[icedchai]

Learning is part of the job. Finding information on technical topics is soooo much easier today than it was 20 or 30 years ago! Watch youtube, download an ebook, look at somebody's blog. When I as a young teenager, learning about programming in the early 90's, I had to convince my parents to order physical books that would take weeks to arrive.

[throwaway1183]

> Learning is part of the job.

I don't know what to say. For example, I recently designed some webpage or made some prototype app using X framework in Y language. Do you consider that I learnt something?

I don't know, I feel like that isn't learning. I just made the thing work because I read some stuff, processed information and did some hit and trial.

Compared that to something like "ah hah!" moments; those are extremely rare at work. It only happens at debugging. The reason why I am stating it is because I have forgotten a lot of these things. What stuck with me are the basics and foundations and it took years to be reinforced.

I doubt you will find a job where you get to learn in a proper way.

[icedchai]

Yes, I would consider that learning something! You figured some things out after reading stuff. Presumably, some of that information was retained and will help you in the future. Maybe you don't remember all of it, or even most of it, but if you see the same pattern again, hopefully you'll know where to look.

I run into "average" developers who won't even look for an answer. They don't realize their problem has probably been solved many, many times before. They'll attempt to reinvent the wheel instead of using a proven solution like an existing library. They'll literally stare at an error message, not paste it into Google, then tell the team they're "blocked" a couple days later. How about asking someone?

What is the "proper way" of learning to you? Do you want to be taught in a classroom?

[throwaway1183]

> They don't realize their problem has probably been solved many, many times before. They'll attempt to reinvent the wheel instead of using a proven solution like an existing library. They'll literally stare at an error message, not paste it into Google, then tell the team they're "blocked" a couple days later

That just sucks. And that is the average? I have really skewed view of average then! Because I think of myself as average and I don't do any of those stuffs. I am actively seeking solutions and methods. If I had to write from scratch, I would only do when there is hard requirement and a proper reference exists. Without proper reference it would be a nightmare!

> What is the "proper way" of learning to you? Do you want to be taught in a classroom?

I never believed in learning at the classroom. It never worked for me as I got bored and tired. Sometimes when I was stuck, classroom helped but most of the time I couldn't focus.

For me proper learning requires immersion and building intuition. There is factual learning where I just take facts for granted. Then there is building intuition and understanding why the facts are like so. If I can follow these patterns, I reach a state where I will have solid high level intuition of a topic and I call myself to be learned. Once I am at that stage, I can create and think of new ideas/triggers ultimately allowing me to see patterns of possibilities. When I don't reach there, I don't feel I have done my work on learning.

It takes a lot, and genuinely a lot of time to reach that state of mind. And even if you reach there, it is under constant threat of being overwritten by other memories. However, once you have a baseline, you can easily remember more facts and how to do things.

I hope it makes sense!