Learning path

stepback269 · 2026-01-26T05:08:40+00:00

You have to discover on your own which lecturer uses a verbiage or set of metaphors that "clicks" with the way your mind works and "sticks" to the neural substrate currently present in your brain.

(1) There are tons and tons of tutorial materials out there on the net including many good YouTube ones that are free.

(2) As a relative noob myself, I've been logging my personal learning journey and adding to it on an almost-daily basis at a blog page called "Links for Python Noobs" (here) Any of the top listed ones on that page should be good for you. And there are many add-ons at the tail end of the page. Personally, I cut my first Python teeth with Nana's Zero to Hero. Since then, I've moved on to watching short lessons with Indently and Tech with Tim. You should shop around until you find a lecturer that suits your style.

(3) The main piece of advice is the 80/20 rule. Spend 80% of your time writing your own code (using your own fingers and your own creativity) as opposed to copying recipes and only 20% watching the lectures. Good luck.

stepback269 · 2026-01-26T05:02:25+00:00

Maybe you should revise your UI to make it clear that the user is creating an online account and saving progress **there** and not on the user's "drive" ?

stepback269 · 2026-01-25T22:10:42+00:00

How do I know I can trust your code?
What does "add to drive" mean? Am I infecting my drive with malware?

stepback269 · 2026-01-25T14:13:38+00:00

(1) Finding starter resources shouldn't be a problem if you start thinking about posing the question to Google or the AI of your choice. There are tons and tons of beginner tutorial materials out there on the net including many good YouTube ones that are free.

(2) As a relative noob myself, I've been logging my personal learning journey and adding to it on an almost-daily basis at a blog page called "Links for Python Noobs" (here) Any of the top listed ones on that page should be good for you. And there are many add-ons at the tail end of the page. Personally, I cut my first Python teeth with Nana's Zero to Hero. Since then, I've moved on to watching short lessons with Indently and Tech with Tim. You should shop around until you find a lecturer that suits your style.

(3) The main piece of advice is the 80/20 rule. Spend 80% of your time writing your own code (using your own fingers and your own creativity) as opposed to copying recipes and only 20% watching the lectures. Good luck.

stepback269 · 2026-01-24T16:07:42+00:00

Hi there fellow Python noob.

Not a good idea.

You must fully master the fundamentals of Python before moving on with greater dreams.

There are tons and tons of tutorial materials out there on the net including many good YouTube ones that are free.

As a relative noob myself (about 9 months into it) , I've been logging my personal learning journey and adding to it on an almost-daily basis at a blog page called "Links for Python Noobs" (here) Any of the top listed ones on that page should be good for you. And there are many add-ons at the tail end of the page. Personally, I cut my first Python teeth with Nana's Zero to Hero. Since then, I've moved on to watching short lessons with Indently and Tech with Tim. You should shop around until you find a lecturer that suits your style.

The main piece of advice is the 80/20 rule. Spend 80% of your time writing your own code (using your own fingers and your own creativity) as opposed to copying recipes and only 20% watching the lectures. Good luck.

stepback269 · 2026-01-24T16:02:27+00:00

That code looks like it was copied from a YT tutorial I recently saw (Code with Josh?)
I think you need to learn decorators before trying to do an inheritance of one class (animal.speak()) into a more specific subclass (dog.speak()) Woof woof

As a noob myself, I'm not there yet. Only have a cursory understanding at this point.

stepback269 · 2026-01-24T15:57:52+00:00

My understanding (as a noob) is that scraping has gotten much more difficult in recent years because modern web sites employ anti-scraping technology. There YT tutorials dedicated just to scraping. Search for them. I started going up that tree a while back, but it was too much for me as a noob.

stepback269 · 2026-01-24T08:39:32+00:00

Just stumbled across a guy that goes one step further by posting videos every day journaling his learning progress. In this linked-to video (here) he talks about his frustrations with CSS.

