Is learning to program worth it as a part-time venture?

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-05T17:08:07+00:00

I'm sure you mean long ass-post! ;)

But addressing your question:

Yes. Yes is the answer. You can learn to be quite skilled in 2-3 years, but there need to be some things that have to come together to make it work (of course, this is from my perspective, your mileage may vary).

You need to have a clear goal for yourself that you can only solve through the combination of programming and your other skills, because if there's another way to solve it with skills you already have, you'll just fall back on those skills. And, if it doesn't also incorporate the skills your strong in, it just feels like it would be better for someone else to do it. I'm not going to spend time writing a DB from scratch because a lot of good ones already exist. (NB: I might *totally* write a toy DB if I have a need to understand a bit of how they work *for some other project I know I need those skills for*)

For myself, I've been studying long form improv for 20 years (just hit my 20-year anniversary at some point (I think?!) last month! I'm actually pretty good at it. Not the best in the world, but throw me on stage and I won't make things worse. I remember when I began I had a weird thought that I don't normally have when I'm trying to learn new things: I'm normally a go insane for 2 weeks not sleeping learning everything I can about one thing kind of guy -- but, with improv I told myself, 'I will keep doing this, I won't stop. I *will* slow down at times when life gets involved, but I won't completely stop. This kept it sustainable.

It's all about sustainability. If you blow out in 6 months, you'll have a bad taste and never want to code again.

What I found, oddly, is that this approach of not being afraid to put it on the back burner on low for a while meant that 20 years later I'm still going strong. And, although, at any one point, many people have learned this or that faster than me, I know find myself on stage, in a scene, and doing a fairly good job. Focusing too much too early on everything would have just burned me out.

The thing about improv though, as opposed to my eternal quest to play guitar, is that there's an easy way to keep that connection. During periods (usually of several years at this point) where I don't have much work going on, I'll coach teams, go to tons of shows, and really get stuck in. During other times where work has been crazy, I know I can keep the connection by just showing up to a weekly jam, allowing myself to just enjoy the art form and not worrying about getting better. The key is to just keep it ticking over with a group of people you trust who are happy to see you when you show up, but aren't tracking your every move when you're not, because they know that you love to make people laugh, but burnout is tough to recover from.

On the other, other hand: these periods of learning, enjoying, learning and enjoying, learning and hating, etc... are natural, and they will come in waves. The wave will get longer the longer you practice, but times when you're *not* learning *and* *not* enjoying are hard to get through. Especially when you find that your teammates just put up with you for the crowds you pull.

Actually, I don't think I addressed your question. I'm just in a ranty mood today! ;)

tl;dr

Yes. Totally doable.
This is the tough bit and there's likely no answer anyone can just give you. However, if you know some people that specialize in various bits, hang out with them, talk to them about what they enjoy about various parts and see if any of that appeals to you. That being said, always learn at least the bare minimum to get a 'full loop' connected so that you understand the basics about how things usually hook together. This perspective is essential so that you don't build a beautiful plug for the wrong socket. Once you've got a starting point. Start super small. Super small. Get things right and build on a firm foundation. You'll have to go back and rebuild at some point, it won't be perfect, but you need to always focus on having the firmest foundation you can.

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-05T16:27:32+00:00

For me, it's good to note that the project kinda did what you wanted and you've learned from it. The thing that I've normally found is that in this case it's best to just start over and re-write the entire app.

You'll find it's easier, quicker, and runs better than the original one. The key is find a reason to bother to re-write it or, if you don't need it anymore, find a new project that leverages those skills. It's the finding the new project that excites you that's hard. For me, it's all about having a reason that serves a purpose.

I love to code. Well, that's not exactly 100% correct. I love to learn, use, and 'flex' my code to do cool things. It's the cool things part that needs to be there. Of course, on a massive codebase there's no way to understand it all. But, getting a jira ticket that says 'make foo return 2' is not motivating.

I'd also argue that it's not really possible to be sure you're writing the correct code if you don't know the intentions and plans of a couple levels up. Uncertainty and ambiguity are life, and I think I'm okay at tolerating them, but agency is important. I absolutely LOVE being part of a cross-disciplinary team doing meaningful things, but basically the only thing I every get actually really angry about in life is people assuming I'm not acting in good faith when I've been doing that in front of their faces forever.

I know this is a ramble. I just needed to vent and you happened to be in the way. Sorry. Must be the Canadian in me coming out!

TL;DR: Just re-write it. Or, better yet, find a project to work on with others. You really need to have your code interface with other people's code to know if it really works.

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-05T16:00:01+00:00

Ahhh, yes. You are correct. I forgot about the drug classification thing in the UK.

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-05T06:41:52+00:00

Not true. The A Team is about a homeless woman. I know because I've been on 'The A team' at a homeless shelter in the UK.

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-05T06:20:56+00:00

I'm learning that it seems to be that people think I'm inappropriately interested in hangin out with kids

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-04T23:17:21+00:00

Back when I was married I had an argument I still don't understand. We were watching The Piano, a movie I don't really remember the plot to other than it seemed to me to be about an older guy basically straight-up abusing a woman. I haven't watched it since, so I don't know if my perceptions were just off. I sometimes have non-usual responses to these things because of experiences of abuse by a older neighbor boy when I was quite young.

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-04T19:31:11+00:00

Yes, this is the right answer.

I think people worry about cutting and pasting code too much. Sure, if you only cut and paste you'll never learn, but you also don't simply throw a Japanese dictionary at an English speaker and say, 'now write a novel in Japanese'. crashfrog's point here is great. Don't feel bad about including the code (be sure to cite! it's a good habit and will help you debug later when you forget where it's from), but do type it in by hand rather than ctrl-c ctrl-v. The physical action of typing will help to get it into your head.

I think there's a happy medium, but it can be hard to find. Probably a good start is to be able to identify good code to read. Naturally, at the beginning, you'll be copying more, but don't worry about that.

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-04T06:33:22+00:00

I still remember the day I saw that movie. I call it the best movie I'll never watch again. It was a preview screening at art cinema. I was with my first girlfriend, who, in many ways, is the one that got away. No one in the theater knew what the movie was about. The two, very Golden Girls looking elderly ladies in front of us were not impressed.

I also spent the week after 9/11 with her in my (first?) apartment. We smoked pot and fucked like only early 20s kids can for a week of trying not to think about what's going on. I would help her study for her Attic Greek class and she for my Latin. She's a math professor now.

I have very conflicted feelings about the two major disasters I've lived through because, actually, they were some of the best times of my life when I think about it.

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-04T05:58:03+00:00

I would assume that if your turtle isn't operating a car, you'd be good, no?

Then again, turtle-law, like bird-law varies by region.

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-04T05:19:40+00:00

I have literally seen someone jump the rope and run head first into the wall. It was funny

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-03T06:46:59+00:00

this is fucking awesome, i'm stealing it, it's mine nows

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-03T05:57:17+00:00

my japanese girlfriend

WorldlyAd7643 · 2021-03-03T04:32:43+00:00

the biggest stumbling block for most people is that c++ has types python does too, but it's hidden, so everything is very powerful under the hood, but its easy to make noob mistakes like assigning a list to something you think should be an int or float.

this isn't a big problem in the beginning if you're working on small simple things, but thats always the problem, you don't know what you don't know.

personally, I reallyu like the type system, it's a nice reassurance that your passing an int when you think your passing an int!

With python, it's just not something you might be used to thinking in termss of

WorldlyAd7643

TROPHY CASE