tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6751075600808435552024-03-13T06:51:08.936+01:00New Country, New CareerNew Country, New Career:
One Girl's Path to Becoming a Web DeveloperStephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comBlogger79125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-43773701734198953022016-11-16T09:49:00.001+01:002016-11-16T09:49:22.749+01:00Raspberry Pi Project Build #2 - Building a client using ES6 + ReactJSOnce I got the simple client, built with HTML and jQuery, on the server going and could see it was sending messages, I knew I wanted to change this and build it with ES6 and ReactJS instead. I've built some small projects so I could learn React and I've built some tools for User & Admin dashboards for a project at my last job, but I honestly hadn't written any JS or React in a few months and was pretty worried how it would actually go. And I had only recently dabbled with ES6. I created a project within my server using the <a href="https://github.com/facebookincubator/create-react-app">React Create App</a> CLI, which takes care of all the configuration, leaving you only to have to worry about building your project and allowing me to quickly get started.<br />
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I have found the most important thing that I have learned as a software developer is that you HAVE to break big tasks down into the small bits of tasks to make them manageable. So, I started by getting the SocketIO client setup again and making sure that that config was sending messages to the server. Then, I wanted to start on the layout. I made a sketch of what kind of UI I was hoping to achieve to keep me on track:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT_W3D5XEWXWnJq9biUZ06k4mgUwYdiTjj5Xe60dbLKqxX1vTCilKbEeDsDRtOwatINX8HPR_ld4lyzAa1t_Y-QjUircdnka1_65JWLlMMcusJd2Nym89psshizJpGTnvGTr4TnpfQPNHa/s1600/screenshot.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT_W3D5XEWXWnJq9biUZ06k4mgUwYdiTjj5Xe60dbLKqxX1vTCilKbEeDsDRtOwatINX8HPR_ld4lyzAa1t_Y-QjUircdnka1_65JWLlMMcusJd2Nym89psshizJpGTnvGTr4TnpfQPNHa/s400/screenshot.png" width="287" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Mockup of my UI design</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
The mockup shows that I should have a grid of 64 squares, representing each of the LEDs in the UnicornHAT. When a user clicks on a square, the color changes to indicate that square will be illuminated on the Pi. Once a user enters their design and clicks submit, that design is immediately sent to the Raspberry Pi and is displayed for 10 seconds. At first users wouldn't get to select colors, but, eventually, there should also be a slider bar where a user can select a color, then click on one of the squares and select that color for a square.<div>
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There's a good bit to figure out and build here, so I started at the smallest part, a Square component. Then, I created a Board component, a grid of 64 Square components. It really is all about working on reasonably sized tasks that are small in scope and build upon those to increase the complexity of your app. I did struggle for a little while to get the board component looking ok, updating state properly, and in an 8x8 configuration.<br />
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I've found that working with ES6 has really made writing JS much more of a joy for me. I actually really, really enjoy it now. Things just make a lot of sense and the find the code is clean and is much easier to navigate than ES5.<br />
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At this point the squares did not change color when clicked, only updated a boolean field from false to true. I was anxious to actually get the raspberry pi and find out if my design decisions were going to place nicely with the pi, before going too much further on this.<br />
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At this point, I still didn't have my raspberry pi yet, so I also played around with add some authentication for the socketIO clients with the server. It wasn't terribly difficult to setup, but it is hard to find easy-to-understand documentation on how to do this stuff. It was also tricky since I needed to code this in both JS, React, and Python. 😏 It was also a bit tricky deploying the react client on heroku since it was within the Express server. I didn't want to have to worry about having to manually build/minify the app before deploying it. So, I eventually figured out that I could edit the scripts in the express server's `package.json` file and get the react app to be built upon every deployment to Heroku. This ensures it is the most up-to-date and correct version of the React client every deployment.<br />
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Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-88628739408783562182016-11-10T10:31:00.000+01:002016-11-10T10:31:12.234+01:00Raspberry Pi Project Build #1 - Controlling the Hardware Remotely With Socket.IOSo, I started last week on my raspberry pi project. I had not received my Raspberry Pi yet, so I first started figuring out how might I be able to accomplish having a web app that sends messages to the pi from OUTSIDE my local network. My initial thought was building a front-end in React/React Native with a Ruby on Rails API backend that would control the pi. I quickly realized in some internet research that a RoR backend would not be optimal, mainly because there was already a <a href="https://github.com/pimoroni/unicorn-hat">library</a> in Python for controlling the UnicornHat LED board. So, it was in my best interest to write the pi's software in Python, even though I have no experience in Python. I would still keep the frontend in React & React native.<br />
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With that kinda worked out, I next focused on figuring out how I was going to send messages from outside the local network to the pi. The main goal of this project was that I wanted to make a fun, interactive lightboard where friends across the world could send me so pixel art that would pop up in my living room. So much of the raspberry tutorials and info focused on controlled a LED or lights while on the local network or it only interacted through GET requests to well-known APIs like twitter or gmail. I needed to send POST requests to the pi.<br />
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I started looking and couldn't find a lot of helpful info that was applicable to my project. I had heard of websockets, but hadn't used them before in any project. I started wondering if possibly that could work for me. Luckily, I found <a href="http://www.microcasts.tv/episodes/2014/06/21/using-socket-io-to-control-the-raspberry-pi-remotely/">this wonderful video</a> where someone created a server and clients using SocketIO and javascript to turn on an LED on a raspberry pi. It was kinda a mind shift for me to think of the RPi as a client, since, for some reason, I wasn't even imagining having a separate server to handle all of the requests/messages and the Pi AND the mobile/web apps being clients. After I thought a bit about it though, it made a lot of sense. I looked into if there was a python socketIO client library... and there was! So my plan was to follow similarly what I saw in the video and implement the following:<br />
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<ul>
<li>Create a simple Express server (javascript) that connects to clients and relays socket messages.</li>
<li>Create a javascript client on the server for testing the server.</li>
<li>Create a python client and make sure it receives socket messages from the server.</li>
<li>Create a react-native app using <a href="http://getexponent.com/">ExponentJS</a> with a button just to see if it works. Make sure it connects to server and sends messages.</li>
</ul>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUsO8baoc4gVEbxKRRC_6BK8dj2ODeONbeCrWsxv7-BDsXJhvw3okA_cNv029QbRxNtRiGBwTcp-YC3JWakckBPW7yX2BwfU59n80_Vpp5Rw5-L9fXRp0lkRAstSaXAu7d10-wqlwfxuMs/s1600/rasppiprojectschema.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="372" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUsO8baoc4gVEbxKRRC_6BK8dj2ODeONbeCrWsxv7-BDsXJhvw3okA_cNv029QbRxNtRiGBwTcp-YC3JWakckBPW7yX2BwfU59n80_Vpp5Rw5-L9fXRp0lkRAstSaXAu7d10-wqlwfxuMs/s640/rasppiprojectschema.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Project diagram showing SocketIO communication flow.</i></td></tr>
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<div>
<br />I spent my first day working on this. Surprisingly, this went pretty smoothly even though everything I was doing was basically new to me (especially the figuring out python part). I was able to get the server going locally and relaying messages to a bare bones python client and JS client on the server!</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhto4-ltJrMkapqMGe8UYqGpt4Xvdj4yJRXLC-ZsCsXo7WF_Vnf-HE_t7QRBdHX0c07gS1m7Tcy_tma8moPZqHnD92bEHYZ_ZqJ2iC7aip2TJI6vc_D6C3c6wbZIvL0gav0GNVtGuZG1UdY/s1600/IMG-20161104-WA0002.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhto4-ltJrMkapqMGe8UYqGpt4Xvdj4yJRXLC-ZsCsXo7WF_Vnf-HE_t7QRBdHX0c07gS1m7Tcy_tma8moPZqHnD92bEHYZ_ZqJ2iC7aip2TJI6vc_D6C3c6wbZIvL0gav0GNVtGuZG1UdY/s640/IMG-20161104-WA0002.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>I got the python client connected and receiving messages from server!</i><br /></td></tr>
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<div>
I also went ahead and deployed my server to heroku and updated the configuration of the clients. After getting it to work, I created another client using ExponentJS and React Native. Honestly, after setting up 1 client, the process is almost identical in the other clients, minus the differences in the languages, of course.</div>
