It’s been several months since I’ve updated my Github, or really did any coding at all.
Originally, I planned on learning Go after being disillusioned with trying to learn Python. I found Go to be refreshingly explicit. For a novice coder, this turned out to be both a good and bad thing. I focused on the minutiae of how individual Go functions worked, how types worked, and other esoterica instead of focusing on actually learning to code. As a result, I didn’t get very far in any of my projects.
It was with no small amount of reluctance that I decided to return my focus to Python, which I had attempted to learn several times in the past. On the surface, Python doesn’t care about any of the things that Go requires a programmer to be explicit about. I find it to be more visually readable, but I have no intuitive grasp on how it works under the hood. This is something that frustrates me since I want to know how things work. However, it means that my focus can remain on creating something that works. Learning the way a programming language actually works can come later. For now, my goal is to learn how to code. To do that, I must write code.
This in no way means I am giving up on trying to understand how Python or other languages function. That’s something that fascinates me about programming in its various forms. But it does mean that I can focus my efforts on that broad activity called ‘learning to code’ rather than zeroing in on one small and nonfunctional aspect of it.
Perhaps later on, when I’ve actually developed a career for myself, I can resume tinkering around with the details. For now, I’m just going to create programs that are simple and usable.