This update is all about slowing down and sticking to the plan. My past updates have mentioned my propensity for jumping around and trying to learn too much too fast. I have been kind of been blowing off JavaScript to a certain degree and just focusing on JQuery and I believe this to be an error. JavaScript is a core element that needs to be learned well. With that said, I have laid aside my JQuery books. First things first and I think a solid foundation in JavaScript is the proper order of things. I am going through each page and doing all the examples in my Head First JavaScript book. This has been a challenge and is going slower than I would like it. I have ZERO programming experience and it is showing in my understanding of JavaScript. So, it’s just plugging along, example by example and trying to make sense of everything.
JavaScript is an extremely powerful language and the more I learn the more I am impressed. Just for fun check out James Padolsey’s blog entry on the game of Pong. James has taken his pong game that he had to write in Java for a computer science class and turned it into JavaScript, you can look at his very clean code and play the game yourself. I would love to be able to write beautiful clean code like James one of these days!
I’m going page by page through the Head First JavaScript book and am really enjoying the examples. I hope to put some of them up on cliff538.com to just show them off and let you see what to expect from buying the book and jumping into the JavaScript.
A big part of this slow down and trying to learn things well, is that I do not want to be a cut and paste kind of web developer. The goal is to truly understand the tools (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, JQuery, AJAX, PHP, etc.) and be able to take what is in my head or on the paper and truly make it work by my own skills using the tools provided. I don’t want to be the guy searching the web for just the right plug-in or code-snippet to make my page work. Will I ever achieve this lofty goal? good question, but the fun is in the journey, I am truly enjoying shutting off the T.V. and opening my book, firing up MAMP, Coda, and three different web browsers and playing, I mean learning.
Now, does this mean I’m not jumping around anymore? NO WAY! It’s in my blood, I love learning and playing with new stuff, so along side my deep concentration of JavaScript I hope to put my examples of JavaScript up on cliff538.com and I have purchased ScreenFlow and would like to try making a few screen-casts on some of the basics of all this web building. Installing MAMP, working with Coda, installing a new WordPress site, etc. Still looking for a good microphone then we’ll see if I’ll consider it good enough to put up on the web site. One last thing, it’s about my problem of having no programming experience, at all, nada, none, ZERO. The thought process and structure is very foreign to me and I thought along side the JavaScript I should dabble in Python to help get my head around some of the basics. Head First is coming out with a Programming book in December that deals with beginning programming and Python. So I would like to start into that book as well.
I’ve rambled on enough….. Back to the books! Never Stop Learning.
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