The first thing you should know before you start your Software Engineering Career is that you are not in the business of coding. Erase that thought. Coding is the means by which you execute your actual business: Problem Solving.
As a Software Engineer, you are in the business of Problem Solving. Coding is just the means by which you solve the problem.
Cymmone Yancey
The Art of Problem Solving
As a Software Engineer, clients and businesses aren’t paying you just to code. They want you to be able to solve their problems by building software on their behalf. The first part of that is to find a solution to their problem. But, before you can run off and try to solve a Fortune 500 Company’s problem, you should be able to solve the problems you’ll encounter while learning about your number one tool: programming.
Learn How to Self-Learn
Self-learning is by far the most important facet of problem solving. Conducting effective searches to find information, the ability to decipher other people’s solutions, and the ability to apply that solution to your own situation/problem are all skills that will take you far when Self-Learning. In this article, we will touch on the first skill: conducting an effective search.
Note that these methods may not be the most comfortable. If you are the type of person who jumps from place to place, glazes over important contracts they’re about to sign, or has difficulty taking their time when dealing with the unknown, this will be fairly difficult for you at first. However, you will be happy that you took the time to learn these skills.
Take your time when you first start out so that you can be the most efficient Developer when you reach the employment stage.
Cymmone Yancey
Conduct Effective Searches
The first step to Self-Learning will be finding resources to learn from. Many of you will jump straight to the documentation of a programming language like Java or C++, get frustrated when you don’t understand what you’re reading, and give up on it. That’s a perfectly natural reaction for someone who is just starting out. Documentation was written from the perspective of someone who already knows how to code and just needs some more information about the language they are using. It is riddled with intimidating and technical language, so if you were a beginner trying to waltz into the documentation and come out with an answer 30 seconds later, it’s no wonder you got frustrated.
Documentation was written for people who already know how to code.
Cymmone Yancey
“Well, Cymmone, if I can’t learn the language from the documentation, what should I do?”
Google it. I’ll bet you were expecting a better answer. Honestly, that is the best advice you will ever receive. Learn how to effectively search for information, and there will be no limit to what you can learn. That being said, I do have a trick to effective searching. Let’s look at this from the perspective of a beginner:
I am just starting out. Coding seems pretty hard, but I really want to learn. I’m going to look up how to code.
Literally typing “how to code” seems like a natural reaction for a beginner, but you’ll end up with a lot more information than you were hoping for, most of which is propaganda to start using their services.
Here is my advice to you when it comes to searching: do not type out the action you are trying to do. Instead, search for the goal you are trying to accomplish. Let’s jump back into the perspective of a beginner:
I am just starting out. Coding seems pretty hard, but right now I just want to write my first program.
See? We’ve identified their objective! If you are having a hard time figuring out your objective/goal try this formula:
I want to [thing you were trying to do] so that [expected outcome of that thing].
In this case, it would be:
I want to [learn how to code] so that [I can write my first program].
Now how do we conduct an effective search with this information? When conducting a search always remember this rule. Use:
[3-5 words describing your objective] + [the programming language you’re using]
So in our case, the search should look something like:
“write first program java“
Let’s do a side by side comparison of the results from our first, ineffective search (“how to code”) with our second, effective search (“write first program java”):
Not only does the “how to code” search get billions of results, but the first handful of results you see are all advertisements for services. With our “write first program java” search, we can see that we get significantly less hits and the first handful of results are all step-by-step tutorials on how to write our first Java program.
All in All
You did it! You got past the first hurdle, conducting an effective search. The next step is to be able to decipher other people’s solutions. This involves reading for comprehension and learning how to read “between the lines”, as it were, when it comes to new content. We will touch on this in our next article: “The Art of Problem Solving”.
I hope that going forward, you will have more confidence in your ability to conduct effective searches that will aid you in launching your Software Engineering Career. If you have read this article and are left with any lingering questions, contact us at thebackend.code.blog@gmail.com
If you enjoyed the read and would like to see more content like this, leave a clap or two below!
The BackEnd 