What's some of the lingo or jargon that you think newbies should know?

Question

I'm attempting the 'self taught' entryway into programming, but I come across so many acronyms that I don't understand and have to look up. Help me proactively learn these things!

Answer 1

David Carroll now that you put me on the spot nothing comes to mind, but one of the first big thing I was having difficulty understanding was what exactly an API was. I get the gist of it now, but it was just something o saw everywhere that was just wasn't explained anywhere without actually looking it up. I'm only about 3 serious-ish months into my journey, so it was completely foreign to me. Hope that helps you to understand better. Thank you for the response!

ifl I spent 5 years in the Army we had acronyms for acronyms. Most of them were the same letters. My favorite was the CP, which (in my unit) was a coffee pot 🤣. CP 2 was always dead lined...
Is that the same as an ID - 10 T?
EDIT; Nevermind..... I looked it up.... lol

I was honestly hoping to spark a big discussion with everyone sharing what they believe is an important definition that was commonly misused or not understood.

Mike Morley you're winning! 🤣

Answer 2

Interesting question. Without additional context, it would be difficult to identify jargon you consider to be unfamiliar. Likewise, an experienced developer would likely take for granted what others find to be unfamiliar.

Also, there happens to be a vast range of possible jargon for any given number of different technologies and paradigms that much of the randomly submitted jargon might be out of context or irrelevant to where you are in your learning experience.

It might help to share some of the words or phrases you found yourself researching and share a little about what you are learning to narrow the scope. Otherwise, it would be like asking someone to dump a technical dictionary into this thread. 😉

Answer 3

Here's three for ya...

1. Algorithm: a method to solving a problem (such as sorting, searching, etc.)
2. Big O: A notation used with said algorithms to determine their efficiency
[ex: O(n)]
3. Constant Time: The optimal yet usually nigh-impossible case where, adding additional elements to a product will not increase the time needed to perform algorithms on it.

Answer 4

I guess we tend to learn the acronyms as and when we come across them (rather than in advance....). The trick is to proactively make a note of the acronym and immediately find out and document what it stands for.
Google "<new acronym> meaning" or ask in this forum for help!

Answer 5

My all time favourite: RT[F]M
😊

Answer 6

At the fundemental level you should start with understanding the data structures and algorithms theory and application. This is useful across most language domains. Specific technology stacks and special library jargon will come with experience once you work with them.