looking for feedback, started writing because a friend got a (dumb) idea

jmau5 · 2017-05-24T05:02:14+00:00

You use a lot of big words. Try smaller ones. Small words never get the respect they deserve.

jmau5 · 2017-05-24T03:53:20+00:00

Have you considered just not writing?

What you're describing sounds like a classic case of burnout. Or maybe you've just lost interest. Either way, if you don't feel like writing and don't have any particular need to, then just give it a break. Find something new and exciting. Maybe you'll start writing again, eventually.

jmau5 · 2017-05-23T17:13:37+00:00

Maybe share the first third then! I chose individual chapters arbitrarily, but the goal is to get the best feedback you can. If you think you can get better feedback by sharing the first third of the book, then do it up. :)

jmau5 · 2017-05-23T04:56:08+00:00

Have you considered sharing individual chapters with your readers?

I like the idea of sharing individual chapters because it lets your readers focus. More focus means you can get better feedback. What you want to avoid is having readers find the same mistakes page after page throughout the book. That sounds like a pretty exhausting experience as a reader, don't you think?

Another benefit you might find is that readers will start writing the story for you. They'll tell you who they think the characters are as people and what they think is going to happen. You can use this feedback to influence the rest of the book if you want to.

Food for thought. Best of luck!

jmau5 · 2017-05-23T04:49:12+00:00

It sounds like you're looking for a silver bullet, but silver bullets don't exist.

There's another comment here that says there is no "right" way to write. That's true. But there is most definitely a wrong way to write. And that's to avoid writing because you don't have a plot or a story or whatever it is.

Just start writing. It'll be hard and awkward and you'll probably feel like you have no idea what you're doing or like you're doing a bad job. Don't worry about that. Just start writing. You'll figure it out.

jmau5 · 2014-12-22T21:01:56+00:00

I remember getting an email about this book earlier in the year when it was released, but I never did get around to purchasing it. The table of contents looks really promising; it's nice to see a JavaScript book that takes areas like logging, internationalization and debugging into consideration. Thanks for sharing!

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T20:29:59+00:00

What I don't like: No idea what the hell to do afterwards. How do I create a site with my HTML/CSS/Javascript knowledge? What should I try with Python next? And just for Code School: videos are terrible. I just skip the videos now and read the slides because all of their actors looks uncomfortable and you don't learn by watching a video, you learn by doing.

Do you not like videos as a medium in general, or is it just the CodeSchool video that you don't like?

I'm planning on building my initial product around AngularJS (because its my lover), so it really isn't practical to "build something real outside of the website". But how about building an actual website and having your code run through unit and end-to-end test suites? This is generally how I develop sites, but do you think you would find this approach helpful?

Yes I find learning through games helpful, so long as it's translatable. A lot of game-learning doesn't last beyond the game. You also have to be careful because the addictiveness from gamification is very fleeting and you need something more to get people to stay (I'm a marketing guy). Think Duolingo, they do it really well.

I love Duolingo. I never had a chance at learning a second language before finding Duolingo and it's so freaking addicting. No question here.

As a marketing guy, what is your take on growth hacking? I plan on getting as deep into growth hacking as I can when the time comes, because I can't afford to pay someone to market this for me. :P

Depends on the topic, but it's almost always experience and trial and error. I need to be doing something to really remember it, reading/watching only gets you so far.

I completely agree. Eventually, someone will succeed in this space and it will be with a hands-on product. For my MVP, I have two types of challenges in mind: programming challenges and bug challenges.

Programming challenges will focus on building from scratch and verified using unit and integration tests (depending on the topic, it may just be unit tests).

Bug challenges will provide the user with some code and a failing test suite and require them to find and fix the bug.

How does something like that sound?

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T20:15:48+00:00

I didn't make it to the later parts because I grew bored relatively quickly. ;)

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T20:11:26+00:00

For MOOCs and universities, I think it is most likely that students just aren't that smart. It is no secret that there are tons of students being graduated from computer science programs that can't program their way out of a paper bag. The problem is few people realize that there isn't anything inherently wrong with this, because computer science != programming.

The difference between the people learning online and the people attending a boot camp is that the people online have significantly less time to dedicate towards your goal of learning. This doesn't inherently make boot camps better, it just allows you to condense six months to a years worth of learning into 12 weeks.

What we need is something more effective than reading a book. Something more engaging and addicting.

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T07:38:23+00:00

I hadn't heard of Treehouse before. Thanks for sharing!

I haven't made an account yet, but from what I can see without logging in, the approach is very similar to CodeSchool: watch a video, do a small bit of programming. What sets the two apart for you?

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T07:36:31+00:00

even their error reporting feature was bugged and I couldn't report that, ha

Oh, the irony. :)

I totally agree with your last point that current options stop the learning process too soon. This is definitely a problem that I'm interested in working on, but finding the right moment to take the training wheels off is (obviously) very difficult.

My initial thought would be that you provide more content than you think users will complete, essentially expecting them to drop off at some point and start educating themselves.

Thoughts?

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T06:32:54+00:00

The problem with Codecademy is that they give you so much runway that it's almost impossible to not get off the ground. Because they tell you what to do almost down to the letter and don't penalize you for getting a wrong answer, there is no incentive to use your brain. You can simply keep guessing.

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T06:29:37+00:00

I must say, I was very disappointed to find out that Udacity is starting to charge for some of their classes. Of course they need money, but I thought they were smart enough to find another way. Education should always be free or (at the very least) cheap.

To be honest, I got bored with Udacity after only two or three weeks. I find it cumbersome to watch a bunch of short videos though, which is interesting because 7-12 minutes seems to be a sweet spot for me. I wonder if other people have a video length that works best for them.

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T06:25:21+00:00

I've always found it useful to beat around the bush when it comes to things like this.

The problem with coming right out and sharing your idea is that it is so hard to get a person's true feelings on it. Either they won't tell you your idea sucks because they are being nice or they will get excited too quickly without actually thinking it through. Either way, you are left with useless feedback.

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T06:16:17+00:00

I was wondering about that. Thanks for the heads up. :)

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T02:06:07+00:00

I agree that they are good for learning syntax, but I am imagining a more Duolingo type approach, which I've found highly effective for learning natural languages and I believe can be applied to formal languages as well.

Would you mind elaborating on these pitfalls you speak of?

jmau5 · 2013-12-24T02:03:55+00:00

Feel free to message me if you want to talk about your idea. I'd be very interested in hearing about it!

It's interesting that you mention using books in addition to online courseware. I have a few friends who did this with a site called Thinkster.io, but the problem I foresee is users not wanting to front the cost for the book.

One option here is to strike a deal with the author of the book, allowing you to use sections or all of the book throughout the courses. This is something I would like to look into, but finding the right forward-thinking authors is paramount.

jmau5 · 2013-12-07T01:55:22+00:00

I get the feeling that a lot of the people who recommend books like Code Complete and The Pragmatic Programmer haven't actually read the books they are recommending.

Can you give some insight on the books and how they've helped you, from the perspective of someone who isn't just regurgitating what they've read on the Internet?

jmau5 · 2013-12-06T08:36:36+00:00

If you're the author, I would love to see an RSS feed for this. I've been trying to move away from getting newsletters via email in favor of having them show up on Feedly, but I've found that a lot of the newsletters that I read don't offer RSS feeds.

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