W11: Déjà Vu

Programming is an Art Form That Fights Back

Do I still enjoy creative writing?
Yes.
Do I still want to make the best of everything and give it my all?
Yes.
Do I still sometimes regret not choosing something like art school?
Yes.
Do I still think I am blundering around trying to find my future?
Yes.
Do I still think my group from a2 is awesome?
Yes.
Do I still think programming is an art form that fights back?
Definitely.

Well, that about sums it up.











    Kidding. (Although my answer for every one of those is still true.)
I am still in the same state of attempting to figure my future out- and struggling.
I am still fascinated and impressed by many people's ability to learn and comprehend programming and the aspects of computer science.

    Anyways, I welcome the TA's back and emphasize, that in my opinion, programming is LARGELY learned by "doing". Of course, at first it was, "sweet! free thursdays for me :) ", but soon I realized the importance of the labs and the help provided by the TA's. I learned a lot from my TA during my labs and I relied on the labs as a major part of applying the concepts taught and understanding. Now that the end of the term is closer than ever- with exams starting only a week away, I really have to get through more lists of to-do's and have the material engraved in my mind- or something like that. I struggled with trees and recursion (slightly better now), but linked lists? wth.

    It's not just me though, I see that others have as well. As this fellow slogger has noted, that with practice, trees and recursion begin to feel more routinely, and linked lists just require practice as well. I find that, and I don't think I'm alone in this, computer science just takes a lot of practice and applying the concepts to actually learn. Another classmate, and a friend, has shared similar struggles in this course. In her slog, she mentions discovering the convenience for recursion and how a lot of the time, it's taking the time to think things through and not trying to immediately implement code; as well as drawing diagrams when necessary, pictures can actually really help.

    And yes, programming is an art form that fights back. It's like the Language of Shakespeare, it is its own language and it's probably marvelous and has some majestic features as well. Unfortunately, it's not something everyone can understand easily. I've heard people say that Shakespeare was just some babbling idiot and his works don't make sense, but isn't that me? I've wondered who the creator of python was and wondered if he was sane. I mean when I first looked at code, I thought, wouldn't it just be easier if there was proper grammer? Of course that would probably kill efficiency and possibly be even more complicated to write but what I'm trying to say is, programming is impressive, but it doesn't come easily (at least not to me); if you're really passionate and just love coding, then of course it's brilliant- but to me, it's like trying to understand Shakespeare for some people.