this post was submitted on 23 Sep 2026
16 points (100.0% liked)

Learn Programming

2254 readers
1 users here now

Posting Etiquette

  1. Ask the main part of your question in the title. This should be concise but informative.

  2. Provide everything up front. Don't make people fish for more details in the comments. Provide background information and examples.

  3. Be present for follow up questions. Don't ask for help and run away. Stick around to answer questions and provide more details.

  4. Ask about the problem you're trying to solve. Don't focus too much on debugging your exact solution, as you may be going down the wrong path. Include as much information as you can about what you ultimately are trying to achieve. See more on this here: https://xyproblem.info/

Icon base by Delapouite under CC BY 3.0 with modifications to add a gradient

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
Ategon@programming.dev
JaumeI@programming.dev
bugsmith@programming.dev
16
I struggle to find material that is easy enough for me to follow and well structured (sh.itjust.works)
submitted 2 weeks ago by FavouriteShapes@sh.itjust.works to c/learn_programming@programming.dev
5 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

I've done a bit of programming before. I'm in a bachelors program for structural engineering, but they only get us to focus on Python.

Python material is so very wordy. I often try to restart from basics, and there's a lot of 'you have to reinstall it and use the pure python version, it's the only way you'll learn it properly' - but I find this way more confusing than using an IDE. I struggle to implement new libraries as well, in my existing IDE (i use spyder). Feels so clunky.

I want to be able to make things i can actually use, practice programming regularly, but I'm really not good at self directed stuff. Or even setting things up, as i tried to explain with the second paragraph. Any pointers towards relevant resources?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] joshcodes@programming.dev 2 points 2 weeks ago

I always shout out "Automate the boring stuff" because it is excellent and free: https://automatetheboringstuff.com/3e/chapter1.html

I find picking simple tasks that I want to accomplish can be a great way to learn things, and the book above is a fantastic resource for this. If you want to learn how to modify values in a CSV file or perform calculations or get data from the internet, this teaches you how. When you need to understand a function, go read the documentation for how it works but dont get bogged down. Small iterative cycles with a feedback loop are how we learn. Read how to do something, extend the idea and apply it yourself, see what works and what doesn't. It becomes fun after a while.