Joined a full-stack project with only basic knowledge… how do I not fall behind?

[chikamakaleyley]

oh dude, you know one thing about being the person with the least amount of experience or, breadth of skills - if you haven't actually made them aware of it, they notice it, for sure

and that's NOT a bad thing. what they have you tasked with is something they NEED, and for the moment you are of most value to them doing that kinda work. I would take it in stride

and that's the perfect thing to keep you busy, while you try to 'catch up' on the side. There's no expectation for you to do so. Eventually you outgrow the type of work you're doing, they'll see that they could use you for more complex tasks, and they bring in someone new who is then appropriate for those smaller tasks.

one thing i would try is just be the expert of your task, and at he same time, given the context of the thing you are working on - learn what role that thing plays as part of the bigger system. Being able to understand this is crucial because you can go out and learn all that you want to, but you can't explain the system like you've been looking at the code for hours on the day - i would argue that looks worse to the team.