A Coding Story

[yahoodevelopers]

By Julie Shin Choi

Yahoo was turned upside down in the best kind of way as developers descended in droves upon our Sunnyvale campus this weekend. Over the span of two full days, hackers from all around the world spent their time, energies, and talents to collaborate with fellow developers...

[smilincolleen]

Useful Chrome Extensions

For my experience at DBC 4 chrome extensions have been useful. 

RubyDoc Search

Ruby on Rails API Search

MDN Search

LiveReload (mentioned before) I'd suggest installing them. The worst that happens is you forget to use them. I enjoy saving the clicks when using them versus searching and clicking on the documentation link in the google search

[smilincolleen]

Phase 3

I meant to type this up sooner. I just wanted to relax after I finally finished phase 3. Phase 3 started off with just getting thrown into Rails on the first day but it wasn't even so bad.  But then Tuesday was testing. It was broken down so it was easier and seemed fun. On Wednesday we had to do TDD and that wasn't as easy since we were writing tests that were for our own code before writing our code and we were also using Rails for the second time or so. After many hours of struggling we all had a lecture on testing. I'm not even sure how beneficial that was after such a draining day. That TDD on Wednesday was the first day of a group project. The second day of the project I was out sick. I finally caught the stomach bug that was going around. That was a day we had to take another group's project and work on that and a different group took over our project. I did some learning at home but didn't work on the projects. I was back to class on Friday but still felt pretty miserable. From not eating for a day and a half, I was so lightheaded pretty much all the time. It's extremely difficult to code especially code something new when your head is foggy. I am actually impressed with how much I was able to accomplish.  My group also worked on the weekend on our projects. On Monday we presented our projects. Our group winged who was talking about what. I hate the winging. Someone just starts and keeps going and then talks about things I thought I'd talk about and then it stresses me out.  They weren't official presentations or anything so it didn't really matter.  I sort of forget what we did during that week on Tuesday and Wednesday. I think we did a few problems in Socrates to just practice or learn a few things.  Then on Thursday of week 2 the fun began. In the morning, we had pitches. Everyone voted. The top 4 pitches were chosen. We were put into teams and we began working. We worked hardcore. My group came in on Saturday to work but worked from home on Sunday. (I postedsomewhere in the middle of our hardcore work.) We continued to work hardcore until late Thursday night. Friday we had presentations and we were still putting together our presentation on Friday morning. That stressed me out too. I had sent screen shots to be included Thursday  night. I suggested using a google presentation so we could edit it ourselves but my team didn't start one. Then I get in on Friday and learn I still have to put all my screen shots in a presentation that is in fact using google which was my suggestion of earlier. I would have much rather gone to bed with my slides set up. Well it was go time and I felt we didn't have enough screen shots. Then we presented and didn't use everything anyway because we ran low on time since the first presenter out of the 3 of us took up 6 of our 10 minutes. Once presentations were over we breathed a little sigh of relief. Then we had a presentation from KISSmetrics and ate lunch. Then we were told some stuff about LinkedIn profiles and how to update ours. We were given some time to update them but I didn't do that since I could barely say my words correctly by this point since I was so tired. It was a very long day for me. I already posted about it once so I guess I didn't need to say some info above. During the last week, I spent 2 nights at the hacker house so I didn't have to spend a really long time commuting. The first night I didn't get much work done since I was sort of stuck. The second night, I was up past 2 AM and stuck again and not accomplishing much. I ruled out a lot of ways to do the money though. During the last week of Phase 3, my sleep duration was even less than it had been during DBC. Earlier I showed how I was at 6:46 on average a night for a month in DBC well the last week, I was at 6:16. That is not enough sleep for a non-pregnant me and it surely wasn't enough sleep while I was pregnant. I needed the weekend to recover and sleep more. Friday night I only slept about 8 hours. I wanted to sleep 14 or more but my body woke me up by 8 am. If you want to see our app you can go to http://live-together.herokuapp.com and you don't really  need to put in real email addresses or addresses but then you won't get to test out the email features for things.  You can view the code on github too.

