85: Top Tips review: why should you build your own website?

10/19/20 • 10 min

We've had some great guests on our podcast, and we've asked each of them for their "Three Top Tips" for new developers. All their advice has been amazing, and a lot of the same concepts have come up time and time again. In this miniseries we're looking back at those top tips, and linking the themes together.

This week our theme is "Just Build Websites". Having a project to guide your learning and apply your knowledge is really useful, especially when you're just starting out (but also useful at every stage of your career). So who thought this was advice worth sharing? Find out all this and more in this week's rehashed instalment of A Question of Code.

Previous Episode

84: Why should you own a rubber duck?

It is a truth universally acknowledged that any developer in possession of a bug must be in need of a rubber duck to talk to.

There are lots of ways to get "stuck" when programming. It can often be because of something simple, like a syntax error or typo, or maybe a fundamental lack of knowledge or experience with the system you're using (be it an API, framework, or whatever...). It could even be an "architectural" issue, or a bizarre language quirk. Perhaps it's a situation where a weird hack is required? Do you know them all?

One of the most effective ways to get "unstuck" it to rubber duck. That is to say, to talk about your problem to someone (or something). Explaining an idea helps clarify it in your own mind, and if you can't explain something clearly then there's a good chance that you don't really know it. So what are the benefits of sharing often and early? What is "The Curse of the Demo"? And why can pair-programming be a super power? Find out all this and more in this week's talky instalment of A Question of Code.

Next Episode

86: Top Tips review: just get things done!

This week our theme is "getting things done": that is to say, just start already! There's a lot to be said for doing research and preparing thoroughly, but there's even more power in just starting. By doing a thing, you really start to learn the thing. There's a gulf of distance between knowing something "in the head" and knowing that same thing "in the hand". So should you start coding straight away? And what are the best ways to jump in at the deep end? Find out all this and more in this week's rehashed instalment of A Question of Code.