Pro tip: I saw a guy at the coffee shop trying to learn Python from a 900 page book and it looked like torture

I was at the Bean Counter on 5th Street yesterday and this guy next to me had this huge 'Python Bible' open, just staring at page one like he was lost. He told me he hadn't even run a single line of code yet because he felt he had to read the first three chapters first. I mean, that's a sure way to kill any fun in coding before you even start. How do you convince someone to just open an editor and try something, anything, instead of reading forever?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_claire11h ago

Didn't someone say coding is more like swimming than reading?

adam_baker11h ago

Actually, that swimming idea is way off. Coding is way more like reading a really hard book than jumping in a pool. You spend most of your time reading other people's code, docs, and your own stuff to figure out what's wrong. You can't just splash around, you have to sit and think.

singh.harper8h ago

Oh man, that's exactly how I started and it was awful. I got a massive Java book and tried to read it like a novel, got bored in a week. What finally clicked was when a friend made me install an editor and just copy a simple "hello world" program, then change the message. Seeing it run made it real. @the_claire has a point about the swimming thing, because you have to get your hands wet to learn what the book is even talking about. How do you get someone to just take that first tiny step and run a line of code?