How to code like a cool cat

First up, our managing director, Jon Malyon, who to paraphrase Derek Zoolander, is an “ex developer that used to code good”.

What I wish I’d known…
Don’t be afraid. Be hungry and remember, sometimes you will need to chew on something for a while to properly digest it and extract the nutrient nuggets. It wont all make sense at once.

The hack I swear by…
Create your own library of code patterns for re-use later. Otherwise you will spend your days hunting down a piece of functionality that you wrote on an old project that you will want to re-purpose on a new one.

My nifty go-to guiding light…
Google is your best friend! Unless you are building the next AI interface then the chances are that someone else will have encountered your same problem, so keep it simple and have a search.

Sarah is our head of development…

What I wish I’d known…
I wish I’d known that you don’t need to be perfect before you show people what you’ve done.

The hack I swear by…
If you’re learning, find something you want to build first. A problem you want to solve; always go down the project route because it gives you a driver to finish.

My nifty go-to guiding light…
I love Can I Use. It’s a favourite of mine!

Aaron is our full-stack developer…

What I wish I’d known…
All programming languages can do anything any other programming language can (paraphrasing); learn one well and others will be substantially easier.

The hack I swear by…
Use an IDE that supports formatting the language that you’re coding in. Proper formatting saves a lot of grief when it comes to revisiting code and a lot of IDEs these days have formatters and linters built in.

My nifty go-to guiding light…
Stack Overflow. If you have a problem, chances are someone has had the same problem, has posted it here, and someone has answered. Just be sure to read/understand what code examples posted there actually do before using them.

Colette is our front-end developer…

What I wish I’d known…
Start by learning what interests you and build from there. Don’t worry overly about following a set ‘traditional’ path.

The hack I swear by…
Teach. However basic you think your level is. Explaining concepts to someone else will help solidify that knowledge in your own brain. This could be in person, at groups, such as Codebar, or by blogging.

My nifty go-to guiding light…
Build real projects. If you need ideas, check out Frontend Mentor.

Josh is our web developer…

What I wish I’d known…
Never pay for learning as you can find all you need in documentation or online.

The hack I swear by…
Copying and pasting code snippets from browser stack will only get you so far. Make sure you take the time to prod, poke and play with code so that you fully understand it.

My nifty go-to guiding light…
Codebar for learning and Codepen for building things and proof of concepting as the web interface is easy to use.

Renato is our junior developer…

What I wish I’d known…
It’s normal to feel like you don’t know enough. You will always have this feeling and there will always be something new to learn.

The hack I swear by…
Use more than one platform to study code. You will learn it from
different perspectives.

My nifty go-to guiding light…
W3Schools is a very handy website with tutorials and exercises.