[mar77i]

Similar here. It's been 10 years since I started going on on my own. I've gotta say that about half a year before my life broke down back then that I got introduced to Linux. I joined IRC channels I was interested in; #python, ##C, #Bash, and of course the distro specific channels.

I basically built up my career around my code foo and the way I was taught on IRC. Even if it may seem like a harsh environment in the beginning, they proved to have a point with the semantic perfectionism, only through which one can convey all nuances of what one is trying to say - and do.

One advice upfront, look your stuff in the original technical documentation. The C Standard, the infamous Intel Developer's manual. Learn some assembly, be it on an old 1980ies personal computer.

It's one of the big lessons how you start organizing your code flow, function and data so that you can effectively get things done and make something more from something less with what compares to hammer and chisels. I find myself fixing python code under comparable viewpoints today; being thrifty of what types an object may take, being explicit with comparisons, etc.

The thing that lets this compare to training Karate I once heard in the context of chess; "It's you who is manufacturing your own checkmate". To have a comfortable, easy to modify codebase is infinite work, but the more intention you put into the detail, the less you need to care about the bigger picture. Good code is equivalent to but the intention behind it.