[smilincolleen]

Dev Bootcamp Phase 2 Tips

I made a post with some Phase 1 tips so I thought I should try to do the same with phase 2.

Embrace that you will feel like you're drowning with so many new things all at once. If you realize that everyone is struggling and that slowly it will get better, it won't seem as bad early on. I feel like the phase before me did a really good job preparing us for the worst so then it didn't seem so bad. But I mean it was really hard to learn so much all at once it just wasn't as bad as I was expecting.

Don't constantly compare yourself to others.  This is the same as my tip for Phase 1 but this time,  I was thinking about some people with prior front end experience. Sometimes I was paired with them and was constantly comparing myself to their level of knowledge and then thinking I was behind. I had to put it in perspective that they already did it before. 

Don't kill yourself to complete an assignment.  This is more true in Phase 2. There was pretty much no way anyone was finishing all the assignments. Just make sure you are learning and doing something with each topic. 

Sleep. Don't be afraid to sleep on the couches at DBC during lunch. I may take your picture, but the rest will be good.

Check in on people in Phase 1. The break from Phase 2 work actually helps you figure something out when you sit back down. You also get to brush up on your Phase 1 knowledge while helping.

Utilize the Pairing Sessions with Teachers. Sign-up for a 30 minute pairing session each week with the teachers or TA. If both have slots, sign-up for both. You will learn more in that 30 minutes than 2 hour struggling on your own. Or you will discover that you might have actually retained some information over the previous week even though you kept thinking you might not really know any of it.

Pair for part of the day on solo optional days. I think talking through a problem helps versus sitting alone. I would struggle longer when alone. If I was with a pair for some reason if we were both stuck I was more likely to ask versus if I was just stuck myself.  Many people seem to like to pair for half a day so it works out perfectly.

Utilize part of each solo day for portfolio challenges. You may not get through all the core assignments for the day (or you won't for sure). But if you spend some time when TAs or teachers are around to ask, it is really beneficial. I didn't do this as much as others and then on the 2nd weekend, I was at home struggling with a few that probably could have been sped up if I asked a question at some point.

Have fun with your programs. If you like to make something a little prettier with css do that because it will make you have a little more fun when completing your program.

Get the MDN chrome extension. It's helpful on all the css assignments. (While you are at it, download the extension for Ruby docs too. It's awesome to type MDN space into the address bar and then just type what you want to search for. 

All of my tips for Phase 1 still hold true too.

[smilincolleen]

Reload Magic When Editing a Webpage

OK it's not really magic but you know how you edit some files in sublime then you have to go over and click refresh on the webpage that you are working on. Well now with this you don't have to and it automatically uploads.  Go to sublime.  Hit command + shift + P and install package Live Reload. If you don't have Install Package like I didn't use https://sublime.wbond.net/installation#st2 and copy that in to sublime.  Then get the chrome extension Live Reload.  Restart sublime (again if you had to install package control).  Go to the tab that has the website you are working on. (For Dev Bootcamp we use shotgun so that still has to be running.)  Click on your new icon in the corner for Live Reload to enable it for that tab.  Then like magic you update sublime and click save and your webpage updates.  It's quite cool.  I hope I got all those steps right. I started to get too excited that it worked and stopped remembering everything I did. 

[smilincolleen]

git tip

So I've been cloning repositories for weeks now because we are always given a skeleton to start with. And each time a weird folder was created with random letters and numbers and I've have to rename it. Well just recently I learned a better way to do this. 

type: git clone <url for the clone> <folder you want all the stuff in>

The folder is freshly created as you do this.

