8-Bits of Advice for New Programmers (The stuff they don't teach you in school!)

hello I'm not doing this one in the car today because this is something I feel really passionate about and I want to take it very seriously today I'm going to tell you my eight-bit get it over advice for new programmers program is just starting out and this is the stuff they don't teach you in school I'm not going to talk about any language in particular because the real roots have been a great program is understanding the structure and the nature of code everything else is just since actually can be learnt in days so let's get started bit eight don't make life hard for yourself set yourself realistic expectations you're going to have to learn to walk before you can run the first thing a programmer should be learning about is is variable than arithmetic and then follow that up with sequence and loops and arrays and functions and then extend it with structures and classes and then you can figure out the more advanced stuff like object oriented programming and inheritance and polymorphism going further still talking about template classes and preprocessor stuff then if you want to interact with anything you have to learn libraries you have to learn protocols don't jump in the deep end make sure you understand thoroughly the basics first and you don't need to care then about what language you're using you understand the order of things you understand how the processor is handling the data and you understand how these tools these hardware tool CPUs and graphics cards can be leveraged to your advantage so don't make the first thing that you write your ultimate ambition start by doing little programs on route learn things don't say your expectations too high to start you're still a beginner it may be really tempting thing I'm going to go and write a computer game or I'm going to create a massive complicated web structure from a website I'll be a bit more reasonable why not start off with writing some little console replication simply really simple stuff enter your name and it does funny things with the organization of the characters or it's solved arithmetic or it's a simple little game high-low is an excellent example for really starting off you're not going to be able to get very far if you try and jump in at the very deep end bit seven choose the right tool choosing the right tools goes hand in hand with the language you want to use but you're just starting out don't start with really complicated compiler chains make files stick to the rapid application development environments fully integrated stuff you want tools which always edit the source show you the compiler information see what it's doing if it is not the compiled code of this and so because you up still to step through line by line and I means you also want your integrated development environment to have the really good debugging facilities you want to be able to perhaps look at memory so you can see what's going on as you program is stepping through there are loads of really good free development environments online but I would recommend you stay away from the ones that require you to compile them yourself start off with something that's really tightly integrated find a nice executable that will just click and run and most importantly whatever the tool make sure that you can run your program within seconds of finishing that last line of code you're a learner you're going to want to run the program it doesn't do what you want to do you want to edit it and then run it again and this this rapid turnaround time is great for giving satisfaction and feedback bits six keep it fun once you had just off the ground and you familiar with some basic loops and things I invite the programs that you want to write but understand you're not going to write a triple-a title within a few days of starting to code if you want to write games start with a very small level game so do things like a Tetris clone that'll be really good for teaching about algorithms and thinking about data if you insert music software try manipulating a waveform load up a music file and see if you can understand how the file is structured then have some crazy effects to it by playing with the map if you're into sports as a hobby why not write some applications that can keep track of scores or personal bests something that you might actually consider using yourself it's not up to me to tell you what's a program but all I can say is just make sure that you enjoy doing it if it becomes a chore it's probably going to dissuade you from doing it and that's not what you want at all if you're just starting our programming bit five practice when I was learning to code the best way to practice was to create the whole program dedicated to learning one function when I was learning about loops my program would contain four loops and while loops always repeat until in those days but you're breaking up so you got a program it just contains a working loop so it does it might just do something boring like add up all of the numbers between one and a hundred and display but then you've always got a reference point so later on you can go back to that program and look well how did I do the loop that as your skill set develops you'll have a whole library of there are little programs which you can label and they can always use them as a reference but just remember it takes time and it takes effort and it takes practice don't shine like the program at the start which has every single feature that that language might offer you keep these little practice programs simple and discreet they only do one thing and that one thing was to teach you how to code bit four never cut and paste you're just starting out the worst thing you can be doing is going online highlighting a load of code you've seen on a website and showing it for yourself that's very useful later on but you're just starting out get used to syntax by piping it out get used to writing concise code rather than really verbose code because it's less to type get used to writing readable code get in the habit of good variable naming conventions and you won't be able to do any of this if all you're doing is cutting and pasting code from other people write it yourself even even if you're copying it from another website trust me it's the quickest way to learn the nuances of a language bit three don't listen to people on the internet internet forums have a peculiar type of people even though the Internet can be a really good source of information I mean I wish I had it when I was learning there are always people online who want to show how good they are the really arrogant program is out there that's whenever a guy starting out is requesting for some help on a forum the first thing they get told if you do any wrong you should be doing it like this that's not correct don't want to use that technique how is this helpful for somebody just starting out if all you wanted to do is display your name on the screen and some guy on the Internet is yelling at you telling you using the wrong encoding format for your strings how's that going to help don't get me wrong there's a lot of good advice to be found on the and certainly don't shy away from asking people for help but just identify that there are people out there who see you as a threat the last thing they want is more coders in the world and they also really need to show off just how good they are don't let those morons ruin your day by making your little programs really overly complicated it will only lead to confusion and frustration bit to remember that the tools work for you and you can't hurt them this goes hand-in-hand with bed 3 break the rules use global variables all over the place use unsafe system call don't check all your integers to make sure that we've been range this is stuff they will not advise you to do at school well you know what it doesn't matter you're learning you're not going to cause any harm you're not going to break a computer emotionally the computer doesn't have feelings you're not going to upset it and your code isn't being reviewed by somebody on the internet doesn't matter do whatever you need to do to get the job done it'll be more satisfying and more rewarding and you'll want to keep on with it over time you can learn that there are accepted standards that you should probably follow and good and good practice as well but don't swamp yourself with all of those concerns right at the beginning that will come with time and mostly it'll come through experience because you'll realize we'll hang on I'm breaking the rules and I know what I'm doing now and all I'm doing is making life more difficult for myself that's fine when you're writing enterprise level code when you're just starting out it really doesn't matter do what you want get yourself into a real mess there's no greater mental challenge for a program than debugging stuff and if you want the career as a programmer you're going to be debugging a lot of stuff so you can make it make a complete hash of everything because if you can get yourself out of it that journey will present it so much new learning to you and if you get really stuck select all delete stuff again it doesn't matter you're learning and that leads means a bit one get things wrong absolutely the best way to learn is to make mistakes don't worry about writing really complicated specifications and plans to start with doesn't matter final new start writing code would get stuck in get things wrong the programming tools available today are becoming so sophisticate they'll tell you as you're typing in the code whether something is right or wrong and you'll say well why is that wrong and it'll over time it'll become logical parent course that's wrong I understand now and once that's built in once that's in here that skill never go away and you can use this talent that you've developed for programming in any language so there you have it my eight bits of advice for new programmers if you're just starting out I wish you the best of luck and I hope it becomes a happy hobby and possibly a career for you I don't know just make sure that you're enjoying yourself and not demoralizing yourself if you found any of these tips controversial or helpful I really like to know leave a comment below and if you've enjoyed this video please check out Moeller's thanks

Channel: javidx9

Views: 620,152

Keywords: programming, syntax, advice, 8-bits, novice, learners, coding, mistakes, tools, development, learning, computers, language

Id: vVRCJ52g5m4

Length: 9min 33sec (573 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 13 2017