Hello good people and welcome back to my blog!
What we learnt this week
Week 6 has come to an end, and this week we focused on testing.
We started some lectures explaining what testing is and why it is so important to test and to start testing, EARLY. We learnt about TDD, Test-Drive Development, which suggests that the development of code should be driven by tests written prior to the code.
I may write something up on what testing is and why it can save you so much headache early on, simply because I can really see the value of testing. Like I said, I may.
Given that we have got some time off, I want to reflect on my journey thus far rather than write on the technical things I've learnt this week.
What I've learnt so far
Six weeks.
I've said it, I'm going to say it today and I'm going to say it when I come to the end of the Bootcamp (in shaa Allah/God willingly), this has been the most intensive learning experience of my entire life.
Technically speaking (and I mean this absolutely technically), I am a full-stack developer and I have no shame in saying that - there is no imposter syndrome here good folk (I fully understand imposter syndrome is usually developed within the workplace but I'm just playing with the term). Of course, my skills would need to get to a much higher level within the next few weeks for me to comfortably start handing out business cards, but that's neither here nor there.
I have learnt about front-end (HTML/CSS/JS), back-end (Node.js and many npm packages) and some UX/UI (Figma and more).
I've made a basic rock-paper-scissors game, a Pokédex, a database in the cloud. I've also got my own personal projects that I want to get started on during this break.
My joy and pride!
One of the really good things about the School of Code Bootcamp (not that I have anything bad to say!) is that anything we learn, we immediately have workshops tailored to the subject/topic we have learnt.
What I've found easy to grasp
What you find easy to grasp is usually something you enjoy, at least in my experience!
I enjoy anything JavaScript related. If I could build a webpage with just JavaScript, I would. But obviously, you can't!
I enjoy using JavaScript to beat challenges on code wars, and I'm hoping to move to LeetCode soon because I've heard good things about it.
I also understood HTML quickly and was able to make basic, static websites. So a lot of the front-end stuff I was able to absorb quickly.
What I haven't found easy to grasp
Let me make this clear, CSS and I aren't the best of friends, and I have admitted this before. I have struggled to try and make sense of this language, but we continue to be at odds. It took me a short while to be able to make sense of it.
Another thing that just didn't sit well with me was using SQL within Node.js. I did find it difficult (like I mentioned on Twitter), specifically trying to use POST and PostgreSQL, whilst having my database on the cloud (Heroku in this case).
How I have or will overcome my weaknesses
Naturally, with anything that you do, you will have your strengths and weaknesses - being introspective and identifying your weaknesses simply allows you to tackle them swiftly.
After speaking to my mentor about said weaknesses, I spent more time reviewing CSS videos and playing CSS games originally introduced during the Bootcamp. After some time reviewing, I spent time making the front-end of the Pokédex and found that my CSS skills had improved immensely.
You can find the CSS games here, Grid Garden and Flexbox Froggy.
In the upcoming week, I would like to make a Fullstack To-Do list app and that's where I face my latest nemesis - PostgreSQL. So I'll keep you guys updated on that end because I knew this day would come and it's going to be a deadly one.
Which is perfectly okay, but I need to go through that learning curve to learn and to continuously progress.
My reflections
Though the learning has been intense, I have thoroughly enjoyed the course thus far. I'm being pushed every day and I'm spending a lot of time coding and researching within the Bootcamp and outside of it.
I'm well aware that I can only reap the benefits of hard work after an extended period of time. The road may be long but the direction is clear, and if the only thing I need to bring to the table is hard work, then bring it to the table I shall!
I'm very happy with my progress thus far but not deluded about the progress because we aren't even halfway through the course so far. I have to admit, this break has come at a perfect time because, during my time off, I realised I may have been feeling a bit jaded!
I'm looking forward to feeling re-energised come the 4th of January and carrying on killing the content of the course.
I don't know if you could tell by the way I came across but I am currently really looking to go into the front-end. I never thought I could design or that I didn't have a creative side to me - looks like all I needed was some code! On the outside looking in, you would never think that you could be creative through code, but now on the inside, it's clear that everyone here is an architect.
If you're still reading, thank you so much, I hope to use this blog to post and share my journey and the useful knowledge I gain throughout my journey! I would love to connect with other developers to see what they're learning and learn from them - you can connect with me here:
Twitter: @codewithmohamed
Github: github.com/codewithmohamed
LinkedIn: Mohamed Mohamud
Email: mohamedcodes92@gmail.com