For example I was starting a drop down menu problem and got the skeleton as follows:

git clone https://gist.github.com/c1e790667d9240f80b7a.git drop_down_menu

I actually learned this tip because my husband was watching me as I was cloning a repository and said he'd kill me if I cloned it then manually renamed the folder in a next step. So under the threat of death I asked him how you do it then. 

[smilincolleen]

Week 4, Day 4

I was going to put what total day it is but thinking was too hard. It was challenging enough to figure out it's Thursday. 

We spent the day doing css. I did enjoy the exercises but probably should have skipped them and worked on portfolio exercises. I liked the less challenging day though.  I wanted to leave early and work at home but we had a meeting at 6 to discuss feedback. It went so long that I had to catch the 7:30 train versus 6:30 or 7.  And then I get to the train station and wait forever to board. I keep checking if it says the train is departing on-time and it does say it. Usually we board 15 minutes before departure. Today at 7:25, we started boarding. They didn't check for tickets going on either. I get on and there are some really talkative guys behind me. Then they come on the loud speaker to announce something but the speaker in our car doesn't work. We'd have to be quiet to hear from the other cars but those guys just never shut up. I hear something about a 20 minute delay. Dave looked it up for me and told me that a train hit a car around 6 so delays were likely.   So I had to rush out of DBC to get to the train and then didn't have to rush. And I rushed so I didn't have time to grab food so that sucked.  I really do think I'll become one of those people that never leaves their house. I am not sure I can handle 5 more weeks of public transportation.   I didn't walk to the train station today because my plantar fasciitis is so bad that my feet have been hurting all day. 

I got home, showered, had some cheese and crackers for dinner, and got back to coding until I couldn't keep my eyes open anymore. But then I decided to blog quickly and am more awake but still going to go to sleep. It is far too late.  I got to bike from home to the train station today since my new light arrived. It sure was nice biking home in the dark WITH a light. I never enjoyed it so much. Granted I really do hate biking home when I'm so exhausted in the evenings. 

[smilincolleen]

Day 17 (Phase 2, Day 2)

Our day started with an Engineering Empathy Session on Sexism. I've heard good things about this session so I was glad my group had it.  It was quite interesting.  

At one point we had to pair up with someone in the room we knew the least. I picked Seth because we hadn't paired yet and I think I spoke to him on 2 occasions. We were supposed to look at the person and then guess their favorite music, what they are afraid of, and their hobby. We've spent 3 weeks together in class so it wasn't like a total stranger. There were a few people in the class we met a day or so earlier and that would have been more interesting. 

With 3 weeks in class, we both used our predictions of what we observed in the 1 hour lecture or so a day and we were both pretty much right on. We were both way off for music. He got my hobby but my avatar gives that away. I sort of guess a hobby based on one conversation.  Other people had to size up the other person based on their clothes and they were way off.  When someone asks me what I'm afraid of, the first thing I think of his heights but what Seth said was very good. I forget his exact wording and he said 2 things and both ended up right on. One was about being afraid of not being appreciated. I never really think about this but once he mentioned it, I had a harder time concentrating just thinking how true that was. I think the other had to do with being listened to when I talk. I forget his exact wording but his exact wording triggered thoughts directly in my head that were 100% accurate. Too bad we learned so much all day that I forget the details from earlier in the day.  I won't disclose Seth's fears here but I'm shocked how right I was.   One thing about that exercise made me kind of afraid that my guesses would offend. I wasn't so much afraid of what the other person would guess for me.   I almost wish I could do something similar with every person in the class to see how they perceive me. 

