Apps 1031exchange's progress diary

[1031exchange]

Thanks for reading~

I want to become a competent Android and iOS programmer and aim to become one by October 31st. That's about 90 days from now.
If I don't make it then people can make fun of me here and I lose all dignity to show up here again.

I'll just type up the daily lessons I take and the progress I make towards my goal. People can make fun of me here if I get off-course.

Hope you find reading this along is interesting and let me know what I'm doing wrong.

Kevin

 

[1031exchange]

July 22 progress diary:

It's been ~10 years since I coded thus I'm going to start off by getting back my programming skills.

I will rely primarily on free education over the web and start off by learning C-sharp. Why C-sharp? Why not. I found some great free education on the web and might as well utilize them
-a 200-lesson video tutorial on the web
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0EE421AE8BCEBA4A&feature=plcp
-a 23-lesson text tutorial on the web
Tutorial Contents

Why work with 2 set of lessons? Because the video lessons seem really easy to follow. The text lessons acts as a backup as sometimes I like to learn in noisy areas, such as a bar with a pole dancer next to me (yeah I know it's weird but sue me). The overlap may also ensure my learning is solidified.

How long do I aim to finish these lessons? Two weeks. around August 6th. Not sure whether it's feasible but I need this pressure. I've already wasted too much time in the past two weeks thus resorted to joining this forum. Wish me luck!

Lessons completed:
Video lesson 1: Introduction and Installing C# 2010 (well it's already 2am July 23rd so I can't do much more, looking forward to finishing off many more tomorrow)

 

[1031exchange]

Lessons completed:

Video lesson 2: Changing Forms Properties
Video lesson 3: Showing Message Boxes
Video lesson 4: Variables

Thoughts: I didn't do nearly as much as I should have. Today was a huge workout day for me in the gym and that got me really mentally tired to do more lessons.

However, if I do plan to finish learning C-sharp by August 6th I need to average about 15 lessons a day and today's progress didn't cut it.

I figured the best place for these lessons is just learn at home, going outside to do take these lessons don't help as I can barely hear the audio on the video with background noise around me.

 

[1031exchange]

Lessons completed:

Video lesson 5: Changing Properties With Code
Video lesson 6: If Statements
Video lesson 7: More On If Statements
Video lesson 8: If Statements Part 3
Video lesson 9: Switch Statements
Video lesson 10: Mathematical Operators
Video lesson 11: Arrays
Video lesson 12: Lists
Video lesson 13: For and Foreach Loop

Thoughts: Well at least I did more lessons than my previous day. I overcame with guilt on how few I did that I stayed up until 4am to do 3 more before going to bed. I still need to hit an average of ~15 lessons a day to achieve my goal by the deadline I set for myself and hope I can do that the following day.

 

[1031exchange]

Lessons completed:

Video lesson 15: Do and Do While
Video lesson 16: Try, Catch and Finally
Video lesson 17: Methods Pt 1
Video lesson 18: Methods Pt 2
Video lesson 19: Continue and Break

Thoughts: sleeping at 4am took a toll on my the previous day. I feel like I'm still getting in an rhythm to learning this. Learned today that I should also consider learning Objective C but unfortunately I don't have a mac so I'm gonna stick what I started.

I am considering whether mentally I should switch around different things just to keep my learning interesting. Honestly the video tutorials made by this C# guy is pretty boring and I'm getting all ADD when I'm hearing him talk and squirming around in my seat. Nonetheless I think he's doing a terrific job explaining these.

 

[1031exchange]

Lessons completed:

Video lesson 20: Constructors
Video lesson 21: Access Modifiers and Static
Video lesson 22: Overloading Methods and Enumerations
Video lesson 23: Creating Your Own Properties
Video lesson 24: Throwing Exceptions

Thoughts: think I overestimated how many of these lessons I can take one day. It definitely takes brain power to digest all this information that I'm taking in.

Wasted two hours of my life watching "Dumb and Dumber" today. Never saw this movie when it came out years ago, I wish I had never seen it...

 

[1031exchange]

Lessons completed:

Video lesson 25: Inheritance and Override
Video lesson 26: More on Inheritance and Interfaces
Video lesson 27: Indexers
Video lesson 28: Structs
Video lesson 29: Partial
Video lesson 30: Abstract


Thoughts: these lessons are really dry. I need to balance these lessons with an interesting side project where I can have immediate results to have something to show for

 

[1031exchange]

I've decided to start a side project and learn Blitz Plus, a much easier language, simultaneously while I'm continuing with my C# lessons.

Luckily I found some tutorials on the web that seem pretty good:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5A3140380ED5A9ED&feature=plcp

BlitzPlus lessons completed:
Beginner lesson 1: Creating a Basic High/Low Number Guesser Game
Beginner lesson 2: Improving the High/Low Number Guesser Game
Beginner lesson 3: Using Graphics
Beginner lesson 4: Creating A Helicopter Game Part 1
Immediate lesson 1: Creating A Helicopter Game Part 2

C# lessons completed:
None. I feel bad about it and I should

Thoughts: I think this will be a good balance going forward. I'll still continue my C# lessons but am exciting about Blitz entering my schedule

 

[1031exchange]

BlitzPlus lessons completed:
Immediate lesson 2: Completing the Helicopter Game Part 3

C# lessons completed:
None

Thoughts: really very little time to do lessons today as I completed the only lesson today around midnight.

Not trying to make excuses but just want to state my case that today I still got a lot of stuff done. My morning was taken up by turning in my mobile phone for repairs. Afternoon was taken up by 2 gym sessions (chest and legs) as I needed to put in extra time to make up for my lack of workout this past Thurs and Fri. Evening was taken up by hanging out with friends.

I'm going to purchase a C# book online to solidify my learning from online. Afterall these guys who write the books are paid to do a good job. Not saying the guys that make online tutorials are less better but these guys make online lessons voluntarily thus may not explain everything as thoroughly as they should.