It’s been like 6-7 months since I started to code. I had been making notes all the way. But right now when I tried to review them I don’t find them any useful.
Note making is very essential because remembering everything isn’t easy (and very impractical).
So, I wanted a little advice from you guys about how to effectively make and organize notes and share your experience on this.
P.S. If you could share a couple of images, it would be very helpful to visualize your guidance.
4 Likes
It might help explain why I’m still a beginner… I’ve never taken notes. Only practiced.
Reading is how we take notes. Read the documentation. Read articles. Try out everything you read about. Explore every new built-in to its fullest. That’s the note taking I do. The paper only comes out when I want to explore a problem and need to sketch it out. Problem is that’s where many learners seem to put the paper and pencil away.
9 Likes
I make notes using Notion. There are many others. You can use like One Note, Google keep etc
Commit your code daily so that you know what you are doing You can always go back and check
as this helps u in remembering and gives you confidence boost as well.
Happy Coding
4 Likes
I’ve looked at your achievements in your profile and it’s really great that you’ve accomplished so much without even making notes.
Practice is another important aspect of writing good code and problem solving. I also try to sketch up plans and break down problem but when trying advance concepts it really becomes a pain. That’s why I think that notes would be helpful to review and look that if what I’ve learned before would be helpful here or not.
1 Like
Online note keeping applications are good but I prefer having hard copies.
Though I mostly use note-taking in areas other than coding, I recommend you take notes by hand. Or, at least to write out the most important points you want to remember by hand. This has been well-studied (here’s an article by the BBC).
You might also find it helpful to write out your thought process while working on projects. Coding can be practical and is concerned with the actual writing of code. Writing out the steps you take to solve each problem will help develop your critical thinking skills and enable you to both remember information and learn how to apply that information.
5 Likes
The notes are the online documentation. What more do we need? Many very capable minds have gone into creating that resource. Are my notes ever going to equal them? No. My examples will help give them concrete meaning, though, so that’s where I pour my energy.
2 Likes
TBH it takes me a lot of time to understand the documentation. 
I really appreciate people who can figure out what’s even written there!
Every teacher or professor that I ever came to love had one thing in common in their teaching method… They interpreted. We were given examples that were then interpreted according to a given concept of the day.
It was not the rote material on the board, but what they added to their description and the little insights as to their relation to other concepts. I loved those teachers. Throw the book away. That’s not what we’re here to learn. We’re here to learn how to read that book and derive knowledge and insight through active participation with its content.
10 Likes
Documentation is one of the most important (if not the most important) tools a developer can use. It’s necessary to learn how to make use of it. Here, I’ve found a video by Codecademy that may be of help.
7 Likes
Then begin to admire yourself, soon enough. It truly is where it all begins. There are no flight attendants on this journey, just a manual, and once you have code facing the outside world, you are the pilot. Learn to read documentation. Priority number one.
1 Like
To ignore documentation is to disrespect the discipline one seeks to engage in. That is counterproductive and leads to no good end. A Primer starts us off with well documented and teachable fundamentals. That’s what program language documentation is. Maybe not the Nick and Jane variety we got as six year olds, but still much the same thing.
4 Likes
I didn’t mean to disrespect but it’s just that documentation is hard for me to understand and interpret what’s written over there. But if it’s so essential to read the documentation then I would surely give some time reading and using the documentations available. 
I actually didn’t knew about this video. Thanks for providing the link. I hope it helps me to understand documentations much better and it woud be easy for me to read docs.
Nothing helps understanding documentation better than reading it. Videos can never replace that experience.
2 Likes
I find taking notes on the more conceptual elements of programming more helpful than trying to take notes on everything. I find it more useful for me to have a highly organized bookmarks folder, where I can easily find the documentation for whatever language or framework I’m trying to use, as well as helpful articles and tutorials. That way I don’t have to google the things I know I probably won’t remember, or spend time trying to find where I wrote it down–I know it’s in the folder.
4 Likes
For me and my learning process I find that it helps to write/take notes. I have notebooks filled with them and color-coded tabs with the subject matter listed (Python: Dictionaries, functions, SQL: JOINS, etc.). I refer back to them often too. TBH, I’m a office supply store nerd. I like notebooks, pens, highlighters and the whole process of selecting them. I like organizational items as well. 
Additionally, I also have several bookmarks and folders of official documentation (Seaborn, Matplotlib, Pandas, Python, etc.) and links that I’ve found helpful from StackOverflow (or whatever) for the times I’ve been stuck and I sought out an explanation for an error. Sometimes reading how other ppl have solved errors is enlightening too…b/c everyone’s brains work differently and maybe you finally see/understand something that you hadn’t before.
And, as @mtf said, interpretation of concepts (& documentation) with examples that make sense to me is also important. Because if you can explain a concept out loud and to someone else then you’ve learned it. 
2 Likes
I usually keep notes on long and important lessons that can be easily forgotten, I usually don’t for ones that I find are easy to remember/simple.
I also will sometimes print out things that I can see myself frequently referencing (this git cheat sheet comes to mind). Having a physical copy of things sometimes is helpful!
@armaan_barak seriously, the greatest course on learning I had in my life:
Improving Your Study Technique from the University of Groningen.
It’s simple, straightforward, based on data and dutch accent.
1 Like