At one point we all had to stand in a circle. A statement was read and if it was true of us we took a step toward the center of the circle. Then you got to see who was in the circle with you or who stepped in when you didn't. There were 15 statements. Some statements were like "I was born in this country." or "I had books readily available when I was a child." or "I was told I was smart and could do anything I wanted when I was younger."   Even when the statement was positive and I stepped forward it still made me sad to think how the positive statement wasn't true for some people.  Man these pregnancy hormones are crazy because I really wanted to cry a few times during that "game" and even afterward when we were asked our reactions of the exercise.  I wanted to speak up and mention some things I thought about but then thought I might actually cry so I didn't.  During our EE session sometimes the slides just had a few words on them and they triggered a lot of thought.  One slide had 

Act like a lady Take it like a man

We had women go first at one point and just shout out different things were were told or that were drilled in our heads throughout our lives on how we had to act or behave like women. Next the guys went next.  It was just so odd to hear.  The women part was a little odd since there were only 5 females in the room so each of us had to do more talking to fill the time. 

We talked about the different types of oppression (insittional, interpersonal, and internalized)

A few other slides I wrote down where. 

Allyship If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.  How to be an Ally Notice Empathize Interrupt Interrupting Sexism What you said was sexist vs. You are sexist.

This session only lasted 1.5 hours. The time really flew. I feel that we covered a lot.

Once EE was over,  we did soloing versus pair programming. We could work with a pari if we wanted. Close to 12, Mark and I decided to pair up versus working solo. When I'm stuck and talk it through out loud it helps me solve it better and I was getting nowhere solo so I was glad he suggested pairing up.

When lunch started, I interrupted the Phase 2 teacher just to let her know I'm pregnant. I figured I should let her know since everyone else knows. The past 2 days I've had on this sweater that you can tie but I have hanging down and it's huge so I think it disguises the belly more. She hadn't realized I was pregnant. She also doesn't really know anyone in the class so she's trying to learn all that.  We only talked for a couple minutes but I'm glad I told her. I mean sometimes I get lightheaded or I get up way more often to go to the bathroom and I drink way more water than I used to so end up refilling my water bottle so now she might realize why all that is happening. 

At 2 we had a lecture on Active Record. I was surprised how fast that hour went. We were took to make sure we read if we haven't read the Active Record info on migrations, validations, associations, and query interfaces. She suggested that we all create a list of different methods we discover and like. There are a few listed in the Rails Guides but not all. She mentioned find_or_create_by and pluck. I haven't used either. Both seem fun.  When creating your migration tables, I learned today that you can type "t.references :<other table name>" instead of having to say "t.belongs to :<other table name>" and Active Record does the thought for you.  This may also be in place of something like "t.integer :<other table>_id."  I learned a little bit about psql.  I will probably forget most of it but it's cool. You type "psql <folder name>_development" then "\d" and then you can do cool stuff like sql queries to see your tables and data. The bad part is that it does not auto complete the folder name, but now I just know to make my names even easier and shorter.   I've often been curious how a join table should list the tables together like if you want to join students and classes which would go first. Well I learned today that Rails like them alphabetical so it would be "classes_students" and note both are plural. Some conventions have the first word singular which is what we actually learned last week.  In addition to has many you can also have has many through. You would use a has_many through if you have additional information in your join table. Then the join table is not just for ids but for some other piece of information.  I don't think we even go through all the information she wanted to cover. 

At 3, I had my first one on one session with the teacher. I was stressing because usually I'm further into a portfolio problem before a session so I can have specific questions and here I was pretty confused.  We just worked through it together. She helped me with some stuff and I mentioned where something might go (like file name and in what folder) and I was usually right but each time I said it, I said it like I was unsure (because I was unsure).  We had about 20 minutes in our session since lecture ran late but I feel like we got a lot accomplished and I learned a lot. I wish I wrote down a few things because now I forget what she said exactly. One thing was about sublime shortcuts for erb files. You can download something that has some shortcuts or you can make your own. I don't know how to make my own and I don't remember the name of what it is that I should download.  It was mentor night so we got free pizza. It was nice to have a dinner at a normal hour. 

Each day I write these posts, I feel like I leave out so much that happens and so much that I do and then I look up and realize I have a really long post. I often want to actually write coding examples but then think how I already have no time so I don't get to it. 

