The Most Common Mistakes Newbies Make

Question

I'm compiling a list of common mistakes I've made over the years, and some new coders make.

This is especially for those that start Sololearn with absolutely no experience, or background, in computer programming/software engineering.

So I'd like to know what are the most common mistakes that you see new coders make?

Answer 1

Here are a few mistakes that I've made, and see others make:

1.) Not Reading The Frickin' Manual(RTFMing). Meaning your
specific language's documentation, and example code.

2.) Not using Google, or a search engine, even though redundant content can be ok to cover all aspects of a question ad nauseam.

3.) Not asking coding questions in line with comments to explain what they're trying to achieve, and what they're seeing returned.

4.) Expecting an immediate response.

5.) Giving up too easily.

6.) Assuming that one tutorial, and a little practice is all it takes to program in a specific language professionally.

7.) Jack of all trades, master of none.

8.) Lack of proper pseudocoding techniques, and methods.

9.) Expecting short, and long term employment in an overly saturated job market.

10.) Not seeking proper mentorship.

11.) Lack of group participation.

12.)Fear of failure, or short lived success.

13.)Not commenting in a constructive manner.

14.) Not remembering to keep in practice at all times. There is a quiz factory here where you can like/dislike the potential challenge questions that are not timed.

15.) Not picking up a good book/pdf on your favorite language.

Answer 2

@Gabriel Z I added yours in as "lack of constructive comments".

Answer 3

@Edward I like to think it's all procedural in the end, but why would you say that?

Do you see a lot of new coders trending toward ancient languages sometimes?

Like languages that our modern ones are built upon the "macrocodes" of?

Answer 4

@Edward Maybe the procedural interest is more for the core of languages, or device development.

Answer 5

@mhj You might want to start a new discussion thread for that.

That's a little too off topic for you to get a more in depth answer than Google for "Python 3 interpreter encoding", and this link might help explain:

https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/interpreter.html

Answer 6

@kae The types of mentorship can vary, but I think what you might be looking for is a mailing list with frequent users.

For almost 10 years now I've been a reader of the Python tutor list, and trust that they can help quickly with code guidance.

You could also start frequenting the comp.lang.languagenamehere type of lists. Currently I just read the Python, C++, C, and x86assembly.

Those types of lists help by following the question answer sessions, and also by knowing that someone known there should get to you quickly.

Also, go to your languages website, and see what mailing lists they have to offer, and talk to the usuals there.

Answer 7

@Gabriel Z Would you say we could sum that up as "lack of group participation"?

One could also say they were overly eager sometimes as well.

Answer 8

@Gabriel Z I might put that up as improper code outline algorithms, and pseudocode to begin to explain one's work.

Which means I might add on to #8. #3 kind of says it too, so help can be asked for with inline code commenting.

Answer 9

forgetting variables and parenthesis

Answer 10

i agree with number 2 . always google first

Answer 11

Completely agree with the need to use documentation and Google.
And would you tell more about proper mentorship, where can I find them, and how?

Answer 12

Giving up easily is very common.

One of my friends said, "I tried coding and I can't".

I asked, "how long did you spend learning?"

"2 minutes."

"It takes more than 2 minutes."

Answer 13

procedural programming instead of object oriented

Answer 14

Procedural versus OO is just the problem of paradigm. I think the best programming language has both procedural and OO elements in it, optimised as much as possible...

Procedural style gets thinks done quickly. OOP bundles related things so you don't have to look around your ENTIRE code to do something with it

Answer 15

True indeed

Answer 16

can any one give best text book for python .

Answer 17

Not making enough comments.

Answer 18

@Dwight, I was thinking about code comments, thinking you will understand the code at a later date, because it's obvious what it does. But you made it into a good one.

Another one could be not making proper variable names?

Answer 19

I agree with giving up easily,

Answer 20

یک اتفاق جالب: ظاهرا از یونیکد در مفسر پایتون پشتیبانی نمیشه.
python interpreter does not support unicode. does it?