Ask HN: How should new programmers learn in the AI era?

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I think you should at least know the basics! AI still makes mistakes, and sometimes it can't fix them even when they're simple errors.

I'd say stay in the fundamentals and build things by himself. Do not rely on AI. Instead, train him to search for answers in offline materials. Help him read other people's source code instead of summarizing it using AI.

Those little exercises are still good projects IMO. Find where his passion is about (it could be making games, or making apps to help his girlfriend do X, or drilling into computer architecture), and help him to build up the ability to teach himself using material offline.

And train his patience, too. With so many free helping hands nowadays, it is very important to be patient and NOT seek out help unless one has exhausted all available venues at hand. My thumb of rule is "3-night" -- if he cannot find the answer or even make an progress for 3 nights, he needs to seek external help. But build up his tolerance towards frustration -- in pretty much all trades, programming included, tradesmen need to retain the ability to tolerate certain level towards frustration -- otherwise they would achieve nothing. Build up his tolerance towards frustration, build up his tolerance towards boredom. IMO it helps to sit with him to debug programs step by step.

I would limit myself to using ai to explain and not use the tech to fix or create anything. Learning takes time and effort. One has to understand something and then make some excercises to make it stick.

Also providing examples how to do something would be OK. Not different from searching for info and reading some blog or stack overflow.