I am still on my Backend Development study track. I was working through the API development section from The Odin Project’s Node.js course.
I was trying to organize my rough notes on CORS and API development. I don’t know everything yet but I have at least learned a few things about both topics. I was trying to make sense of it all and so I thought organizing my notes would help. Fortunately and unfortunately, re-writing my notes lead to more confusion and questions than answers. The fortunate side was that I needed to get my first attempt out of the way. The unfortunate side is I realized I still do not fully understand how CORS works between a server and a web client (i.e., browser).
Personally, I struggle at starting anything new. I can for example, edit code faster than writing some code from scratch. So, working from templates helps jumpstart my work on most days. This is the same with notes so I try to get through the first couple of drafts as quickly as possible so that I have something to work with. From there I usually go through multiple drafts that reflect my level of comfort with the topic. It is actually really cool to see the progress and reflect on my mistakes while re-writing my notes.
I had forgotten this for a bit today and over obsessed on making my notes perfect. So moving forward I will keep trying to remind myself that multi-drafting notes is normal and getting something on the board fast is better than dwelling over things that you don’t really understand yet. When you review your work and practice code, then you can improve on your notes in a significant way.
TLDR;
Okay, so here are the highlights of what I did:
- Backend -> Continued going through the material on API development with
Node.jsfrom The Odin Project’s backend development course. Reviewed my notes to try and confirm my understanding of the topics.
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.