Forem: miguelf1671

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miguelf1671 — Fri, 22 Dec 2023 14:18:38 +0000

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The importance of scoping in programming

miguelf1671 — Tue, 19 Dec 2023 16:15:54 +0000

Scoping in programming is probably one of the hardest things to do because how can you scope a project without being too overly ambitious? Or what if you scope a project that doesn't have enough to show and now your adding features that might not make a lot of sense?

My struggles with scoping

I am currently at Flatiron Bootcamp for software engineering and for your final project/product, you have about 3 weeks to design something your proud of and something that shows all the skills you have learned during your very quick 3 months, the only requirement was to implement one new technology that you haven't learned. I started off great since I already knew what I wanted to make, A restaurant training app that helps small restaurants train any new front-of-house staff while also keeping everyone on the same page by providing food and beverage descriptions. Sounds easy enough right? well, when I scoped this project out I didn't put into the equation how long it would take me to figure out which technologies to use and how to use them resulting in a very frustrating two weeks.

The technologies I Employed

During my time at flatiron, I learned React for frontend, python for backend, flask for the web framework, and SQLite3 for data management. Some pretty solid technologies to make a decent version one product. So what do I end up doing? out of all of these, I only planned to use React and some form of SQL. Bad idea, for my data management I wanted to use Postgresql, for my web framework I chose Django for its many features, mostly for its authentication features that are already built in. For some reason, Postgresql was not playing nice with me and my Windows laptop, luckily I had a Mac mini at home that I could travel with but this is already a week in of trying to get Postgresql to work. ultimately I decided to not even bother using Postgresql and just stick to Sqlite3, Now I had to learn Django and its authentication process which I later realized shouldn't have been my main focus, my focus should have been just making a functional website no matter if it had authentication or not but I already was too deep into that I just had to finish. Now I am finally seeing a bright light at the end of the tunnel of this development hell that I had to go through to learn a valuable lesson, stick to what you know and make little but impactful improvements along the way, and just never give up on the vision even if you have some sleepless nights.

What would I do differently?

Start small and focus on the core functionality of the product instead of trying to create a fully-featured app. In this case, I should have just started by creating and displaying training material.
Stick to more of what you already know in terms of technology and later on maybe transfer over once you are happy with your version one.
Break down the project into smaller tasks and estimate how long it will take, it's easier to estimate small tasks and completing these small tasks will keep the motivation and consistency you need to get to the finish line.
Manage your time to your advantage, it's amazing how fast time goes by while coding, to the point where you lose track of it.
You will always face challenges in development, It's how fast you can adapt to them and take action that will determine your success.
Learning to fail is an art, we all fail and if your not failing from time to time then your not growing. Sometimes the journey is more rewarding then the end result.

From Chef to Programmer

miguelf1671 — Sat, 11 Nov 2023 00:14:46 +0000

I started my culinary journey fresh off of high school, I would watch a lot of cooking shows and even worked in a restaurant weekend nights when I was a senior in high school. I knew it was something I enjoyed it and it gave me a purpose, I needed discipline in life and instead of signing up for the military I wanted to be part of a brigade of amazing chefs and cooks. So after little to no thinking I joined a culinary school that had a bootcamp structure and off I went into my culinary journey. Things started off great, I met amazing people and worked at some really nice places but as everyone knows the life in the restaurant industry is not all glamour in fact the opposite, missed birthdays and holidays was the norm.

Fast forward 7 years and the pandemic hit everyone especially the restaurant industry as a whole, amazing places where closing left and right and everyone was uncertain about everything. Being stuck at home it got me thinking about my future a lot and what I wanted, I looked for things to do and stay productive and that's when I found coding as a escape from everything. I bought a Udemy course on sale for $20 and I really got into it, but ultimately I always wanted my own restaurant. I was stuck and at 26 I felt I didn't have a lot of time left to decide my future.

Lets fast forward again to 2023, now I have a baby at home that depends on me for his future and now the daunting question comes back, what should I do with my life? I didn't enjoy being in a restaurant anymore, I realized I was not cooking for the people I wanted to eat my food and it was more of just a job. Coding came back into play but I was very hesitant to dive in fully, thoughts like am I good enough to code? What even is a programming job like? Ai is here, is it even worth it? and all these questions where constantly in my head but luckily I had this really good friend of mine that I went to culinary school that transitioned to coding around the same age as me that really inspired me to take the leap.

Now it is September of 2023 and I finally decide to join Flatiron coding bootcamp in NYC, I said to myself if I do this there is no turning back no matter what. Now I am currently ending phase 3 of the program and has just felt like a flash and probably the best decision I ever made. I went through many struggles in the program both personal and technical but I am still here ready for the next challenge.

For my phase 3 project I made a GUI using python and custom tkinter that for its main function is to make a prep list for kitchen staff in a restaurant. Yes somehow I always end up doing something with food or restaurant related and I think that is a good thing, I can combine my skills together to make something useful. I have a more clear path to where I want this career to take me and have met amazing people throughout this journey. For anyone in the fence about jumping into tech I say go for it and don't look back, in cooking its impossible to learn everything there is to learn but that does not mean you can't be good at it, same goes for programming.

event.target in React

miguelf1671 — Fri, 20 Oct 2023 12:38:37 +0000

In React, using event.target is essential and will be used a lot through out your project. Event.target is used to access a DOM Element, for example this is done when a user clicks a button and when its clicked event.target would be the reference to that button element. You can also think of it as a detective that its job is to identify what element the user has taken action with. Once the detective knows what element the user has triggered it then can also get you information of what has changed in that element. For example if you have a text input, event.target will refer to the input field when the user starts typing text, but before you can see that information you need to call a event handler like onChange. So it can look something like this:

<input type="text" onChange={handleInputChange} />

You can either write all your code inside onChange but it is usually neater if you make a separate function to handle the onChange, especially if you plan to use it multiple times. Here is what the handleInputChange function would look like:

function handleInputChange(event) { const input = event.target; const text = input.value; console.log("You typed:", text); }
Here you can see that event.target is the input field and you can then access the text that the user has typed by getting the value. So we pass down the variable input and get the value with .value. The const variable text is the same as event.target.value, that's why we can then return text as the value of the input change. Understanding this crucial into making sure your app reacts the way you want it to.

JavaScript Scope

miguelf1671 — Fri, 29 Sep 2023 14:48:32 +0000

JavaScript is still used widely in programming for better or for worse and scope in javaScript is super important. Imagine scope as a way of organizing your room and keeping track of everything you store away. If you put things in all different cabinets and shelves how will you ever find things and make good use of them? It will probably be very hard for you to keep track of everything that way, and it can be very frustrating.

So what is scope in javaScript? Scope sets boundaries of where and when you can use variables and functions you have created and it's functionality will depend on that.

There are two main types of scope:

Global scope: When you have a global scope is like placing something in your living room. Anyone in the room can see it and touch it because you made it accessible to everyone. In code this would translate to giving multiple functions that global variable to use and manipulate because its available to use anywhere in your code.

Local scope: When you create a local scope you can think of it as every room in your house is a function, and in those rooms you add a specific item that is unique to that room. Other rooms would not have access to those unique item's, they can't see them or touch them, therefor they are local to that specific room. In code its the same, when you place a variable inside a function, only that function will have access to that variable.

In conclusion scope is very important in JavaScrript, it will determine how you organize your code and ultimately how your code runs or doesn't run.