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Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

#71

Post by penpapersw »

First of all it's not bad to keep using what you know, if what you know works well and is the right way to do something. Like if you're very good with the delegate pattern, don't throw it out just because you heard closures are Better™.

What I personally do is to use what I know well, and when some code feels clunky or I notice problems with it, I'll google the problem and be open minded about new solutions, even if they're really different. And I do a bit of research on the good ones (like 20 minutes or so), making sure they don't have other flaws and just ensuring they fit my use-case.

Case in point, I'm doing iOS development again for the first time since iOS 3 or 4, and when I started trying to use CAKeyframeAnimation again, it felt a bit difficult and didn't look all that great either. So I googled for ways to animate with a bounce effect in iOS, and found the newer UIView method to animate with a spring effect, and another solution using UIDynamicAnimator which was new to me also.

After like 5 or 6 hours of reading, googling, writing code, deleting code (custom segues turned out to be the wrong way to use it in my case), and lather rinse repeat, I finally ended up with not only a good end product, but the knowledge of how to use several new APIs and several new concepts. During that I also incidentally found out some cool Objective-C tricks that came out since I last used it.

Plus I felt really uncomfortable with understanding how ARC works (previously it felt like just a bit of magic to me), so I used the same principle of googling my questions & concerns about it, read some stackoverflow answers and blog posts for 20 or 30 minutes, and gained a much better / fuller understanding of ARC that gave me a lot more confidence writing code.

Re: Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

#72

Post by itamarst »

steveeq1 wrote: post #57
itamarst wrote: post #4

1. You need to recognize when you're not learning, for one thing. If it's easy, you're not learning. You need to push yourself into the zone of discomfort, where you feel clumsy and have a hard time. Now you're learning. 2. Find a mentor. Lacking that, find e.g. talk of someone explaining some hard techniques and then try to follow the advice. Even and especially if it feels clumsy at first. (More on those two here:…

Upvoted for "Learn how to learn", awesome talk.

Kathy Sierra also has a book with some overlap; it's about product creation but also teaching (and learning).

Re: Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

#73

Post by justincormack »

markeroon wrote: post #69
xealgo wrote: post #31

I for one will often (and usually naturally) befriend the most talented developers I work with. Talking code often and bouncing ideas off of them will really help you see where you're lacking or where you can improve. Learning new languages and different paradigms can also play a huge role in how you approach future problems. Go to glot.io and play around with a handful of languages you've never touched. Read up on v…

I'm not sure that this is the way. It's much easier to get a small amount of knowledge about a lot of topics. If you want to be a generalist then that's great, otherwise, I think it's important to keep asking yourself "How can I drill deeper?" This is specifically regarding the third point; I agree with the first two!

The OP mentioned architecture - it helps to be a bit of a generalist to learn architecture, as you need to understand different kinds of problems.

Re: Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

#75

Post by andai »

johnfn wrote: post #35

I work on progressively larger and larger apps. This teaches me more and more about coding in the large, in a very practical sense. Every time I learn about something new, my learning is explicitly motivated by the problems that I ran into while implementing the large app. I started by making a reasonably conplex TODO app, which took a few months. This taught me about the importance of declarative (popularized by Rea…

If you don't mind sharing, what's the big app you're warming up for? :)

Re: Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

#76

Post by andai »

vikingcaffiene wrote: post #26

Dev with 10 years experience here. Self taught. There are couple ways I keep up on things (keeping in mind that there are no absolutes and everyone is different). First, I identify subjects that are both interesting to me and have traction with the developer community. Forums like this one are generally a good sniff test. I then subscribe to mailing lists that deal with that tech. I clip a lot of articles and code sn…

Interesting to see the range of responses in this thread, eg. you are advocating keeping it fun and interesting, whereas other people recommend deliberately doing things you don't like.

It might have to do with different personality types. For instance, I am prone to procrastinate on anything that doesn't interest/excite me, so when my goal is to work on stuff I don't like, the output approaches zero.

I resonate with the "do more than nothing" approach advocated by Khatzumoto of All Japanese All The Time[0]. Which is a great website by the way!

It's all about how language learning can be fun. It's like 10% language learning advice, 90% "you can do it stop beating yourself up".

[0]: http://alljapaneseallthetime.com/

Re: Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

#78

Post by nickpsecurity »

return0 wrote: post #54
nickpsecurity wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm upvoting it because it's incredibly common in high schools and college. People have to do tons of repetitive, boring stuff. They have piles of work. Many turn to Adderall to stay focused enough to get it done. Like it or not, it's how a huge chunk of people in college "keep improving" despite the challenges they face not getting better over time.

> People have to do tons of repetitive, boring stuff. A good programmer will automate this stuff and will not bother with it again. Maybe aderall is incentivizing the wrong behavior here.

You can automate homework and tests for your classes? That's news.

Re: Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

#79

Post by nickpsecurity »

nindalf wrote: post #55
nickpsecurity wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm upvoting it because it's incredibly common in high schools and college. People have to do tons of repetitive, boring stuff. They have piles of work. Many turn to Adderall to stay focused enough to get it done. Like it or not, it's how a huge chunk of people in college "keep improving" despite the challenges they face not getting better over time.

I'm not sure that's great advice. Adderall provides a temporary boost but it takes a lot out of you too. Kicking it becomes difficult because you don't think you can be productive or even intelligent without it. This account [1] of a person who got addicted in college and tried for years to kick it convinced me not to try it. Please think twice before recommending or endorsing any kind of pharmaceutical product. [1]…

"I'm not sure that's great advice. Adderall provides a temporary boost but it takes a lot out of you too. "

I didn't recommend taking Adderall. I'm against it unless it's a last resort where nothing else is working. I upvoted it because it literally is how so many students and workers in America keep moving. Not just that drug but many. So, it's worth being in a survey.

The natural follow-up is asking what kind of work they do or where in case one wants to avoid motivation for such a solution. ;)

Re: Ask HN: How do you keep improving?

#80

Post by nickpsecurity »

weavie wrote: post #63
NikolaeVarius wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Studying is repetitive boring stuff.

Not if you do it right.

How do you study mundane, endless trivia "right" where it's not boring or wearing you out? I managed to do what studying I needed to do but it was far from fun. The only times it was fun was when the material itself was fun. It was still work but at least interesting work. Most weren't, though.
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