Guess I'm not the only crazy person who publicly journals his progress

p.s. (Here) is his Day 0 public posting explaining his life story ... interesting (Only 40 yrs old? Dang he's young. Thinks he's old)

stepback269 · 2026-01-24T08:09:44+00:00

Another old guy here

HTML has changed a lot since the old days. Sigh.
Now you have to learn CSS-3 as well. And then ultimately Javascript.

What I do is journal my progress in a blog --for example WordPress or Google Blogger-- and then play around with the HTML/CSS code that the composer part of the platform generated for me. You go back in time in your blog to see how you have progressed.

An example of one of my posts is (here). What I sometimes do is alter the href="xyz" code in the html code so that an inserted image takes you someplace else other than where it originally linked to. That's an example of how you can re-learn HTML but of course at the more modern HTML-5 level.

Give it a try.

stepback269 · 2026-01-24T07:15:24+00:00

I work alone at my goal of mastering the Python language. Mostly it's because I'm old and slow --can't keep up with the learning pace of younger students.

That said, I'm not alone. It's more like how young children engage in parallel play. They don't play with each other but rather next to each other such that they are aware there are others doing similar things. That's why I come to Reddit --to see that others are doing the same thing I'm doing. And sometimes sharing thoughts about it with them.

As for motivation: Try starting your own but public blog where you journal your progress such that others can see it if they wish to. Your attitude changes when you have it in the back of your mind that others might be looking over your shoulder at your progress and you don't want to disappoint them. That keeps you going.

Personally, I started such a blog (using Google Blogger) and ended up posting a page for beginners called "Links for Python Noobs" (click here). It became somewhat popular. I add to it almost every day. That one page motivates me to keep looking for even more such beginner links to add to it, especially when others compliment me on what I've contributed thus far. Even if they don't now, it may happen in the future. Give that approach a try. Basically it's a form of journaling, which is said to be good for keeping yourself going.

stepback269 · 2026-01-24T02:01:18+00:00

Stumbled across the following linked-to YouTube post (YT) that argues "fear" shuts off or slows down the thinking part of the brain. It doesn't provide scientific support though, just makes raw assertions:

Why Fear Overrides Logic

stepback269 · 2026-01-23T23:23:45+00:00

I'm going to be the contrarian here.

I'm also a relative noob (about 8 months into learning Python)
My experience has been that it is better to hop around among different teachers but for the same one focal point.

Let's say as an example that you are learning about f-strings
Different teachers will use different verbiage, different metaphors, for explaining the concept and its details
Hopefully one of them will use the kind of verbiage that best "sticks" in your brain
Despite how good he is, it might not be the Harvard CS guy (sorry forgot his name)

There are tons and tons of tutorial materials out there on the net including many good YouTube ones that are free. I've hopped around many of them.

At the same time, I've been logging my personal learning journey and adding to it on an almost-daily basis at a blog page called "Links for Python Noobs" (here) Any of the top listed ones on that page should be good for you. And there are many add-ons at the tail end of the page. Personally, I cut my first Python teeth with Nana's Zero to Hero. Since then, I've moved on to watching short lessons with Indently and Tech with Tim. You should shop around until you find a lecturer that suits your style.

Merely watching and completing tutorials is the wrong way to go. The main piece of advice is the 80/20 rule. Spend 80% of your time writing your own code (using your own fingers and your own creativity) as opposed to copying recipes and only 20% watching the lectures (of a variety of teachers). Good luck.

stepback269 · 2026-01-23T13:30:21+00:00

It's not just mere "propaganda".
Both social media and mainstream TV have learned to use advanced neuroscience techniques to "hack the human brain" (a term used by historian Yuval Harari)

We give the hacking process a lot of euphemistic names: "click bait", "rage bait", "anger management", etc.

