I finished reading the react book. There were some heavier topics that took longer for me to get through but I am glad I powered through. I really need to re-do some of my older projects with my new knowledge. It is a mess to think about now.
The second half of the book covered more advanced topics in React but did not introduce anything too far outside of what I have already come across. With that being said, I wonder if I am peaking or if I have been down playing my knowledge of the library. I often prefer to be humble and to prove my competencies through my achievements as opposed to making claims about what I can do.
That has put me in a tough situation where I may sell myself short because I do not have the accolades. The question is how do I get those accolades if I am constantly telling myself I am not good enough. It is an interesting dilemma. I think being humble is good but I do need to start putting myself out there more now that I am getting closer to finishing all of my fundamental studies. Over the past two years I have studied a variety of subjects within tech and although I am not expert, I think I finally have a decent foundation that I can build off of.
I have more work to do but personal projects unrelated to tutorials or courses are the next step for me. I got problems to solve!! lol.
TLDR;
Okay, so here are the highlights of what I did:
- React -> Finished reading How to Code in React by Joe Morgan. The second half of the book was much heavier but capped off with some demonstrations with
nginxanddigital-oceandeployments. I use an old school hosting provider. Eventually, I need to play around with a cloud provider. I did not have a great experience with AWS the first time around. I have never used Google’s offering or Microsoft’s. I have a lot to think about but the fact that this book was produced by Digital ocean gives them a plus 1.
Goal For Round 8 of the #100DaysofCode Challenge
This is my eighth round of the “#100daysofcode” challenge. I will be continuing my work from round five, six, and seven into round eight. I was working through the book “Cracking the Coding Interview” by Gayle Laakmann McDowell. My goal was to become more familiar with algorithms and data structures. This goal was derived from my goal to better understand operating systems and key programs that I use in the terminal regularly e.g. Git. This goal was in turn derived from my desire to better understand the fundamental tools used for coding outside of popular GUIs. This in turn was derived from my desire to be a better back-end developer.
I am currently putting a pause on the algorithm work to build some backend/full stack projects. I primarily want to improve my skills with the back-end from an implementation perspective. I have improved tremendously in terminal and CLI skills but I lost focus due to how abstract the algorithm concepts got. I wanted to work on things that were more tangible until I can get to a position where I could directly benefit from improving my algorithm skills and theoretical knowledge. So that’s the focus right now. Build my backend skills and prove my full stack capabilities by building some dope projects.
Again, I still have no idea if my path is correct but I am walking down this road anyways. Worst case scenario I learn a whole bunch of stuff that will help me out on my own personal projects. Best case scenario I actually become one of those unicorn developers that go on to start a billion dollar company… You never know LOL.