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A Tip That Will Help You Learn To Code 10x Faster

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Re: A Tip That Will Help You Learn To Code 10x Faster

#6

Post by IgorPartola »

Another side of this is time estimates. If you have done the exact thing you are estimating, or something close to it, your estimate is only off by a factor of 2. If you are estimating something you've never done, the estimate is off by a factor of 10.

While I really hate the title of the article, I agree with the point wholeheartedly. It is much faster to deliver something where you know all the issues and have experience, than to try and research a new subject, making mistakes along the way.

Re: A Tip That Will Help You Learn To Code 10x Faster

#7

Post by norswap »

The money quote:

> The key to being a good developer is to be able to find your answer as quickly as possible without learning anything else.

I originally parsed the title as "the one tip that will help you (learn to code) 10x faster", while this is obviously "the one tip that will help you learn to (code 10x faster)".

The advice is in fact the exact opposite of what you should do if you want to learn faster.

Re: A Tip That Will Help You Learn To Code 10x Faster

#8

Post by jclos »

PaulHoule wrote: post #5
philmoldavski wrote: post #3

Great advice. If I decide to go down a rabbit hole, I typically set a time limit up front (usually 30-60 min) and try to stick to it.

I prefer to be the guy who can come back alive from rabbit holes that eat lesser programmers.

I prefer to be the guy who sets up rabbit holes to trap lesser programmers and then eat them.

Re: A Tip That Will Help You Learn To Code 10x Faster

#9

Post by JackMorgan »

This advice is good only for people who naturally dive deep into the details and get lost.

What he suggests is what I do as naturally as a fish in water. Skimming the details, finding my answer, and racing off is my greatest skill. But, lately, I have realized _my_ 10x gains come when I bite the bullet and deeply learn a technology. It is against my nature, and takes real effort, but that is where my biggest gains are.

If you read this article, snort, and say, "duh", try getting a book on a tech you use and reading it cover to cover a few times. Try programming without internet for a few hours. I've been doing this lately, and my normal cycle of hitting Google every ten seconds to remember (is it length, count, or size...) has slowed significantly, which keeps me in flow longer. I get pulled out of flow less and I have learned some really useful features of my stack that I previously would have never learned.

Re: A Tip That Will Help You Learn To Code 10x Faster

#10

Post by bulatb » 

  The key to being a good developer is to be able to find your answer as quickly as possible without learning anything else.
That might be the key to short-term productivity, but I think "good" is more complicated. I'd rather take a small hit to my average output than churn out lots of hacky code because I didn't bother to explore the options. Sometimes taking time to really learn something, even if it has dependencies, is an investment rather than a cost.
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