What should I do Before I give up programming?

I’m in the verge of giving up programming and wondering what could I do before I give up to make sure I did what everyone did.

I’ve a bachelors degree in computer science. I didn’t do it as well as I’d have liked to do, but that degree has gave me familiarity with most terms used in basic programming.

I spent last 3 months working on web development(I’m learning MERN). I learnt html,css,bootstrap, javascript and react till date(In bootcamp), but I failed to learn React. Even javascript, i’m no expert at. Even css, I learnt the basics but I’m not an expert when it comes to building half decent sites. Same for bootstrap. I can carve a site using html,css,bootstrap but it won’t look good. I was completely impossible to learn when it came to react. Whenever I saw usage of useEffect and useState hooks and we start making changes in 10 different files for it, it confused me and I understood nothing.

I had access to world’s best resources to learn books, tutorials, blogs, youtube, udemy etc. I had access to forums like this to get help and support but still this was tough for me.

I feel unlucky, sad and hopeless atm. Friends who were weaker than me in conventional college studies and academia have done jobs and internships but I’m failing to even learn something properly. I’m not jealous of them but just feel trash about myself.

People say do projects to learn but I really don’t know how that works. For eg: https://codepen.io/pelko/pen/MWBpNmL This project. I make stupid stuffs like these and can’t produce a good output that is playable. It’s too hard for me.
These are some of my projects.
https://htmlcssbasicsite999.netlify.app/

https://counterapp999.netlify.app/

https://dicegame999.netlify.app/

https://digitalclock999.netlify.app/

https://portfoliosite999.netlify.app/

I did all these projects without looking any tutorials.

I keep forgetting how I built something time and again. I nowadays try my best to add documentation though.

I’m 70% sure to give up programming but still I"d like to make sure I follow advices from fellow forum users about it who’ve spent their life around programming.

In 3 months, I am seeing no progress, except few days like:

  1. When I carved a site on my own using html,css without looking tutorials.

  2. When I carved a site on my own using bootstrap without looking tutorials.

My problems:

  1. I’ve not break through’ed in programming. If I can make anything with javascript that’s over 500 lines of code, I’d consider that a breakthrough. I’m aware LOC aren’t a good metric but please try to understand what I’m trying to say. A big application using programming.

  2. Even in css, I failed to make presentable sites. The coding bootcamp I feel is going too fast as well. Same for bootstrap, I made sites but I failed ot create beautiful sites. People recommend me frontendmentor.io but IDK what to do there? It looks sketchy to me. If there is something that can teach me css, I’d be so grateful.

  3. After watching tutorials, I can’t repeat what they’ve done in tutorial without watching the tutorial of project even though I understand each and every step they do in project.

  4. I still am not fluent in ES6. I can’t think in ES6. Arrow functions, map, reduce etc. I Understand them, but using them is different ballgame.

If you understand my situation, please guide me. I don’t need roadmaps, any more tutorials but plain old guidance and advice on what to do by people who went through this situation

Knowing CSS does not mean that you know how to design. Learning to make good webdesigns is a separate field and takes years of studying and experience. So being able to do that after a bootcamp is too much to ask and not necessarily a requirement if you want to do frontend development. You could work in a team with designers whose designs you would implement. Same for frontend development. It takes time.

I think the most important question is why did you start learning frontend development and do you enjoy learning it?

6 Likes

I don’t think you should give up completely. You aren’t alone in how your feeling I can tell you that. It gets hard at times and you get frustrated your not seeing the progress you want to be seeing but, there is progress happening. You mentioned that now you can carve a site using html, css, without looking at tutorials. That’s progress. It may not feel like much but, it is. It’s small but still progress at the end of the day. I can’t even do that if I’m being fully honest… I just started my coding journey and I’ve had the same thought of giving up.

Keep in mind that everyone learns different and at a different pace. If you are struggling with something… if you can, skip it and come back to it at another time.

Maybe try putting a bit of less pressure on yourself. Take a step back from learning to where it doesn’t feel to be forced ya know?

Hope I was helpful

1 Like

Hi, there
Becoming an expert in any language in just 3 months is a complete nonsense - it sounds to me like you are too demanding to yourself and thus whatever you learn, it always feels like there is no progress. I do and feel sometimes the same - but after few hours of self-hating and “crying” - I remind myself of my other non programming job I used to have and how hopeless and frustrated I was the first 3 or even 6 months, and how I was teaching newbies after 2 years in a position. It takes time to understand things, but it takes even more time to start doing things unconsciously.
I looked your projects - the htmlcssbasicsite999 and portfolio looks nice to me - what I miss a lot is scaling (responsiveness) - page layout doesn’t adjust on resizing the screen. You can achieve this with plain CSS3 - no React or whatever libraries needed for that. Try to learn and apply those and I am sure you will notice that you made a progress! (save the current state of websites for later comparison).

For Frond-End Dev you don’t need to be a designer - most companies have a separate people who do design and you as a developer get a picture with expected layout, colors, description of interactivity and have to code that picture into a live webpage.

Another thing, it is very important to understand where exactly you get stuck! Sometimes it’s not obvious. For example, I learned JS until I didn’t get it, I learned C#, C++ and now finishing course on Python - only now I realize where are my black holes as I noticed I get stuck in every language with similar problems. I might not realized that if I didn’t try to approach programming through various languages.

To conclude:
if you want to quit because you feel not clever enough to do it - don’t quit. Take couple of days of rest, then either set small goals - to learn one concept a day and implement it, or learn something totally different, like Introduction to Game Development or Introduction to DevOps for example - will be useful anyway and get back to your chosen track.

Else, if you understand it but it’s just too boring - this is the valid reason to quit and do something else! Maybe not Front-End, maybe not programming related at all.

1 Like

hello :slight_smile:

do you like programming ?

if (answer == "yes")
  then "don't quit"
elsif (css != "important")
  then "don't quit"
elsif (make_code_more_than_500lines not true)
  then "don't quit and find ideas about personal projeect"
end

programming is all about practice, practice make perfect
so if you like programming, don’t worry about javascript perfection or css understanding, just practice and find your way !

3 Likes

can you suggest a micro level roadmap on what should I do now in order to learn programming?

yup …

first, write on blank file what are your programming skills …
is it enough to master some programming fields ?

if not, then try or retry to master another technology
if you know html / css / js, try to make more complexe project

maybe retry to make project with react

set yourself goals to go forward