<div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis7gZ1LqIrUeSHbD4aYgI7jL6cK4CsBhgCtpcOiOUrmIDfnydG593J_qtu25rTp3lpvGBnTqfoHVKSnoS5B-NET9BB3CophLbnZUtysLEKdhJPNlLtFo1PlehlGfwk-IFPHJhKjSsXARfw/s1600/IMG-20161105-WA0001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis7gZ1LqIrUeSHbD4aYgI7jL6cK4CsBhgCtpcOiOUrmIDfnydG593J_qtu25rTp3lpvGBnTqfoHVKSnoS5B-NET9BB3CophLbnZUtysLEKdhJPNlLtFo1PlehlGfwk-IFPHJhKjSsXARfw/s400/IMG-20161105-WA0001.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Using exponentJS XDE, I have a React Native client also working with the server and other client!</i></td></tr>
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</div>
<div>
I was pleasantly surprised that, at the end of the first build day, I had a server and the raspberry pi and react native clients communicating with each other. I really was expecting to struggle with this for days.</div>
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<div>
As I still hadn't received my raspberry pi yet, I decided that my next step would be change the client on the server, which was just html and jQuery over to React.</div>
Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-54062656830577544792016-11-07T10:06:00.006+01:002016-11-07T10:06:59.377+01:00CS50x & a Raspberry Pi Art Project<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Since my last blog post, I decided to finally try Harvard's <a href="https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-computer-science-harvardx-cs50x">Intro to Computer Science</a> course (CS50) that is available to take for free through EdX. The course consists of 12 weeks of lectures, 9 problem sets and a final independent project. Watching the lectures and working through the problem sets is a definite time commitment, especially as the coursework progresses it gets much more challenging.</div>
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During the past month I've been going through a very stressful period so I've found this course to be a great escape for me. I have thrown myself into the coursework and have been working intensely on getting through all 9 problem sets. I've learned C by solving problems using different sorting algorithms, different types of data structures, allocating memory, recovering 'lost' jpeg images from a data file, implementing a spellchecker and a web server ...all in C. I even wrote PHP for the first time to complete the last few assignments. It was nice to see that the things I'd learned as a Ruby on Rails dev were transferable when I was working in a unfamiliar language like PHP. To me, it made me feel like a real programmer. Though the language's syntax is different, the underlining principles and problem solving strategies are pretty universal. It's just really an adjustment to the syntax of the language. So I was able to jump into a PHP project, without any background in the language and get through the tasks relatively simply.<br />
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Last week, I finished all the problem sets, I just started on my final project. For this project, you have complete freedom to choose to write any kind of software that you want. I knew I wanted to do something artistic, interactive and with language(s) outside my comfort zone. I drew inspiration from a few places-- the current exhibit of <a href="http://www.stedelijk.nl/en/exhibitions/jean-tinguely-machine-spectacle">Jean Tinguely's art at the Stedelijk Museum</a>, an interest in learning about <a href="https://www.raspberrypi.org/">Raspberry Pis</a> (and maker culture), and recent attendance at a React Native meetup.<br />
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My original idea was a <a href="http://www.stedelijk.nl/en/exhibitions/jean-tinguely-machine-spectacle">Tinguely</a>-inspired wall installation with EL wire, leds, motors that were connected to a raspberry pi that could be controlled/interacted remotely by a user with a mobile app. As I researched more about hardware and RPis, I soon felt overwhelmed by the hardware side of it - wiring, circuitry, power supply, soldering.<br />
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Since my focus is mainly on the software, I didn't want to get discouraged during my project by the hardware side of things. I want to setup myself for as much success as possible. So, I opted to go simpler for now and purchased a preassembled LED board with a square grid of 64 LEDS. This way, I can focus on the writing the software and getting my feet wet with hardware/RPi. Then, if it is a blast to work with, I can dive deeper into building my own hardware on future projects.<br />
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I will be using 2 pieces of hardware for this project, a <a href="https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/raspberry-pi-3">Raspberry Pi 3</a> and <a href="https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/unicorn-hat">UnicornHAT</a>:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0174/1800/products/Rainbow_1_of_3_47e94e82-ba3a-4804-a280-3140109cd304_1024x1024.jpg?v=1456669057" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0174/1800/products/Rainbow_1_of_3_47e94e82-ba3a-4804-a280-3140109cd304_1024x1024.jpg?v=1456669057" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Raspberry Pi 3 w/ an AMAZING rainbow case</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/a4/d2/2b/a4d22baac61cc2a2e0269df86908b7ab.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/a4/d2/2b/a4d22baac61cc2a2e0269df86908b7ab.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">UnicornHAT 64-LED board</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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I still haven't received the hardware I ordered yet, but I've already started on the software infrastructure that is necessary to get the Raspberry Pi communicating with a remote native app or web browser. I've already gotten the RPi's software communicating with a server and receiving data from a React Native app using websockets. I am going to post much more frequently to detail how the build process is going and document what I'm up to.<br />
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This is one of the most intensive projects I've taken on by myself, since I will be writing code in multiple languages that I am not familiar with. It'll be the first time I'll work with hardware, write a native app, work with websockets, code in Python, etc etc. I can't wait to see how it all turns out.<br />
<br />Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-48871239676997598642016-08-19T22:44:00.002+02:002016-08-19T23:33:58.146+02:00still here, learning and growing.<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I've started writing this blog update many times over the past several months but always felt like it was inadequate, too long after the fact of doing something interesting, and I had just missed covering too much stuff over that time and it was too late to share it. So I ended up never publishing anything at all. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">My absence from the blog doesn't equal inactivity. Quite the opposite of that, actually. I'm still at my original & first dev job and coding every Monday through Friday and sometimes on the weekends. I go to tech meetups and even host my own events. Heck, I even co-organized and co-hosted a <a href="http://stupidhackathon.wtf/" target="_blank">Stupid Hackathon</a> in Amsterdam.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">This year has been weird, stressful, anxious, exciting for both me as a human being and me as a programmer.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Here are the code-related highlights:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I've regularly kept up hosting the Coffee & Code meetups I started with another awesome person in January. Every 2-3 weeks we meet up to work on code and generally support each other while drinking a few beers or coffee. It's usually full and regularly attended by a lot of folks. I've actually made some new friends through it...</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">...And with those friends I made through hosting the coffee & code meetups, we just organized and hosted a stupid hackathon (<a href="https://www.stupidhackathon.wtf/">stupidhackathon.wtf</a>) event. First one ever in the Netherlands? I think so. It was literally a hackathon devoted to developing the most useless and dumb ideas for apps/hardware. We scored some sponsors and hosted nearly 40 participants for an all-day hackathon last Saturday. We had 17 projects presented at the end of the day! Cool stuff. I even worked on a project at the event. We made a lightweight css library for CSS'ing like it's 1996 Geocities again ---> <a href="https://github.com/StupidHackathonAMS/geolize.css">Geolize.css</a>.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Also... with those friends from Coffee & Code, we've started our own <a href="http://www.bitchesandbytes.nl/">coding group</a>. We felt our goals and mission no longer matched up with the local railsgirls organization we were previously affliated with. We not only want to get more women excited about coding, but also help them get jobs/internships with companies that are similarly enthusiastic as we are and dedicated to actually hiring them. We will host our coffee & code meetups through our new group & plan to soon host coding workshops and other events.