| It's not easy to overcome that inertia without the passion for programming itself. I have two suggestions: 1. Start small Don't start with Java. Find something simple as hell, like QBASIC[1], or easy as hell (to begin with) like Ruby or Python. Play. I repeat: Play. Play. Play. Play with the language. Let it be fun. Let yourself be childlike about it. Focus on messing around and seeing what you can do. At some point, you'll realize that you're six layers of "I wonder if..." deep, and at this point, I officially declare you to be a Programmer. 2. Start big Find a problem you want to solve. Here are some examples: - "I can't believe there isn't an iPhone app for tracking what kind of burgers you eat."
- "I hate how I never know when a Hacker News post involving Tim Ferriss has been submitted."
- "Wouldn't it be great if I never had to e-mail myself a file again?" Footnotes [1] - Renowned computer scientist Edsger Dijkstra would opine that any programmer whose first language was in the BASIC family tree is forever warped in the most vital parts of their brain. I cannot confirm nor deny this, but my potentially-warped brain has served me quite well. Many of these types of problems already have answers, like the third one (the answer is Dropbox). But the practice of researching them and finding existing answers is just as much a part of programming as is the writing of code. |