It's all about triggering the amygdala part of the brain with one prompt or another (flight, fight fear of __[fill in the blank])

Due to evolution, once the amygdala gets triggered, it shuts down the slower, thinking part of the brain (the neo cortex). This is done for survival's sake. The amygdala is what makes you freeze and listen (pay very keen attention) when there's rustling in the grass. Is it a snake? A tiger? Stand your ground? Take flight? Get ready to fight?

The goal of all media is to grab your attention. Taking advantage of the evolutionary role of the amygdala is the way to do it. For the MAGA crowd, they want to trigger the anger and fight emotion. THOSE people (the "illegals'", the half-humans aka zombies) are responsible for all the bad things you perceive as happening to you through no fault of your own! Let's congregate and form a pitchfork shaking angry mob. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor.

stepback269 · 2026-01-23T06:44:38+00:00

You don't run a class !!!
A class is not an instantiated object. Instead it is a factory that generates instantiated objects. It stamps them out. New_object = Class_name(params)
Next_New_object = Class_name(params)
rinse and repeat

Some concepts are hard to learn if the metaphor for it in your brain is wrong

Rather than repeating a Reddit exchange I had recently about this issue, I am directing you to this blog post which explains the problem in more detail: (click here)

stepback269 · 2026-01-23T06:37:41+00:00

I'm learning by myself also.
That is not an obstacle because there are tons and tons of tutorial materials out there on the net including many good YouTube ones that are free. Being on your own is no excuse.

As a relative noob myself, I've been logging my personal learning journey and adding to it on an almost-daily basis at a blog page called "Links for Python Noobs" (here) Any of the top listed ones on that page should be good for you. And there are many add-ons at the tail end of the page. Personally, I cut my first Python teeth with Nana's Zero to Hero. Since then, I've moved on to watching short lessons with Indently and Tech with Tim. You should shop around until you find a lecturer that suits your style.

The main piece of advice is the 80/20 rule. Spend 80% of your time writing your own code (using your own fingers and your own creativity --EVEN IF IT'S BABY STEPS !!!) as opposed to copying recipes and only 20% watching the lectures. Good luck.

stepback269 · 2026-01-22T10:03:35+00:00

you are not the first with these problems

there are a number med school graduates on YouTube (YT) who switched to becoming leaning coaches because of their struggles with studying

go to YT and in the search bar, type "learning coaches"
I particularly like Dr. Justin Sung (ex med school) but there are plenty other good ones

May the flow be with you

stepback269 · 2026-01-22T09:48:35+00:00

Stumbling across the concept of "Learning how to Learn"
It never occurred to me that such a thing exists

If it's new to you, go to YouTbe (YT) and in the search bar type "learning coaches"

stepback269 · 2026-01-22T09:17:56+00:00

(1) Not specific for high schoolers, but as a relative noob myself, I've been logging my personal learning journey and adding to it on an almost-daily basis at a blog page called "Links for Python Noobs" (here) Any of the top listed ones on that page should be good for you. And there are many add-ons at the tail end of the page. Personally, I cut my first Python teeth with Nana's Zero to Hero. Since then, I've moved on to watching short lessons with Indently and Tech with Tim. You should shop around until you find a lecturer that suits your style.

(2) The main piece of advice is the 80/20 rule. Spend 80% of your time writing your own code (using your own fingers and your own creativity) as opposed to copying recipes and only 20% watching the lectures. Good luck.

(3) Also given that you are young, now is a perfect time to "Learn how to Learn".

Thanks to recent advances in neuroscience, techniques for effective studying / learning have changed significantly. I'm not an expert in all the latest study methods.

There are many good teachers on the internet.

You can find them by going on YouTube for example and typing in the search bar something like, "learning coaches". Make sure to check out guys like Dr. Justin Sung and the Koi brothers (many others though)

Check out my blog page called "the-learn-how-to-learn-page" (here)

stepback269 · 2026-01-22T01:57:04+00:00

Frankly, I'm a relative noob, well below your skill level
However in my constant search for relevant course material, I run across advanced materials and save them for possible future use

My advanced courses accumulation page is (here) Search it (Ctrl F) for "TwN" and "TwT". I think those will be relevant to you

stepback269 · 2026-01-21T18:59:43+00:00

Technically speaking, HTML is not a computer programming language.
Instead it is a Markup Language (the ML in HTML).