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">In May, I went to my first RailsConf in the US. As a Ruby/Rails dev, I feel like it was taking a pilgrimage! Utterly amazing. Everyone should try to attend RailsConf at least once... cuz it's fun. and you learn stuff. I applied for and received an opportunity scholarship. I'm really grateful that I was chosen, otherwise there's no way I really could have afforded to go. This is probably the funnest thing I've done as a dev so far. It was my first conference experience. It was awesome to be a scholar and get paired up with a speaker as my guide. I got paired with the amazing <a href="https://twitter.com/nodunayo" target="_blank">Nadia Odunayo</a>. It was really invigorating to go and see/meet some of my Ruby/tech heroes like Sarah Mei & Sandi Metz. I think RailsConf is probably the highlight of this year as a dev. I even gave a <a href="https://youtu.be/DHHHnPwSY5I?t=1h7m45s">lightning talk</a> - it's my <a href="https://youtu.be/DHHHnPwSY5I?t=1h7m45s">first talk </a>at a conference (don't bother that it was only 5 minutes long)!</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I finished my 1 year job contract and signed a new, indefinite job contract at my current employer. In the Netherlands, this is what you want if you work a full-time job. It offers a lot of job security (or so I'm told).</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I've learned some ReactJS through the awesome <a href="http://www.reactjsprogram.com/" target="_blank">ReactJS Program</a> by Tyler McGinnis. Highly recommend it - there are really good video explanations in there. I feel like it has helped me understand JS fundamentals better as well as I worked through it. And the intro to ES6 makes me really excited to see the direction that JS is going in. ES6+ is making writing javascript actually kinda pleasant for me. I've actually even built some react components for the production rails project I work on at my job. ;-)</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I'm working through the <a href="http://freecodecamp.com/">FreeCodeCamp</a> curriculum. Slowly. I'm trying to do the individual projects in ReactJS. I'm slow. But I try to work on it when I'm motivated and have the energy.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I'm really looking forward to getting more skilled/confident/comfortable with javascript and ReactJS. I really believe that building up my JS skills is a great compliment to what I'm now capable of building in Ruby on Rails and the next logical step for me as a dev. </span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Next month, I'm attending <a href="http://euruko2016.org/">Euruko</a> with my colleague in Sofia, Bulgaria. Pretty excited to go to another Ruby conference after having such a stellar time at Railsconf. It wiill be even more awesome to share the experience with my colleague.</span></li>
</ul>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">So, I'm still around... growing as a dev, figuring out interesting/frustrating problems, and trying to contribute to the local coding community positively. I'm still happy that I changed careers and I get to code for a living. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">More than anything, right now I'm trying to find a balance between the constant need to "<i>always be learnin'"</i> with also needing to be a real human being that takes rests and does other interesting things to keep my brain happy and keeps me a dynamic and interesting person and not a grumpy, dry code bot.</span></div>
Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-62678199161981210542016-02-21T21:28:00.001+01:002016-02-21T21:40:06.718+01:00Learning Front End + Coding as ArtI may already 'made it' as a Ruby on Rails developer, but that doesn't mean that I don't have weaknesses in my developer abilities. I know that doing creative stuff in the front-end is not my strongest area. Sure, I'm able to work on the haml/slim/html views and coffeescript/jquery in the front-facing portion of the Rails app I work on, but coming up with cool designs and integrating/writing interesting javascript are not things I consider myself good at. I've also been trying to level up my javascript and learn more ReactJS, but felt that some gaps in my understanding of the fundamentals of javascript have been making it really challenging for me. I think my approach of reading random bits and pieces about JS from online articles, tutorials, videos has only left me feeling... <i>fragmented</i>. <br />
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I feel like I needed more of a path for learning with little challenges and project along the way, so.... I have started the <a href="http://freecodecamp.com/" target="_blank">FreeCodeCamp</a> front-end curriculum to push me along/keep me on track. It might be silly for someone with some experience as a dev to do this curriculum, but I don't think so. I have been able to fly through the HTML/CSS/Bootstrap parts and started on the first individual project for FCC on Saturday -- a tribute page.<br />
<br />
It's kinda silly, but I'm really love + proud of the <a href="http://traumverloren.github.io/andy-warhol" target="_blank">page</a> I made. It's so silly, really, but I actually keep going to look at it again, to see the responsive design as I change the size of the browser window from big to small, and think about the quotes I included from Andy Warhol as I swipe through the 5 simple sections. It makes me smile. I love it because I feel like I finally made something with my coding skills solely for art's sake, I didn't make it for anyone else and made it in the exactly the way I wanted. I made something for no reason other than to exist and be beautiful.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-82622001444595161382016-01-04T07:56:00.000+01:002016-01-05T07:57:13.162+01:00Creativity in coding.Of all the places to get inspiration for coding, I got it on Sunday at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. There's a really amazing <a href="http://www.vangoghmuseum.nl/en/whats-on/exhibitions/munch-van-gogh" target="_blank">exhibition</a> of the works of Edvard Munch & Van Gogh right now. I've gone to the exhibit a couple times, and it still blows me away that I live where I can bike 10 minutes and see pieces of art like this. I don't think I'll ever get over this feeling of awe, but I digress...<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDoio6fRJ19c4BTKqWoeeeJLlpQhp6NZ-jaRSF9YBbXpqYPB3EmX8Ks96FOyP1pKxr4nW09Zh0POTti6Umo-owqW_mHoF1a40O7KcXeD8ZVr0vQx1XUfbcj8Ik6w0KrMUpQC1JvuY4GuA4/s1600/CPLDtRVUAAAswAj.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDoio6fRJ19c4BTKqWoeeeJLlpQhp6NZ-jaRSF9YBbXpqYPB3EmX8Ks96FOyP1pKxr4nW09Zh0POTti6Umo-owqW_mHoF1a40O7KcXeD8ZVr0vQx1XUfbcj8Ik6w0KrMUpQC1JvuY4GuA4/s400/CPLDtRVUAAAswAj.png" width="331" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>My favorite painting from the exhibit. Cupid and Psyche (Munch 1907)</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />On this visit to the exhibit, I noticed a Van Gogh quote that I had missed during my prior visits and it really resonated with me:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 20px;"><i>"Great things are done by a series of small things brought together."</i> </span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
In the context of the exhibit, it was reminding us that the series of paintings by each of these artists should be viewed in a collective manner, where the themes of life, death, love, angst are not singular events. <br />
<br />
It also had a lot of meaning to me in regards to what we do, when we code in our dev team (or working on your own project). When we work on a project, we are all working on individual parts- building new features and functionality- which, on their own, might not mean that much, but when we are constantly repeating this process, all those small things, written by the different individuals of our team, can collectively add up to a really cool web application.<br />
<br />
Maybe it's weird to some, but, to me, coding is the most creative job I've ever had. Sure, there are rules to follow- syntax and best practices- and, yeah, you have to have 'tuned' your brain to have a good grasp on logic, but approaching how to solve problems is all up to you. I don't think of the rules as limiting; they are what actually allow you to be creative. I see the rules as simply outlining the canvas, but within that canvas I am free to design and build as I want. <br />
<br />Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-45290865561310467022015-12-31T22:53:00.003+01:002016-01-03T20:50:53.100+01:002015: my year of coding in review.<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Wow, what a year. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">I started over this year. <b>And... it's really, really hard to start over.</b> It's hard because it kinda means throwing away what you are comfortable with. But that's exactly what I did at the beginning of this year. I walked away from 7 years of working as a scientist in pharmaceuticals and hoped that somehow I would reboot myself as a web developer by the end of year.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Here's a big list of stuff I did this year:</span><br />
<br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I got a coding internship.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I commuted 3 hours every day on the train.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I read a lot of coding books.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I spent my weekends doing online courses on treehouse & codecademy.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I got a full-time coding job.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I read Sandi Metz's <i>Practical Object-Oriented Design in Ruby</i> twice.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I got some new titles: full-stack developer | Ruby on Rails dev | coder | web developer.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I coached at a RailsGirls weekend workshop.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I got <i>a lot better </i>at Ruby on Rails.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I </span>didn't learn as much Dutch as I hoped to. :-/</li>
