Aminah Writes
November 13, 2022

Okay, So I'm Learning Python, Right?...šŸ

My first foray into the world of software development came by way of PHP, as I was doing some Wordpress website design as a side hustle, but also because I liked it a lot. I didnā€™t enjoy it too much (PHP, that is), as it was very confusing without context.

The next language I learned was Ruby, which had more context since I was learning it in a coding boot camp. It was okay, but because I couldnā€™t grasp object-oriented programming at the time, I didnā€™t feel fully comfortable hanging around with Ruby.

The next next language was JavaScript, which was, and still is, where I feel most at home. I was quickly able to pick it up, and OOP was even easy for me to grasp there. Iā€™ve been working with JavaScript since, and itā€™s been really difficult to try to make a home in any other language, despite knowing that itā€™s something I have to do if I want to grow as a developer.

So, I recently decided to learn Python for the simple fact that I wanted to. Iā€™ve dabbled in it before, but never really sat down and tried to understand it. When I worked at AWS, it was a must to learn the basics, since it was the easiest way to interact with the AWS product line. Even though that was the case, I still had hesitations around learning the language.

No matter how hard I tried, I just couldnā€™t seem to leave my comfortable JavaScript house.

Now, working as a software developer with a blockchain DAO, I feel invigorated when I think of being able to learn Python. Somehow, Iā€™m excited to know that I can expand my programming tool belt, whereas before, it felt more like a burden because there was so much I had to learn, non-programming-wise, to keep up with my job at AWS.

Although I'm really really learning it now because we're going to use Python as the backend language for a new product we're about to start working on at work, I'm still really learning it because I think it's just a cool language to know.

It's so versatile, and hearing my tech lead excitedly talk about it doesn't hurt either.

The two and a half resources I'm using to learn are the following:

Python Programming: An Introduction to Computer Science - for theoretical knowledge with some hands-on practice; an overall picture of Python and all its use-cases with a comp-sci flavoring

boot.dev - for more interactive learning; more geared for backend work

Real Python - the half part, because it's mostly tips and tricks to get deeper into the programming language

So far, it's been really good! My only concern is that I don't spend as much time on my JavaScript continued education, which I hope irons itself out naturally as I become more comfortable with Python.

I'll keep y'all updated.

āˆž Aminah