Learning in public became a lifestyle adopted for me last year when I started learning software development. If you don't know what it is or don't do, I strongly recommend starting as soon as possible.
This is probably the main reason why I know what I know today and how quickly I have increased my knowledge.
I would say I move faster than most who started studying with me, and one of the reasons for that was learning in public.
You can learn more about my thoughts in my zettelkasten.
Today, I'm here to share how this lifestyle helps me combine creating a product with learning a new technology.
The mindset
I have a "job" where I create a list of names for an event, but all this work was done manually, and I didn't like it. I was wasting a lot of time, and there were usually some mistakes.
I had a goal of learning new JavaScript frameworks such as KoaJS and RelayJS. Moreover, I had a few side projects, and I had rarely used other frameworks like Next.
I had a pain point and a goal, and I just combined them and made good use of my time.
I basically started from scratch on both challenges. I had never managed a product and didn't know anything about it, and I had never worked with these frameworks before.
What most people would do in this situation;
- Not create a product because they're too inexperienced in the area;
- Create a lot of unusual side projects before;
- Wait for the best moment (which doesn't exist);
- Be afraid to fail;
- Give up halfway;
My thought was the opposite; I knew that in the end, I would acquire a lot of knowledge.
How I started
As I knew and admitted that I had no knowledge in the area, I needed to find a way to acquire that knowledge. I needed a way to move faster, to move consciously and correctly. And that's where learning in public came in.
Github
Most of what I learned about the technologies was by looking at other people's code on GitHub. I studied and saw how the code worked, how it ran, and why that code was there. I tried to get content from people I knew were good and believed in their potential to have written good code so I could learn from it.
Much of the base technologies I learned there; I say "base" because it is difficult to have an open-source system/product that would give me everything about the product I want to build.
Looking for issues and discussions in the technology project was also crucial. As I was learning, my doubts had most likely already been answered in some issues. Also, I learned a lot by watching people's discussions and problems.
Community
Having contact with a community of good developers was essential. I sought and followed people who dealt with what I was looking for.
I posted my doubts on Twitter, and many people helped me. I wasn't afraid to ask stupid questions or something like that because, after all, my doubt could be someone else's in the future. Additionally, I found answers to my doubts in issues on GitHub or in other tweets.
Discord
On Discord, I had a more direct interaction with other developers, being more focused on chat. Discord provided a fluid and quick discussion on subjects.
Finn
After doing all these things, I learned a lot about how to achieve my goals, but I hadn't worked on a real project using these technologies. Then came the Finn, an idea and project by Danilo Assis, tech lead at Woovi, who proposes mentoring in a real project. Finn helped me on how to work well and following good practices with the technologies I learned... having access to a good, solid and organized code makes all the difference. In addition, I was able to learn the creation of the product and brand and how to deal with the problems that the product is trying to solve.
And that's how learn in public helped me extremely in moving quickly into topics I didn't know about.
I'm sure if I hadn't adepted this "lifestyle" I would still be doing projects consuming pokemon's API. Hahaha!
Finally, the Event List is a product in final stage of development, when it is ready I will update the link here! Landing page
Related articles:
Just do it
Ways to get knowledge
You shouldn't need to watch videos or lessons to learn something
blazu Thoughts
Top comments (1)
Thanks for the mention. You rock!