<li>I went to Burning Man.</li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I bought a place in Amsterdam and got rid of that crappy long train commute.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I learned some jQuery, AngularJS, Polymer & ReactJS.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I hosted an all-day talk/workshop/training for RailsGirls_NL. First time I've done anything like that before. This was one of the highlights of my year. I met cool people and got to talk about coding... total win/win situation for me.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I get to be creative in how I build stuff and solve problems. I </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">feel that my input, contributions, and ideas are valued.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I don't have anxiety attacks as often.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I enjoy going to work now.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">I feel I am the most in control of my career that I've ever been.</span></li>
</ul>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">This time last year, I really had no idea what the hell I was doing. I had just started following online Rails tutorials and built my first Rails app by following step-by-step instructions and not really knowing what exactly the code meant. I read some blogs from people that I done this before me, and I was trying to kinda follow what they did. But, I didn't know anyone that had taught themselves how to code while being in a foreign country. I tried not to worry about that initially (there's always remote work, right?) and hoped for the best.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">But, somehow, I'm ending my year as a gainfully employed developer in an amazing city with a great tech scene. It wasn't magic, it wasn't talent, and it certainly wasn't easy... it took a ridiculous amount of work and frustration to get here. And I absolutely believe that anyone else can do that exact same thing if they desire to.</span><br />
<br /></div>
Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-79989570316246257052015-12-13T21:48:00.002+01:002015-12-13T21:53:23.568+01:00I hosted a RailsGirls meetup and give my first coding workshop!So excited to write about this. One year after building my first Rails app, I organized and presented my first coding workshop. It's a pretty amazing thing to be able to do.<br />
<br />
I have been kinda consumed lately with worrying and preparing for giving my first coding workshop. I hosted ~18 coders at our local RailsGirls event for all day workshop. I introduced the concepts of MVC and styling with CSS and the Bootstrap gem as we worked on adding functionality to a Tamagotchi - virtual pet app. It was fun, but stressful for me. And it was only stressful because I'm not used to being the center of attention or speaking for ~5 hours straight!<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSn3FALyfRbhxWZNMivWSjQwZHTuHwpXbrKT7HT0CqeyNYg0T8IHx_7vgscjsHcYr-t5PmeV3YUN_u8vTrn5aYEzq2NmYG3MCNkM6ieHZ6-OoAkoEJwGcISjeEwFEgu7nrhd0OMXGDqRvV/s1600/steph-railsgirl.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSn3FALyfRbhxWZNMivWSjQwZHTuHwpXbrKT7HT0CqeyNYg0T8IHx_7vgscjsHcYr-t5PmeV3YUN_u8vTrn5aYEzq2NmYG3MCNkM6ieHZ6-OoAkoEJwGcISjeEwFEgu7nrhd0OMXGDqRvV/s400/steph-railsgirl.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">That's me! Presenting to ~18 bright (mainly women) coders.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Everyone was supportive of one another, and I really felt like we created a safe, friendly, open environment for learning about coding with Ruby on Rails. I'm really proud of that. I would love to do another workshop in a few months. It's just kind of exhausting and intense to plan for 5 hours of coding content + activity. I really had no idea how long my presentation would actually take or if folks would be bored out of their minds. <br />
<br />
I was thinking it would be great to offer another, more low-key meetup option like a "Coffee & Code" type event where a small study group could get together for a couple hours and get help on working on their own projects or online tutorials/courses from a coach or 2. It would take the pressure off of one person to present and host an all-day event.<br />
<br />
Overall it was a great experience and empowering to be a room filled with bright women all interested and focused on coding! I am, of course, thankful to work for a company that supports activities like this too!<br />
<br />
Of course I have been neglecting blogging lately, but I have still been trying to learn new stuff- I've learned some more Angular & I've been playing around with Rails API with a Angular client-side app, but this experience really trumps anything else I've been doing otherwise!Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-76992959506860529632015-10-05T20:24:00.001+02:002015-10-06T06:58:34.927+02:00My ~10 months of coding: an update.Wow, I can't believe I haven't post for such a long time. Sorry about that. Even though I haven't been posting about my progress, I've still been busy coding, reading coding books, and even attended a small conference, and also took a few weeks off for a much needed vacation.<br />
<br />
So, to recap, I've been learning to code for ~10 months and working professionally as a Ruby on Rails developer for ~5 months. I feel I've learn a lot and progressed a great deal over the past months in my knowledge about Ruby and Rails. I still get stuck on things, but not as often. I can work through most things pretty independently. Of course, I still like to talk through things with my colleagues because sometimes you find a better way to do things by just talking about it with another coder. One thing I need to work on for the next few months is learning beyond Ruby by trying to do more JS and other languages.<br />
<br />
I try to always be reading a coding book during my free and commuting time. Most recently, I read <b>Eloquent Ruby</b> (a good review of basic Ruby concepts!). I started reading <b>Design Patterns in Ruby </b>and, somehow, I'm not challenged with just reading one coding book :-P, so I am also concurrently re-reading Sandi Metz's <b>Practical Object Oriented Design in Ruby (POODR)</b> on my commute. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifklC0v_WNHT9ro1x00G-e_ZipkbiCwMcF-x38g7VxKJdTcP8ILm0GOc1WsMVkYLLM1d3qo5MwsuDtmP2j_WfOsMhhU5zojPf9mW8mF64OiC-nf1Lr8O1KpcsTFQUP1eyaz2NJZVq2dn-T/s1600/IMG_20151005_073346923%257E2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifklC0v_WNHT9ro1x00G-e_ZipkbiCwMcF-x38g7VxKJdTcP8ILm0GOc1WsMVkYLLM1d3qo5MwsuDtmP2j_WfOsMhhU5zojPf9mW8mF64OiC-nf1Lr8O1KpcsTFQUP1eyaz2NJZVq2dn-T/s400/IMG_20151005_073346923%257E2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My mornings. 7:30 am. On the train and reading POODR.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
I read POODR about 3 months ago for the first time. I really liked it and learned some stuff, but to be honest a lot of the concepts were hard for me to get a good solid grasp of. I have only re-read the first couple of the chapters, but I can already tell a difference on how well I am getting the concepts. It feels really good to be more comfortable and have a better understand of object-oriented design concepts this time around. It means I'm still learning and progressing.<br />
<br />
I took a few weeks off at the end of August to go back to the US to go to Burning Man. It was my second burn and was simple amazing. I was worried it wouldn't be as moving as my first time, but luckily it was even <i>more</i> amazing. I met a bunch of cool people, had meaningful conversations with strangers, wore my amazing fiber optic dress, danced all night, and generally just had a blast. No phone, no internet, lots of dust.... ;) it was a great recharge for my spirit. Just like my first time, it helped me refocus and re-evaluate where I am, who I am, and where I wanna go right now in my life. It also reminds me of what/who I appreciate in my life and what is really important to me.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QuDWGV3XrZk/VfNR5p68h9I/AAAAAAAAirI/81WvLvArmlg/s1600/20150901_012334.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="360" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QuDWGV3XrZk/VfNR5p68h9I/AAAAAAAAirI/81WvLvArmlg/s640/20150901_012334.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Riding around in the desert by the light of my dress.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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A few weeks ago, Google had the first ever <a href="https://www.polymer-project.org/summit/" target="_blank">Polymer Summit </a>in Amsterdam. <a href="https://www.polymer-project.org/1.0/docs/start/what-is-polymer.html" target="_blank">Polymer</a> is a google framework for creating web components. It's a bit out of my comfort zone since it is more front-end oriented than backend, but I spent the day learning how to use polymer and how get the most benefits out of it and the tools it provides. I'm super excited to use it. I've already started on a pet project to remake my personal site out of polymer.</div>
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This weekend there is another conference I will be attending - the Google DevFest in Amsterdam. It's more oriented to mobile dev, but there is a workshop on Angular 2 that I'm really looking forward to attending.</div>
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I'm also helping out with the RailsGirls meetups. I will be hosting the December meetup in Amsterdam. I'm still working out ideas for it and planning for that.</div>
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And if all that doesn't keep me busy enough, I'm super close to my moving date and officially will be a resident of Amsterdam in a couple weeks! So excited for that. I'll trade a 1.5+ hr train commute every morning and evening for a 20 min bike ride. </div>
