I will start this trilogy with something that is highly relevant in the improvement path and purpose of the blog, I want to address principles I've been practicing (and I have to practice more) to make me a better programmer. The principles set out today were taken from the book "97 Things Every Programmer Should Know".
1. Continuous learning.
It seems something extremely simple, but it is not, we live in interesting times where we can find good professionals in any corner of the planet. The big difference is that you have the ability to keep up with so many technologies.
Here's a list of ways to keep you learning:
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Read books, magazines, and websites Se você deseja se aprodundar num assunto considere entrar em uma mailing list ou em um grupo específico.
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If you really want to get immersed in a technology, get hands on — write some code.
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Get to know the frameworks and libraries you use. Knowing how something works makes you know how to use it better. Use the debugger to step through the code to see what’s going on under the hood.
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Whenever you make a mistake, fix a bug, or run into a problem, try to really understand what happened.
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A good way to learn something is to teach or speak about it. When people are going to listen to you and ask you questions, you’ll be highly motivated to learn.
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Join or start a study group or a local user group for a language, technology, or discipline you are interested in.
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Go to conferences. And if you can’t go, many conferences put their talks online for free.
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Listen to podcasts.
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Ever run a static analysis tool over the codebase or look at the warnings in your IDE? Understand what they’re reporting and why.
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Follow the advice of the Pragmatic Programmers* and learn a new language every year. At least learn a new technology or tool.
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Not everything you learn has to be about technology. Learn the domain you’re working in so you can better understand the requirements and help solve the business problem. Learning how to be more productive—how to work better—is another good option.
2. Seek mentors
Mentor is someone in a superior position hierarchically, in knowledge or experience that helps those who submit their advice to develop their abilities, skills or careers. The figure of the mentor comes from the Greek Mythology when Odysseus goes to war and trust your child to his great friend Mentor, which becomes responsible for his education and guidance.
Always try to work with a mentor, you can always learn more from someone more experienced than you. Search virtual mentors, look for authors and developers on the Web that you really like and read everything they write. Subscribe to their blogs. You'll be amazed at how people have a genuine pleasure in teaching.
Consider these two principles, they will help a lot in your and my journey to becoming a better programmer.
