My first taste of Javascript was when I was working on building a website for the first time. If you refer to my resume on this TechFolio, you will notice I built a small website for the local ice cream shop. To make the images fade in and out, I used Javascript and JQuery.
To learn Javascript is not that difficult. I completed that entire website on my own inititive and by using a book I rented from the library. The Javascript portion was learned online primarily through W3Schools. It is a very simple language to understand and shares many similarities to C and other languages I’ve used, but lets you do things you would consider illegal in those language. Learning it is like being a little kid and being told you can break rules for the first time, its like “Oh my gosh, I can really do that, and it still runs???”
This class has a very sink or swim style of learning for Javascript. As I am a Computer Engineering major, I do not share the same background of my colleagues who are mostly Computer Science majors. However, I do feel they would have a better intuition about Javascript than I do, as web design is part of their education (I hear), whereas my learning experience was primarily a summer project.
The way students are accustomed to using Javascript is by doing tutorial exercises on the website FreeCodeCamp which I have found very enjoyable and wish I had known about it when creating my first site. However, since I do know some Javascript already, I did find some of it boring and redundant.
However, That isn’t to say I didn’t learn anything. I got more familiar with methods for accessing variabls and objects. In addition, I didn’t really know the difference between var, let, and const. Var always sufficed for me because I was doing very simple stuff.
The practice WODs were helpful but also way too easy. I do enjoy watching how our professor solves them because sometimes he comes up with a different algorithm than I did. I sometimes learn more just from watching the video than doing it myself. I can always think of a way to solve the problem, but I like to know if there is a different way to solve it.
I look forward to the rest of this class. I think Javascript is a good language for learning, but not as a introductory langauge. I like that C is still very much associated with hardware, and you discover the core principles of computing that way. Javascript is a luxury, but you don’t understand how much of a luxury that is until you have learned C.
The class style, along with the help from the TA, should ensure a smooth ride to software engineering proficiency. Javascript is a good language for the not-so-novice programer!