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Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-77059953919752585362015-06-30T22:17:00.002+02:002015-06-30T22:26:15.272+02:00Finished POODR!I finally finished Sandi Metz's <a href="http://www.poodr.com/" target="_blank">Practical Object Oriented Design in Ruby</a> this morning! w00t! The second half of that book was pretty hard and above my head, but I powered through. <br />
<br />
I felt it was a good experience for me to read POODR at my level (7 months of coding experience). I got exposed to new concepts in basic OOD and just tried to let them 'wash over me' at this point even if I had poor grasp on what they really mean. I'm not sure if it would have been productive to attempt this book earlier than I did. I know I've gotten something out of it this first read, but can't wait for the next time I read it. I'm going to go ahead and put on my calendar to re-read POODR again in 2-3 months. It will be interesting to see how more I can understand or, at least, see what starts to sink in through re-reading it? :-)<br />
<br />
I also listened to the <a href="http://www.codenewbie.org/podcast/poodr-and-beyond-part-ii" target="_blank">second part of Sandi's interview</a> on the CodeNewbies podcast. The parts of her interview I really enjoyed was when she spoke of only comparing yourself to yourself (and no one else) when you are judging your progress and learning. And that maybe we all should take a little breather from being so connected and online all the time... I believe in that too. It's one thing that I miss about living in the US and taking camping trips to very rural areas... where there is no way to access the internet because there's no service. It forces you to take a brief sabbatical from not only the internet but also tv and media in general. Frankly, I've been feeling a bit mentally overdrawn lately and can't wait to finally be on a vacation in a couple months. Being completely cut off from the internet and media for a week is one of the main reasons that I'm <i>really</i> looking forward to my vacation.<br />
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I've also been tackling the <a href="http://rubykoans.com/" target="_blank">RubyKoans</a> tasks. It's kinda addicting and most of the exercises can be completed pretty quickly. There are 282 TDD oriented tasks to complete in the program. In the past week, I've worked on/off during my commute and I've completed 216 out of the 282. I think they are fun, but I also like testing, and I'm comfortable with it.<br />
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Since I've been doing the RubyKoans, I'm rocking a 24 day streak on GitHub! I know that doesn't means anything to anyone else, but it means something to me.... I'm coding something I find meaningful, even if small, everyday.<br />
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Slowly getting through the Treehouse jQuery exercises. I find it harder to get through the treehouse stuff since it is all video-based. It's just not as convenient to do when I have time (that is mainly, on the train, during my commute), since I would have to remember to download the videos beforehand. I just have to accept I will be going through their lessons at a slower rate. I will keep working through the lessons when I have time. <br />
<br />
Next up, I'm going to tackle learning <a href="http://sqlbolt.com/" target="_blank">SQL</a>. And for reading, I'm planning on starting <a href="http://eloquentruby.com/" target="_blank">Eloquent Ruby</a>. And hopefully finding some time on the weekends to collaborate on a Rails API / ReactJS app...Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-49448326389763433192015-06-13T23:24:00.000+02:002015-06-13T23:31:18.953+02:00June 13: Dabbling in Elixir, more jQuery, more Ruby.I didn't do much coding outside of work during the week. Work has been fine, I feel like I'm progressing at a good rate, but outside of work, it was a rough week, so I couldn't put in much effort to coding during my free time. <br />
<br />
But, I did spend late night friday/early saturday morning working through a <a href="http://phoenix.thefirehoseproject.com/1.html" target="_blank">Elixir tutorial</a> that I had been wanting to tackle for a few weeks. I successful went through it pretty quickly and got a fairly simple CRUD quotes app working perfectly locally. However, I spent more time than that trying to get the deployment to Heroku (not in the tutorial) to work and failed. <br />
<br />
To make sure it wasn't me or a dev environment issue (didn't figure it was, since it was running perfectly locally, but did it for a sanity check...), I cloned another sample elixir app and quickly set it up and deployed it easily, so I think based on the heroku error logs that there's some maybe dependencies issue going on. It's kinda weird working with such a new framework like Phoenix, where it is so new that you git clone the framework directly onto your machine to use it. For this specific tutorial, I was git checking out a specific branch with an older version of the framework to use... and maybe in deployment that's getting jacked. I think maybe this is where my issue lies, but I'm not sure. I gave up on trying to fix this project's deployment, I'd rather spend time learning something else or doing my own independent project to practice that waste more time on this one. I'm glad there was this tutorial to do, but I wish it would have spent a lot less time on making the CSS snazzy and instead go through the deployment process. I'd like some reassurance that this app was successfully deployed with its specific config settings even if it visually looks ugly! :-/<br />
<br />
Today, I also finished up another segment in the Treehouse jQuery course. I'm 1/2 through that course. It's hard jumping back into studying something like jQuery with several days of break in between. Takes a while to get my head back in it.<br />
<br />
I'm still slowing reading <a href="http://www.poodr.com/" target="_blank">POODR</a>, probably 3/4 through it. It's getting more difficult to keep up at the end. But, I'm just trying not to get hung up on every little thing that's over my head and power through for now, since I plan to re-read it again in a few months.<br />
<br />
I constantly feel like I need to keep pushing to learn and try out other languages like JS or elixir and not be solely vested in Ruby, since who knows if/when Ruby on Rails is going fade into the background. But after experimenting with Elixir, it's clear that I really do love coding in Ruby. It's just such a readable and pretty language, I'm not sure how you <i>couldn't</i> like it. I'm really glad that I started out my coding adventure with Ruby and Rails. And I'm happy it's what I work with, at least for now.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-60261157926282983152015-06-07T21:57:00.000+02:002015-06-07T21:58:24.906+02:00Progress Update: Learning jQuery, Studying OO Design...I've been spending most of my commute time reading Sandi Metz's <a href="http://www.poodr.com/" target="_blank">Practical Object-Oriented Design in Ruby</a>. I'm 2/3 of the way through it. Some concepts are harder than others to understand, but I'm ok with that. I'm sure I'll be re-reading this book again in 6 months. I've been learning about agile dev, duck typing, inheritance, etc. I really love how Sandi presents concepts. I've also watched some of her podcast appearances (like on <a href="http://www.talkingcode.com/podcast/episode-2-sandi-metz/" target="_blank">Talking Code</a>) and her RailsConf 2015 talk ("<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMPfEXIlTVE" target="_blank">Nothing is something</a>") and can recommend them all. She is inspiring to me... She reminds me of my unofficial mentor at my last job/career... an incredibly intelligent female who I could only wish to be as smart as one day!<br />
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I'm slowly moving through the Treehouse JavaScript courses. I finished up the JS fundamental courses and moved onto the jQuery course over the weekend. I have been having a hard time finding the time to work on these courses during the work week.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-70876377531612209222015-05-25T16:25:00.000+02:002015-05-25T16:25:21.413+02:006 months into programming.<div dir="ltr">
I'm 6 months into the world of ruby and coding. I'm still chugging along, trying to improve a little every single day. I try to write some code everyday. If I don't do that, I'm at least reading/studying something about coding.</div>
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<div dir="ltr">
This weekend, I picked up two more advanced Ruby books to read: Sandi Metz's <a href="http://www.poodr.com/" target="_blank">Practical Object-Oriented Design in Ruby</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Eloquent-Ruby-Addison-Wesley-Professional-Series/dp/0321584104" target="_blank">Eloquent Ruby</a>. I'm really excited to read more in-depth about OOD now that I've been programming for 6 months... I think I'm ready to dive in deeper and that I'm at a point were I will be able to process the information better than a few months ago. I've already started reading it...</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLiWZYCPDZ6nul5r6xSMT8opY1e4nB3ssNhonPavAqz9FwTevYhAODmo4-2epT9uoN8yzdD-COdv_lfvDsulEc9EH2GSXG_FEAcyDRwTOKjrkdvsd8ngscYeyRDDpMa0k-MwCFkTq7tzYW/s1600/image.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLiWZYCPDZ6nul5r6xSMT8opY1e4nB3ssNhonPavAqz9FwTevYhAODmo4-2epT9uoN8yzdD-COdv_lfvDsulEc9EH2GSXG_FEAcyDRwTOKjrkdvsd8ngscYeyRDDpMa0k-MwCFkTq7tzYW/s640/image.jpg" width="360" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Never a moment wasted....Reading about OOD on the train.</td></tr>
