When you code, organization is key. Sometimes, organization comes down to creating comments that separate your code in a few long files. Other times, it comes down to putting different files in different folders. The last thing that you would want is somebody to collaborate on your project and not be able to find what is going on when a bug appears, or be unable to change a typo simply because they cannot find where it is in the first place. That is what React does so well. Separating each piece into its own file and importing it when needed helps to keep code readable and organized.
Last week, I submitted my JavaScript Project which was a simple organizer for my (extensive) game collection. It allows for me to sort the games by medium and then filter them further by name, player count, and more. Personally, I have found myself using this application already when having company over or just deciding what games I can play by myself at home. However, the target of this blog is not to gush over the personal usefulness of the app, but instead to focus on how looking at other people’s projects made me come back to mine in order to make it even better.
The past few months, I have been working with Ruby and Ruby-based programs. While this past project was also using a Ruby API backend, the bulk of the application was JavaScript. With that comes a new language to learn using different syntax and live page functionality. There were new things to learn! Event Listeners, realizing that innerHTML += ... deletes all the listeners already present (ouch!), fetch requests, classes, and more. But the things themselves weren’t where the struggles came in. Instead, it was the change in how the section was taught.
Today is “Day 1” of JavaScript for my cohort, but I have finished the weeks curriculum with the exception of one lab. I this lab I have to recreate some actions that are shown in the demo. I had little to no issue going into this lab and am surprised at the sudden challenge that is before me. I have to break it down into figuring out what to do when I don’t know what is going on.
For each project as it comes along, we are required to make a video explaining the functions of our project and showcasing all the details that we spent days putting into our project. The value from a user perspective is clear: It shows me how to use your product! However, the value from a creator perspective is even greater. As a creator, the videoing process does two main things for us: catches bugs and practices our communication.