There are a few things every developer should know but usually don't realize until it is too late. I'm going to give you five tips you should know early in your development career (or hobby) to save you a lot of time and frustration.
This is one of the big ones, as a new developer tutorials are your training wheels. It isn't until a child removes the training wheels he can get good.
Tutorials are a great help early on and you will always need to use them, but start building things on your own as soon as possible. When you do, you will really begin learn and grow. Tutorials generally use poor development practices to keep them simple and focused. You also don't exercise your problem solving skills.
Git is everywhere in the development world and it requires a lot of practice to get proficient with it. Starting early will not only protect your code and your time but it will give you valuable practice with one of the most used tool in the industry.
There are numerous free training videos and tutorials for using git, this looks like a good video that is under an hour.
Remember rule #1, stop doing tutorials and just Do it!
This is so good advice I frequently say this in business to colleagues and other business owners.
It is easy to be stuck in Analysis Paralysis phase where you spend all your time thinking about how to solve a problem instead of actually doing it.
The secret to development and almost anything in life is to just do something, anything, and when you fail, adjust and do it again. The more you try, the more you fail but the more you succeed.
Failure is also the best mentor.
Michael Jordan says it best.
Initially you will be limited to tutorials to learn the basics. The documentation is a fantastic resource for learning more about whatever project you are working on. Initially you will just use it to solve immediate problems, but you can learn best practices and features that can save you a lot of time by frequently reviewing the documentation.
Just don't. Documentation is there for a reason, it is a reference. No one can remember everything, and if you focus on trying you will greatly slow down your progress. A big part of development is being aware certain features exist not memorizing how to use them.
One of the best skills of any developer and knowing where to look when you need something. Develop that skill!
Hope this helps!