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In general, I keep myself pretty busy. Outside of work, I'm working through the JavaScript courses on Treehouse. I started with the absolutely most basic ones, so it's a bit of repetition of things such as loops, arrays, etc, but the way I see it, practice is practice and solidly understanding these fundamental concepts is not harmful. I'm still studying Dutch. I finished up my Dutch course, and I'm continuing to practice on my commute using the Duolingo app. </div>
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I've been tackling larger tasks at work, building bigger features rather than small modifications on existing features. I'm getting more comfortable and knowledgeable on some different gems that are used frequently like Interactors and Serializers. It sometimes feels like I'm a weird mix of knowledge. Some things that are new, I find easy to tackle and can handle without much guidance, I just kinda know what to do and how to write the tests as I go to guide my coding. And other tasks, I don't really know where to begin without a good bit of coaching. My brain feels a bit jumbled and unsorted with all the new information I'm trying to add to it in a fairly short amount of time. I like the mix of things I get to build, and I like that I split my days between 2 different projects.</div>
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Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-83969776828155883092015-05-14T22:17:00.003+02:002015-05-14T22:17:53.255+02:00Learning Javascript....The social networking of coding community is an amazing part of being a software dev. I have really enjoyed connecting with new folks through emails and twitter. It's funny that I've also gotten in touch with 2 former colleagues that have or are in the process of making the transition from scientists to software devs! It's been great to share tips about learning resources and experiences so far.<br />
<br />
Since I've very interested in learning JavaScript, jQuery, Angular, etc right now, one of those colleagues who has learned JS himself suggested I check out Treehouse for their JS resources. So I did. I have a couple months to check it out for free, so I started today on their Javascript Basics course. I got 1/2 through the coursework today. It's extremely basic stuff right now... beginning syntax, using the JS console in the browser, variables, etc. They have a lot of resources from JS to jQuery to NodeJS to AngularJS, so I'm excited to check it out and see how their material progesses. One thing that really bugs me with a lot of the online resources is that the coding takes place in their own browser based workspace environment rather than locally. I do not like that. I guess it is a ok way to learn the basics, but it bugs me to not have a record of my work and progress locally or on github.<br />
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I haven't studied too much Ruby/Rails outside of work this week. I'm pretty immersed in it during the day since it's my full-time job, so it's nice to break that up with learning JS outside of work. I have had some moments lately where things that previously did not make a lot of sense getting clearer in my mind and I feel good about it... I can see that I'm making progress.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-12216435780941770762015-05-09T22:15:00.002+02:002015-05-09T22:18:50.943+02:00Slow going progress.I'm slowly still working on Ruby/Rails mastery and trying to add some AngularJS and jQuery to that as well. I've only been working on Ruby/Rails at my job during the week and trying to do some online coursework on AngularJS during the weekends. My study pace has slowed down the past few weeks because I'm also making time for running and freeletics and trying to find a flat so we can finally move to Amsterdam permanently.<br />
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I've been super encouraged over the past few weeks by other aspiring devs out there in the world! I've gotten messages and tweets from folks that are also working their butts off to become software developers. It's very humbling to get messages from others that say I'm an inspiration and motivator for them on their own journeys. I appreciate the fact that others are taking time to contact me, and I love the community of coders worldwide.<br />
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I'm glad to give inspiration or advice to others out there! I love chatting with others in similar situations. But, I feel it's necessary to clarify my current skills levels. I'm very much a Junior Ruby developer. I can figure some stuff out and generally understand tasks set before me, but struggle with how exactly to write code to build out some features. I need guidance often from my boss, an expert Rails developer. I hunt google & stackoverflow A LOT. I know it sounds awesome that after studying & interning for the past 5 months that a got a job as a dev (which it is), but please realize that it wasn't some magical turning point in my coding abilities when I got a job or that I'm some coding rockstar. I am not. I struggle everyday, just on new things than the day before. I am painfully aware of my inadequacies. I've been working from home for the past 2 weeks with minimal support from senior devs and that has been a struggle...No one around to talk through things I don't really understand or get guidance on problems. That's definitely added to my frustation with my jr skill level lately. I sometimes wonder what the hell I'm doing, but I'm hopeful that in a few months, that my skills and confidence will grow a lot more.<br />
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I really like learning another new language (jQuery & AngularJS) so far. It's challenging to think in a new language and learn its context. I think it is helping me solidify RoR concepts as I push my brain to think in a different language.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-72400440213224364122015-05-02T22:41:00.000+02:002015-05-02T22:43:24.369+02:00Week's Progress. Starting slowly on jQuery/JS...Another week, more coding. I completed Codecademy's jQuery course and started their AngularJS course this week. When I first started coding, I spent a couple days playing around and learning a little jQuery. It was very confusing and weird looking to me back then. Now, it seems manageable to learn and understand (eventually). It's also nice to look at something besides Ruby. It makes me realize that I definitely can tell I've gotten more comfortable with code since I started out.<br />
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May 1 was my first day as a full-time employee and not an intern. Didn't feel much different. :-) I've been working at home for the past week. I think it's just such a cool thing that I can do that. I've never had a career where I can do that. (...You can't exactly do that as an analytical chemist.) I've been taking advantage of it, replacing my morning commute with a run a couple times this week. Studying coding full-time for the past 6 months, I didn't feel like I had the time to exercise. I had to make one or the other a priority and I choose coding. But now, I feel I'm in a position that I can refocus and make some time for myself to stay healthy and in shape. So, I am trying to get back into an exercise routine.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-62340673338374573372015-04-26T01:08:00.000+02:002015-04-26T01:08:00.217+02:00I finally finished Hartl's Rails Tutorial.Very excited about the progress I've made in the past week. <b>Tonight, I finally finished Hartl's <a href="https://www.railstutorial.org/" target="_blank">Rails Tutorial</a>... all 771 pages of it! </b> It took me 2 months to finish it. I found the book really helpful to clarify and work through some basic rails concepts like sessions and params. I found concepts I learned in it, I referred back to while tackling work tasks. I'd definitely recommend it after you get some familiarity with RoR. Next, I think I'm going to change it up and next tackle learning some JS, particularly AngularJS, in my personal time. I also have a copy of <a href="https://pragprog.com/book/btlang/seven-languages-in-seven-weeks" target="_blank">Seven Languages in Seven Weeks: A Pragmatic Guide to Learning Programming Languages</a> that I want to tackle reading as well.<br />
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Also this week, I setup a dev environment from scratch (for second time ever) on my work mac. It was pretty painless compared to my first attempt on my own 5 months ago. I needed some minor guidance, but I think I would do fine by myself when I do it again. I setup my ruby version manager with <a href="https://github.com/sstephenson/rbenv" target="_blank">rbenv</a> instead of RVM. It's what my colleagues use and you don't have to deal with creating/managing RVM gemsets, so I wanted to give it a try.<br />
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After using <a href="https://github.com/sstephenson/rbenv" target="_blank">rbenv</a> for the past week, I <i>really</i> liked it a lot better than RVM and wanted to change my own macbook over to it. After reading some posts and talking to a colleague, I was worried though that even if I impoded RVM, it would still leave lingering files on my machine that would muck up a clean install of a new ruby manager... and my worst fear is that I wouldn't be able to fix it... so I originally decided that I would not change my setup. But, I couldn't resist the challenge of trying to switch over to rbenv from RVM, and, of course, I attempted to do this late on Friday night. :-) It all went well, though! I just had to run '$ rvm implode', clean up my bash files of any reference to RVM, restart, update homebrew, then install rbenv and my ruby versions. There were some minor little issues to resolve when I checked that my projects still ran normally locally, but I worked through everything and it's running fine! I'm happy that I just did it despite my reservations.<br />
