It’s 2017, and I’m charging ahead with my programming journey. I’m not a total beginner – I built a website with a few projects (all Rails on the back-end) and I lead a team of programming teachers over at Codecademy. However, I’m definitely not an engineer, and I have so much to learn before I feel like I can prototype, build, and manage products effectively.
After working with Rails on the back end and the basic HTML/CSS/Bootstrap/JS/jQuery front end, I want to really dive into the exciting world of JavaScript. I just started learning Node.js and Express, and from there, aim to either settle into Express, or continue onto Meteor, as well as React. I’m also working with my great friend James Mayr, whose back-end background is in PHP. So, a JS back-end should be unifying for both of us, especially if we want to continue to work together (and we do.)
Rails was a wonderful experience, and on my own, I’d probably continue to dive deeper into it. Learning Rails was tough, and it didn’t help that everyone said it should be easy. Ruby wasn’t difficult to wrap my head around – however, understanding Git, ERB, how HTML requests work, what application architecture is, MVC, REST structure, basics of SQL for my database – all of that was overwhelming. Over time, I’ve understood many of these concepts, er, kind of. I hope these skills help me in my JS journey. The danger of Rails has always been how much you can build without really understanding what’s going on underneath. I’m hoping to correct this the second time around, and really understand what’s happening in my Node/Express apps.
My goal is to become a PM, and envisioning, planning, and building products is what drives me at the core. However, I find programming fascinating, calming, and endlessly enjoyable. So, I’m really excited to kick up my skillset to the next level.
Max Learns To Code 