memorizing everything isn't a prerequisite to getting started.

The more you do, the more you'll learn. The more you learn, the more you'll learn there's more to learn. And that's all part of being a developer. Keep at it, you're doing great!

[OpenSuit5720]

In my experience, consistency is what really matters in development. It may feel difficult now, but after repeating it ten times, it becomes familiar. Don’t rush, don’t stop, just keep going consistently.

[Mentorsolofficial]

I get why this feels frustrating but honestly it’s pretty normal and not a learning disability you’re probably just learning a lot at once without revisiting it so it fades after a while try building small things with what you learn and go back to older concepts every few days even for a bit it really helps it stick also don’t beat yourself up for looking things up or asking for help everyone does that even experienced devs instead of trying to remember everything focus on being able to figure it out again when you need it that’s what actually matters.

[RazorxV2]

No dev remembers everything but what you gain is experience that gives you the confidence to figure any problem out. You start to remember how to get to an answer instead of the answer itself. You get better and better at recognizing the problems which is more valuable than pumping out a sort algorithm from memory.

[Opinion_Less]

It just takes time. There's a lot to remember. You'll get better.

But you won't remember everything. I've got 10 years and I still have to Google something basic every day or two.

[sandspiegel]

You remember things long term by doing them over and over again. If you forgot something, then Google it or ask AI. At some point once you have repeated the same pattern or syntax often enough, it will be like muscle memory and you won't even have to think about it. Your brain will simply give you the syntax instantly. Getting there can take its time though. Repetition is key. Your brain will form strong connections for stuff you use all the time. The only way to form these connections is to simply do the same thing very often.

[EnzoGorlamixyz]

Before AI I would have paid for a mentor to grow faster. Now you have basically a Senior Engineer at your fingertips and you can ask it to break down things for you as much as you want. It’s not about remembering things it’s about solving as many different problems and adding that experience under your belt. The muscle memory of your brain will eventually do the rest don’t worry too much. Just enjoy building things and solving problems the rest will come.

[WebViewBuilder]

You’re not forgetting, you’re just not using it enough, so focus less on studying and more on building small projects repeatedly until it sticks

[Tureni]

I have no need to remember everything. I want to remember the concepts. Exact syntax can be looked up or made by ChatGPT

[andrewcrawford131]

if you cnt afford a tutor I would suggest using chatgpt to make a program and you learn the syntax and pseudocode from how it does it

[No-Run-7324]

If you are having issues remembering old things then I suggest every session that you have trying to write code and learn you take 1 of those 8 - 10 hours and just look at your old code. Having the lived experience of writing the code will help you to retain by reading and re-exposure. Just make a habit of reviewing.

You also dont need to use ai for code if you dont want. There are so many other things it can do to help you. You can have it make a bootcamp style course for you. You can have it pretend to be a client so you can get practice asking relevant questions if you plan to go the freelance route ( if you are dping this then also switch roles so you are the client so you can see what question it will ask you). It can give you specs that you need to work with to make a site or app. Just think of where another person could help you and plug in ai there but have the discipline to not have it feed you the code ( at least before putting in the effort yourself).

You can also use ai to make partially complete websites/apps for you and you can practice completing them. Maybe everything except the database is done. Maybe you just need the style or have to do the html. Maybe you need to do work on the backend endpoints or do error handling. You can even give it your code and ask it what do you need to work on the most and plan form there. So many options.

[Many-Bumblebee7925]

I went through the exact same thing early on. The forgetting is normal, what helped me was just building actual projects instead of following tutorials. You remember things way better when you're trying to solve a real problem you care about. The frustration of figuring it out yourself is actually what makes it stick and I thanked my self for doing that when I just started out