[smilincolleen]

Common Rake Commands Used So Far

rake generate:model NAME=model_name   (btw this is singular like note)

rake generate:migration NAME=create_model_migration (btw this is plural like create_notes)

rake db:drop

rake db:create

rake db:migrate

rake console

shotgun I've only been using them a few days. The first 2 I have to look up each time but I've already got the others down. 

[smilincolleen]

Dev Bootcamp Day 16 (Phase 2, Day 1)

Throughout the morning, we didn't do any coding as is with the first day of any phase.  We started off welcoming the new cohort. It's odd being on the other end of everything.  The ice breakers were odd again. This time I ended up with people not in my cohort. I tried to match up with someone from the new cohort but that only happened 1 in 4 times. I ended up with a TA one of the times.  

When Phase 1 went in to have some Phase 1 stuff, Phase 3 taught the new Phase 2 9 topics. That made a lot less scared. I was so overwhelmed based on the prep work but that made me feel better.  

The topics that I remember are HTML, CSS, AJAX, jQuery, CRUD, ActiveRecord, Git, and debugging.  Some of those were even grouped together so I actually remembered less than 1/3 of the topics.  I had to sit down twice. I was ready to pass out. I think standing normally isn't so bad but standing right after I eat causes me more problems.  I was able to stand for 15 minutes before having to sit. I sat for a little under 5 minutes and then I was able to stand for 10 minutes. But then I really had to sit again. Sitting for 5 minutes helped and then I was able to stand again for the rest of the stations. 

Once that was done, we had to teach Phase 1 topics.  That was mostly fun. It was good to explain and answer questions. We also didn't teach alone so there wasn't as much pressure that perhaps someone would ask something I didn't know.  There were 9 boards but we were short on time so we only did 8 of them.  Then it was lunch time. By the time I got to the food, choices were lacking. I did get a tuna which was good because that was the only one left that I was able to eat. I didn't get lightheaded at all teaching. Perhaps the adrenaline of teaching helped. 

At 2 PM we had an hour long lecture. That was a little bit rough. I was so tired. I believe most people were so tired. I went and got a snack to much on while listening.   We covered so many files and so many things that it was so hard to follow. 

I do really like with Phase 2 that there is a schedule so you know what you will do and when.  I also like that the instructor, Anne, uses Screenflow so we can view the lectures later. I just have to figure out where they will be. 

Based on the schedule we won't have any time during 9-6 to work on our portfolio challenges except when we set up our 1 on 1 sessions with the TAs/Instructors. Those sessions last 30 minutes. Based on how many challenges there are, they recommend doing 4 the first week, 4 the second week, and 2 the third week. They are all due by Tuesday at midnight the second week. 

We had 2 core assignments plus 1 stretch assignment for the day.  We only started coding at 3 PM so I thought that was a lot. 

We were not making ruby code and running it in terminal; we were taking a base repository that had a lot of things done for us and then making a few updates so that a previous program we created was displayed in a website. 

The second program was an anagram server. We had a dictionary of more than 25,000 words. Then in the website, a user would give a word. The output would show that word plus all anagrams of that word.  My pair and I thought this through. We didn't just want to compare each and every word in the dictionary to the given word because that would take forever.   Next we thought of taking the length of the word and only comparing it to words in the dictionary of that length.  To compare the words we were sorting the letters via an array.  We thought this might still be too long.  Then we decided to update our schema to have the word and then the word sorted alphabetically then each time, we didn't have to sort the letters since they were already in the table. While working through this all we were noticing other groups finishing up and couldn't believe it. Then later we get to Anagrams 2 where we were supposed to speed up our first problem.  Well we thought in advance how it would be slow so we finished problem 2 before even realizing it was a problem.   I felt like we had a real win there.  Instead of being far from completing our assignments we were done at 6:53. I knew I could rush to the train station walking and make the 7:30 train so that's what I did. I made the train by less than 5 minutes and I rushed walking. I think the bus would have been longer because of waiting for it and traffic.  It's always super nice to be able to take the 7:30 train versus the 8:40 train at least once a week. 