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I've been learning some more difficult concepts and working through understanding APIs, client/provider side authorization, OAuth2, OmniAuth and Doorkeeper. I built my first gem and published it to RubyGems. It's an OmniAuth strategy for one of the projects I work on that is a OAuth2 provider. I got to figure out a lot of things while working on it- building a gem with bundler, publishing a gem, writing a gemspec, and building an example app in Sinatra within the gem. It's cool to think of what I've built recently, when I just wrapped my head around APIs, clients, providers a week or so ago.<br />
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It's weird how things have changed for me over the past 6 months. I worry I've become a bit 1-dimensional though. I live/breath/think constantly about coding. It's what I wanna talk about all the time and my main interest right now. I'm excited about it and can't help myself. I don't think much about my previous career or have a desire to go back to it. I just want to keep getting better and faster at writing code. I wonder if this is just a phase that every new coder goes through or if this is just how it is going to be from now on... :-)Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-43252981341171877322015-04-16T21:10:00.005+02:002015-04-16T21:10:53.518+02:00I made it! Job contract signed!<span style="font-family: inherit;">Very excited to announce... I signed a job contract! I was able to go from a code nobody to signing a job contract for a full-on developer position in 5 months. No $30,000 dev bootcamp necessary. Just self-teaching with online tutorials and scoring a jr. dev internship. Seriously, that's crazy, right?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">As of May 1, my title will officially be <b>Software Developer. </b>:-) I am staying on at the company where I am doing my jr. developer internship.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">If I can make it, I don't see why anyone else out there can. </span>I started flirting with the idea of trying to become a web developer in November. I started reading some blogs from others that found jobs as jr. devs after self-studying for 6-8 months and got motivated.<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">There were 2 big obstacles to getting a job I saw when I started out learning to code... </span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Living in another country and not speaking much of the native language. (How am I supposed to find a job or internship then?)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">No dev bootcamps nearby. (I almost considered doing an online bootcamp....)</span></li>
</ul>
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I didn't let these worries deter me. Here's my milestones on my journey to get a developer job:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>On November 13, I successfully battled homebrew and xcode error messages and installed Ruby and Rails and a text editor.</li>
<li>On November 26, I created a github account. I didn't really understand the git process at all.</li>
<li>On December 16, I finished my first Rails app - One Month Rails' Pinterest clone. I kept working through every free online rails tutorial I could find online. I started the precouse work for 2 different online bootcamps - Tea leaf & Firehose project. I was considering doing one of those. </li>
<li>On January 13, I applied for a couple jr developer internships. I almost didn't. Some of them were posted in Dutch. I didn't think I qualified after only doing some online tutorials for ruby and rails for the past month. And, I definitely didn't think I was qualified when I don't speak Dutch well. My husband convinced me to just apply and the worse they could say is 'No' or flat out ignore me. So I did. <u>Caveat</u>: There were no positions in my current city. So I applied in other cities within commuting distance. I was willing to commute ~3 hrs roundtrip from Den Haag to Amsterdam every single day. I still commute. It's freakin' tough but I've gotten used to it. If I get a decent seat on the train, I pull out the MacBook and work on code stuff for work or work on Hartl's RailsTutorial. </li>
<li>On February 9, I started a jr. developer <u>internship</u> (lots of struggling with tasks at work and reading Hartl's Rails Tutorial during my personal time happening for the next few months).</li>
<li>On April 14, I signed a contract as a full-time software developer!</li>
</ul>
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So that's 5 months from the time I installed Ruby and Rails to I signed my job contract!</div>
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I still have a <i>lot</i> to learn. I am learning something new everyday. Some days I feel like I'm drowning and some days I feel like a coding champion. I truly enjoy coding. I'm kinda shocked sometimes that I do as much as I do. I think about coding and the coding community all the time. I never felt that way in my previous career.</div>
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I am so excited for the future. I can't wait to see where I'm at in 3-6 months from now.</div>
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Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-80163338291991865542015-04-06T22:07:00.003+02:002015-04-06T22:12:08.345+02:00Week 8 finished + holiday weekend!I finished my 8th internship week! Time is going by fast! <br />
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I worked on some new tests and features for the main app project. I struggled with the proper setup of a cucumber (+capybara+poltergeist) test for 2 forms that are submitted using JS instead of ruby. I figured out how to get the test to test the JS functionality and pass the individual tests, but then it was breaking a couple other tests in my full test suite. I then adjusted my test env to run the database cleaner between each test and, voila, it was fixed! I still am unclear how there the carryover of the @javascript notation for those scenarios were breaking the other tests, but this solution fixed it.<br />
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I am also getting more familiar with working on an api within an app. I struggled a little bit this week with changing a feature on the api. With everything I work on, it seems the list of stuff to learn gets longer and longer. It's really amazing the possibilities of what you can build in Ruby on Rails. I feel like I'm only just learning what is possible with Ruby on Rails and it's both overwhelming (most of the time) but, also, very exciting and motivates me to learn more (all of the time)! :-)<br />
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I am still working through Hartl's Rails Tutorial. I'm currently on Chapter 10. I am going back and re-reading some sections from the past couple of chapters on creating user sessions and cookies. I feel I didn't understand all of that discussion, so I'm trying to look back at some material before continuing on. I bought the railscasts with the tutorial, so I'm taking the time to watch through those. I hadn't been watching them, but after watching one on the signup procedure, I found it super useful to get Hartl's commentary as he worked through adding features. I am going to work on watching more of the screencasts this week particularly the sections on user sessions and cookies.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-90195747809546935762015-03-30T08:11:00.002+02:002015-03-30T08:18:25.408+02:00Week 7 and RailsGirls Coaching!I finished week 7 of my dev internship. What a busy week... LOTS of coding, a little dutch practice and a RailsGirls event!<br />
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At my internship, I worked on some new features for one of the projects. One of the main things I worked on last week was adding a form that was tied to other model inside the view of another. I have had to do this once before and it was definitely tricky for me to wrap my head around how to do this. In the beginner tutorials, it's easy... You never add a form for another model inside some other view, you put a form in the view of that model and use a simple form_for tag with your instance variable correctly defined and it's easy. I figured out most of the solution on my own and was proud of that. I found <a href="http://6ftdan.com/allyourdev/2015/01/05/dealing-with-rails-4-forms-and-params/" target="_blank">this blog post</a> helpful in figuring it out and also helping me understand using form_for and form_tag better.<br />
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On Friday evening and all day Saturday, I coached at my first RailsGirls event in Utrecht. I was definitely nervous about coaching since I feel like a huge beginner myself most of the time. I was worried I would be useless to my students. Luckily that was not the case. Coaching helped me realize that I have learned a lot about coding and rails in a few short months. I was able to help students get their dev environments setup on their machine... even a windows machine (eek!).<br />
