[graeme]

I did all the exercises.

1. At the time, I could code the kinds of things K & R had me do. But, I couldn't, say, run a wordpress site, because that depends on knowing libraries, how to run php on my system, a bunch of php specific stuff, and other stuff I don't even know I didn't know 2. It's been five years. Without practice, I no longer can do the stuff I did while I was learning. I could pick it up again, I just mean the knowledge isn't currently available.

Basically, I had no project that required me to use the skills, so they didn't grow past what I picked up, and then they atrophied. Pressing business concerns became more important.

But, now I'm at a point where not being able to program has become more of a hindrance.

[p1esk]

Seems like what you need is to learn how to do specific tasks for you site, not learn how to program.

When you need to fix a toilet you don't usually start with learning hydrodynamics.

[graeme]

Ah, yes, I just looked over the exercises more closely. They seem above the level I'd need. I should probably use something like Treehouse or Codeschool that's more focussed on practical management I'm guessing.

[nulagrithom]

Actually, I think this highlights a problem with so much of the content out there about learning to code. Back to the toilet analogy:

> When you need to fix a toilet you don't usually start with learning hydrodynamics.

I think that's wrong. You weren't taught hydrodynamics. You were taught how a toilet works and then ran in to a plumbing problem. The issue is there isn't much out there on plumbing, so to speak. It reminds me of The Cliff of Confusion and The Desert of Despair.[0]

There's tons of hand-holding tutorials that will teach you the basic syntax of JavaScript or PHP, but once you're set loose in to the real world, where we're no longer just reversing strings and other trivial exercises, there's surprisingly few tutorials available (I suspect because it's way easier to write about simple facts than it is opinionated best practices, but that's a different topic...)

I don't really have any silver-bullet for you here. The "knowing libraries, how to run php on my system, a bunch of php specific stuff" part is mostly a matter of tenacity, Googling, and reading tons of dry technical documentation. It takes a while before the big picture starts to click.

[0] http://www.vikingcodeschool.com/posts/why-learning-to-code-i...

[graeme]

Good article. I'd say I indeed got to the cliff of confusion. Then, I simply stopped in the desert of despair, because business took off and I had a better alternative.

I'm guessing a school like viking would mean I basically do no business developmemt for the three months it takes, right?

[p1esk]

Come on. This is a trivial situation, no need to lament the status quo. What the OP needs is to spend a couple of hours learning PHP syntax/infrastructure, then attempt to solve his specific problem. If he does not know how to start/gets an error, the solution is probably on SO somewhere.

60k questions: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/php+wordpress

Add the keyword specific to the problem, and if can't find it, just post a new question.

[BigJono]

> the solution is probably on SO somewhere

SO (especially the PHP and JS parts) is full of terrible answers that basically instruct people to throw darts at the board until one hits, without explaining any of the underlying concepts behind what's happening.

This sounds like a great strategy if OP wants to become a mediocre programmer.

[p1esk]

It does not look like OP wants to become a programmer. He wants to "better work with my programmer, and make some small modifications myself".

For that, there's no need to go deeper than what I suggested.