[ecb_penguin]

There's nothing wrong with using something before learning it. In fact, I'd argue most people can't learn something without first using it.

You can read all the programming books in the world. Actually writing a hello world program will teach you far more.

If you want to learn to play guitar, you need to start practicing simple chords long before you ever learn theory.

[cousinbryce]

Both right. Sucking at something is the first step to being kind of good at something. At the same time doing that in a professional environment sucks for your coworkers

[ecb_penguin]

> At the same time doing that in a professional environment sucks for your coworkers

The vast majority of what we learn is in a professional environment. I can't build a hobby app with hundreds of millions of active users. We learn at work, and that means sometimes it sucks. But that's why we have blameless cultures, because we all realize you can't learn unless you first do it in a shitty way.

It's also why AI replacing juniors is terrible. Juniors need to make mistakes and figure things out. That's how they become experienced seniors.

[pkal]

Then perhaps "Did you learn X stating your opinion on it as though it were comprehensive and authoritative"?

[bryanrasmussen]

but in the same way nobody writes a hello world programming in any language without first reading enough of the language specification to write that hello world program.

on edit: yes, HN cleverboots et al, I should not have written "language specification", you got me! However I challenge anyone of the especially clever people here to go write a hello world in some programming language that you know nothing about, without first looking up how to do it.

That is to say that while hardly anybody "learns the language" to write hello world, they do learn exactly enough of the language to do just that, and continue from there, until they get to some point at which they may feel to get deeper into the language. Thus the parent comment about people not learning the language was not exactly correct either.

[oneeyedpigeon]

I think you would be surprised by how many people write hello world without reading a single character of the language specification! In fact, I would be amazed if it weren't even the majority of new programmers.

[ecb_penguin]

Absolutely no one has read a language specification before writing hello world.

Even as a developer with 30+ years experience, I'll write a dozen simple programs before I ever read a specification...

I'm looking for examples of basic control blocks, not esoteric edge cases for advanced features I don't yet care about.

[satvikpendem]

I think they meant to say docs not language specification, which I agree with.

[j2kun]

+1 my point is that, if you didn't learn it, you need a humble attitude. And in the context of software you're building as part of your profession, not learning it well is a bigger problem than hobby pursuits.