My usb internet thing wouldn't work at all on the train again. It works less than half the time. I was going to try to start the first portfolio challenge but I needed to read the assignment and get the base files so I couldn't. So instead of working I typed this blog post and ate cheez itz. I did bite my cheek numerous times! I got off the train to discover my bike head light had been stolen. That was a scary bike ride home.  Then I got home and was going to shower, eat dinner, then code. Instead I showered and rested then climbed into bed.  Even with that I won't get 8 hours of sleep.

[smilincolleen]

Dev Bootcamp Phase 1 Tips

Don't constantly compare yourself to others.  Everyone will be at a slightly different place starting out but it will even out. 

Don't kill yourself to complete an assignment.  Staying up late to finish an assignment may not help you learn anything new and then the following day you will be tired and not absorb as much new information.

Don't be afraid of the pairing process.  I was afraid when I started because I just assumed my partner would know more than me. It is better to not assume that and just voice your concerns. You might know more in 1 area and they might know more in another so then pairing is really beneficial. 

Sleep. Try to sleep a normal amount. I've been sleeping less than that and it's starting to catch up with me. You can also tell that classmates are the same way. We are starting to work slower now because of exhaustion. 

Ask questions. Don't even wait until you are stuck for a long time. If you think you might not figure it out or might figure it out but be confused, put up the flag that TAs know to come over. Sometimes they are helping others and you figure it out before they make it over. Then you can take down the flag. 

[smilincolleen]

Week 3

Week 3 was awesome because I really liked SQL. Then I heard we won't use it. Active Record was totally new and tricky to get used to but I liked it too. I liked it but we were all so much slower with our assignments so the fact that I had to leave by 8 meant I was far from getting all the assignments done. But I wasn't so concerned with completing the numbers if I understood what I was doing. I hope I remember though. The extra problems really help with reinforcement. The more I use something the easier it is to remember. 

Week 3 ended with graduation and then a graduation party. I left at 8 but it was still going on. The party was offsite. 

Week 3 is the end of Phase 1. Phase 2 prep starts almost immediately. I wish I actually had the prep earlier since there is so much reading that it'd have been nice to be able to do that on the train if I wasn't sleeping. 

[smilincolleen]

Dev Bootcamp Week 2

I really need to start remembering to post my files I start typing in text files so this is a week late!

Week 2 was less stressful than week 1. I believe the workload was more. I knew the material less. Yet I was stressed less.  I even really struggled on Tuesday with an assignment.  I even tried to redo it after I solved it and still struggled. The rest of the week built off of Tuesday and I was fine with that. Maybe Tuesday's problem just hated me!

I was a lot more tired the first week than the second week. 

Travel was awful. Also I started the week off sick. Each day something negative happened on the bus or train. Mainly the bus on the way home. That is the worst.  Wednesday's bus trip was worse than the other days that they don't seem so bad though.  

I was sitting on the bus by the window. Someone was too my left. So the aisle was to the left of that person.  I was on the bench right behind the door in the middle of the bus.  Now everything happened so fast.  I was using my phone to send messages to my mom via google hangout.  Now I'm  typing with 2 thumbs so both hands are on the phone. Then at a stop I feel this hand on my hands/phone. I have a nail mark in my hand. It all happened so fast.  He didn't get my phone but tried. He tried to swipe it as he was getting off the bus. The lady beside me reacted by moving her head and arms weird but she was mentally and physically handicapped.  Nobody else reacted in any way. Nobody probably noticed.  I saw him as he finished walking down the steps and off the bus. He shook his head. He had failed at thievery.  So he had his hood up on his jacket. And had the hood tied so all you could see were his eyes and like a half inch around them.  He was trying not to be recognized if he got my phone and I filed a police report.  There was no way I could ID him. My description would be that he wasn't that tall and wasn't fat. I was sitting and he seemed average. How vague is that. I could tell he was black but that's still too vague. It's crazy how fast stuff happens. I guess I seemed like an easy target being by the door and having someone beside me with a suitcase blocking the way so I couldn't get out quickly even if I wanted to. But he didn't know I keep a death grip on all my possessions because I'm always afraid they will jump out of my hands. 