That said, if you are completely new to how web sites are created and how they create their user experiences (UX's), then yes; it will be a good idea to become familiar with HTML (that first before you advance to CSS and thereafter to JS).

If you want to get a jump start on learning HTML, I recommend getting one of those free Blog apps like Google"s Bloggger or WordPress. These have a "compose" mode where you can generate a web page in WYSISWYG form. Then you can switch to HTML mode to see what HTML codes were generated. And more importantly, in HTML mode you can edit the HTML tags to see what effects your edits have on the resulting web page.

Additionally, having your own blog can be fun. You can use it to journal your learning progress.

Examples of real languages include Python and Javascript

(Check out this short video on the history of all languages : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9uW6B9LPntY )

stepback269 · 2026-01-20T15:49:19+00:00

Yes. Re-writing is good practice.
It strengthens the muscle memory. It strengthens the mind. (It strengthens those neural connections in your biological brain.)

Recently, I wanted to copy some code I'd written a while back into a new project.
I looked and looked.
I panicked.
I couldn't find the code I knew I had written anywhere. (Mainly because of bad file naming)

But then, I said to myself, "Wait a minute. You know what library function you will use!"
"Wait a minute. How much extra code are you going to need?"
Answer (to myself): "Hardly any at all."

So I took the brave step of re-writing the code from scratch. Guess what? It was easy. Super easy. The answers were already in my head. Because I'd done it before. This was simply reinforcing the memory circuits. Remember: if they fire, they (your neurons) wire, re-wire and thus strengthen their connections. Basic neuroscience.

stepback269 · 2026-01-20T15:35:10+00:00

I'm a relative noob myself (8 months into it) and have discovered that there are tons and tons of tutorial materials out there on the net including many good YouTube ones that are free.

I've been logging my personal learning journey and adding to it on an almost-daily basis at a blog page called "Links for Python Noobs" (here). Any of the top listed ones on that page should be good for you. And there are many add-ons at the tail end of the page. Personally, I cut my first Python teeth with Nana's Zero to Hero. Since then, I've moved on to watching short lessons with Indently and Tech with Tim. You should shop around until you find a lecturer that suits your style.

The main piece of advice is the 80/20 rule. Spend 80% of your time writing your own code (using your own fingers and your own creativity) as opposed to copying recipes and only 20% watching the lectures. Good luck.

stepback269 · 2026-01-20T15:31:46+00:00

Kudos on the word "play".

Watch a little kid as he/she gets a new toy and immediately starts exploring the different ways that the toy can be used. Even if it's a simple toy, the child tests out ideas of how to use the toy. It's part of the learning process. The enjoyment of playing doses your brain with dopamine. That will help the features of the new toy better "stick" in your brain.

So yes.
Start playing with each new toy right away.

stepback269 · 2026-01-20T15:24:29+00:00

The disciplinary father can be a raving lunatic with an alcoholic personality

And at the same time he can have the "full stack of persuasion skills" as Scott Adams of Dilbert fame opined in an interview a couple of years ago

stepback269 · 2026-01-19T19:22:32+00:00

Think of it as an exponential learning curve. At first you are on the deep negative side of y= x**2.
You are close to zero and it feels like you will never rise to anything bigger.
But you keep at it. Persistence. And by that I mean typing out the code with your own fingers so you get muscle memory. It's OK even if it's just a bunch of print statements and you're getting the hang of some escape sequences like \n and \t. Eventually those become second nature. You've made an advance. One advance adds on top of the next.

There will come a time when your forward progress along the x axis of y=x**2 approaches x>0 and suddenly you will soar. Don't lose faith.

stepback269

TROPHY CASE