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What I wasn't expecting was how emotional the event would be. There was several other coaches that shared their stories of getting into coding, many taking their first steps at a RailsGirls workshop just like this one. It was also humbling to hear the story of some of my students who are eager to learn coding so that they can change their careers and better their lives despite difficult situations. It was pretty inspiring. What caught me off-guard was hearing that I am an inspiration to them. I guess I never thought of my journey as being able to inspire someone else or being that impressive. I know since November I have studied and coded nearly every day. And I struggle to improve my dutch language. But I am very lucky to have a partner that supports me and allows me to take risks like changing my career. I am impossibly hard on myself and think that I should know more than I do at this point in my learning. I do recognize how hard I have worked and continue to work towards my goal of being a Rails developer and, even though, I work as a jr dev intern right now, I don't consider myself successful in my goal until I am a full-fledged developer with a real salary and leave interning behind. Hopefully in a few weeks that will be the case.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-66176634410543883442015-03-24T21:45:00.001+01:002015-03-24T21:54:02.243+01:00Halfway through my jr dev internship.I finished up my 6th week at my internship last week. I'm halfway through my 3-month program. For me, it was another busy week of working on different tasks for real project code. I follow a similar formula for everything I build: think about what needs to be built, write a suitable feature test in Cucumber, go through each step in the feature by letting the test steps guide my coding.<br />
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I have started working through Hartl's Rails tutorial during my morning and evening train commutes (as long as I find a place to sit). I felt that only working on it during the weekend was counter-productive since I spent a good bit of time trying to figure out what I was working on from the last time. I was able to work through 3 chapters last week by simply doing it during my commute! The book is great and is helping me go back over basics that I might not have fully understood when I started learning Rails. Plus, reviewing these things while I am doing project work is really helping me think through concepts <i>a lot</i> better.<br />
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On Saturday, I finished the third and final week of the free online MOOC Dutch course from futurelearn & University of Groningen. I really liked the course! I think it was a good supplement to the in-person course I am taking. I only wish this course had lasted longer than 3 weeks!<br />
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I went to a RailsGirls workshop on Sunday and learned about MeteorJS. I built a simple to-do list app. It's easy to follow and I recommend checking it out on their website. I was super impressed with the ease to setup Meteor (1 command in terminal and it was ready to go. No error messages - whew!) It was also really cool how easy/quick it was to deploy it and even make the android APK for my deployed app. Super easy. Once I finish Hartl's Rails tutorial, I want to start learning JS and I might try building more in Meteor to get more comfortable with JS since I liked the framework. I don't think Meteor is at the point that it is production ready since it is so new and they are still adding features. But it is still really cool to try out<br />
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I am still taking an in-person dutch course 1x/week. I have kinda put dutch on the back burner during the week, since I'm so focused on coding right now. What I need most for my dutch to improve is to have a patient speaking partner. I have asked a dutch friend to start meeting with me on the weekend to practice. Hopefully I can make that a regular, weekly occurrence and get some noticeable improvement with my dutch.<br />
<br />Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-87536061910764328092015-03-15T21:10:00.004+01:002015-03-15T21:10:59.791+01:00Week 5 of my internship: UpdateWeek 5 of my internship is done. Working on Bitbucket on 2 different projects. It's definitely a lot different to work on existing code and not writing a simple app from scratch like in the tutorials. I have to spend time reading and figuring out what is going on in the code. But I figure out things or I ask for help to figure them out. One of the applications is in Dutch including the cucumber feature tests. I think I'm doing ok with it.<br />
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This is pretty much sums up how I feel all the time and will for a long time: "Programming is awesome if you like feeling dumb and then eventually feeling less dumb but then feeling dumb about something else pretty soon." I hope I'm learning enough and learning it fast enough. <br />
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On Saturday morning, I worked through all of the second week's coursework of the online dutch MOOC course I'm taking through futurelearn and the university of groningen. I didn't work on any code on Saturday. <br />
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On Sunday, I finished Chapter 5 of Hartl's Rails tutorial. It's frustrating to only work on the tutorial during the weekend. It's hard to pick it up after not touching it for a week and know where I was, where to go. I need to try to maybe work a little during my train commute on it during the week. I want to finish this book! It was a goal of mine since I first started coding a couple months ago. <br />
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Here goes week 6....Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-2200276377990312342015-03-07T19:58:00.002+01:002015-03-07T19:58:32.003+01:00Progress Update.Finished up my fourth week of my internship. I was added to another project. I was introduced to Trello and started getting project tasks assigned and even getting tasks finished and pull requests accepted. I'm using bitbucket instead of github for project work. <br />
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Even though I'm working 36 hr/week during my junior dev internship, I am still studying rails on the weekends. Today, I finished up Chapters 3 & 4 of Hartl's Rails tutorial (some static page creation and working with minitest for TDD). I also finished up the first week of the online dutch MOOC course I'm taking through futurelearn. Whew. Busy week. <br />
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<br />Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-84697785392458524022015-03-04T20:33:00.001+01:002015-03-04T20:33:24.692+01:00Week 4 Internship updateFor the past week or so, I've been working on various tasks with real project code!<br />
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Building a mailer, updating a rake task, adding columns to various models, updating controller methods, updating gemfiles, etc. And writing features and spec tests in Rspec and Cucumber. I spend a lot of time thinking and reading about new things I'm encountering in real project code. I've learned about (and helped implement) an hstore column in a model and get that hash properly outputted in JSON. I've learned about interactors to keep controllers clean and uncluttered with methods. I've gotten several merge/pull-requests under my belt.<br />
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I'm more excited about coding the more I learn. I'm still learning Dutch every week at class, plus during my ~3 hr commute everyday, I've been studying Dutch vocabulary using Memrise. It's really helping to grow my word bank. I've also started a MOOC free dutch course being offered by the University of Groningen. I've been studying Hartl's Rails tutorial during the weekends too. I still want to complete that book. My goal is to complete it in the next month. Then, I plan on going back to seriously study Javascript & jQuery. I think that would be a good knowledge base for me to tackle next.<br />
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Needless to say, I'm busy all the time and I don't have much free time during the week for much else besides work, commute, dog walks, eat, sleep, repeat. I am trying to make time for yoga a few times during the week. I miss not running or going to the gym in the evenings, but, frankly, I'm just too tired. I'm hoping with daylight savings time and longer days, I'll make time for evening runs at least once or twice during the week.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-675107560080843555.post-58433086432550513522015-02-25T21:36:00.002+01:002015-02-25T21:36:47.948+01:00Week 3 of internship...I'm in the third week of my apprenticeship. I'm getting used to the commute every day back and forth to Amsterdam. It's getting better... I'm coming home with more energy. In the morning, people are so stressed out. I try to stay out of others way, I don't care about pushing through everyone to get some specific seat on the train/etc. I try to stay calm, not sweat stuff, and I usually study dutch on my phone using the Memrise app. In the 3 weeks I've been commuting, I've learned ~375 dutch words using the app. It's a great way to work on learning vocabulary every day with minimal effort.<br />
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Mondays are still the worst since I have the dutch course in the evening, but I'm managing. I've even had energy the last 2 evenings to get back into doing yoga when I get home! Very happy about that. With the daylight increasing incremently everyday, I'm hopeful I can start going out for evening jogs a couple times during the week once it stays light enough for me to feel comfortable doing so.<br />
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I've pretty much finished up the bloccit app in the bloc foundations course. I've started getting my feet wet with real project work with some (very) small testing tasks to work on. I even did my first pull request for a real project today.Stephaniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07710886813021833620noreply@blogger.com