[smilincolleen]

Dev Bootcamp Tips

On the first day everyone just starting out got advice from those that already went through the first 3 weeks. 

I liked a lot of the advice. I haven't followed some of it. 

Sleep  (I haven't done that enough.)

Ask for help

Don't be afraid if you have to repeat phases.

Take notes (I have done this. You forget by the end of the day let alone future days.)

Don't code all the time; spend time doing your former hobbies. 

Don't stay too late (I can't so I haven't done that.)

Go drinking with your classmates. I agree with the hanging out with classmates part. The drinking part isn't necessary. 

Some advice I didn't care for was the advice to take your shoes off and relax. So many people walk around in socks or barefoot. I don't know how they do that. I need my shoes.  I guess in general telling people to relax and not stress is a good plan. 

I'm surprised nobody gave a warning about the chairs that sit on the floor. I really hate those. 

We got tips from about 30 people but now that it's been 2 weeks I forget the rest. This has been open on my computer for awhile. I figure I should post it even if I did want to include more originally.

[smilincolleen]

Eloquent Ruby

I started reading Eloquent Ruby in preparation for Dev Bootcamp. 

Some things I heard my husband say but hadn't actually read them anywhere. Some things I just thought about but now I've seen them written. 

Go easy on the comments. I thought about this before because the important ones would be buried in with all the unnecessary ones.

In Ruby you can use parenthesis or not but programmers favor parenthesis.  But sometimes they are forbidden. Don't use them with puts or if you are defining or calling a method with no parameters, leave the parenthesis off. 

Use 2 spaces to indent. Don't use tab. Tabbing can be inconsistent.

Name variables with lowercase_words_separated_by_underscores. I knew this but learned this is called "snake case."

This is only Chapter 1 so I plan to learn many more tips.

[smilincolleen]

Exercises

One of the tasks for prep work for DBC was to complete 38 exercises in Socrates. Some were more time consuming than others. The good thing was you could run them on the site and find out if you succeeded before moving on to the next one. The bad thing was you could have thought that you solved it and then something failed and you had to keep working.  Well I completed all 38 exercises as of yesterday! So far only 11 people in my class completed the last exercise. I'm not the biggest slacker. As of about a week ago, I pretty much was. I wonder if other people compared how many completed an exercise as they were doing them. I felt like it was a contest to finish, but hoped nobody else thought that or they would win. I used Ruby Docs a lot. Sometimes I would spend a half hour trying to figure something out and it was just super simple. Right now the example comes to my mind of using array#sample which chooses a random element from an array. Once I discovered that, it was amazing and I felt like my code could have been completed in 3 seconds.  I hope the more I code, the more I start to remember these things.  I do wish I would have written about more of the things I learned as I learned them because I bet now if I go back and look at all my code, I will forget details I learned. Writing about it would have helped. At the time I was just so into moving on to the next one that I didn't write about much. 

[smilincolleen]

Dev Bootcamp Assessment

On Friday, I got my Dev Bootcamp assessment. It had to be turned in by Sunday night. If I wasn't still unpacking and moving everything out of the storage unit, I would have been done earlier than Sunday afternoon. It was due by late Sunday so I still had plenty of time.  When I first got it in my email, I worked on it for for 1.5 hours. I realized it was 2 PM and I hadn't eaten lunch yet so I took a break for that.  For some reason the coding was just so fun.  In total there were 12 exercises.  We had to time 3 of them. Overall it was a fun time. Now I have to get back to the other prep work for class.