#engineer empathy

Source | http://www.forbes.com | Rebecca Fraser-Thill

In the complex study of human psychology, one finding is remarkably consistent: our well-being rests squarely on our connection to others.

When we feel like we belong, we experience meaning, life satisfaction, physical health and psychological stability. When we feel excluded, physical pain and a wide range of psychological ailments result.

The…

Todos

So, in DBC, we made Todos. When I say that, I mean, we learned how to make a todo app jn Ruby, with the command line. Then we learned how to make a new one that saves and read things in a file. After that we got in phase 2 and made a simple Sinatra Todo app. Then we made one that used Javascript, and now we're 4 days into phase 3, and we already made 2 todo apps.

I feel like there is a common theme somewhere... Are DBC teachers trying to tell us something?

I do not tend to use todo apps myself nowadays but I now know how to make it however I want. I also know how to manage my time, or... know how to not manage my time actually.

As for code, I know that using that same theme to learn new things help a lot, and I feel like I can learn what I want to learn by simply making a todo with it and comparing with what I know.

And since I intend to learn much more... I end up with many todos apps eon my todo list...

Group Project

We got a small group project again, in Rails. Things are much easier, Rails does everything, people are confident, and we can now play with these interesting things, at our own pace, without stressing out!

This week we have to make a "Stack Overflow"-like app. Basically, answer questions, select the best answer, and comment questions or answers. Also, they can vote for a question or an answer, and the site makes the selection after that.

I am not even sure what to say about that, but it is what we're doing.

We're having fun, and have an awesome group again, I guess I'll have something to show on monday, but even if I don't... No biggie!

Effects of DBC

Yesterday, I did something that triggered Matthew. Basically, without getting too deep into that, I made him feel like he was left out for a moment, search for a reason why I would do so, and end up on some pretty bad, sad, and mean reasons.

But then, magic happened.

When I came back to work with him, before we started, we had a conversation that kinda went like this :

"Before we start, do you mind if we talk for a second? - Yeah sure, no problem, what's up?"

And then, he ended up sharing what exactly happened, what he felt, what he saw, and what he feels now. I shared how I felt about it, explained and confirmed what he saw, and apologized. And that was an argument that was solved in less than 2 minutes, without any fight or hard feeling.

This is what DBC made. DBC made us understanding human beings. DBC made Matthew not freak out about what happened, try to check what was happening, and then reflect. DBC made me listen, put myself in his shoes and be understanding.

I had an experience like that with my fiancee, and it is quite strange to realize that what you have been learning, no matter how true it was in your current environment, is actually true outside of it.

Observer Design Pattern

Design patterns are a very important thing in Development. The idea is that experienced developers came up with the idea that no matter the language, the experience, the software they were building, they always ended up on the exact same problems. And then they came up with a "simple solution" for that, simpler than the problem at least.

So, they came up with design patterns they could use next time they would encounter that same problem. Many of them are useful mainly in statically typed languages like Java or C, but most of them are actually useful, for your own logic development, and for the time you might have to end up using these languages.

Also, since it is a pretty complicated notion, it does show people (like recruiters...) that you actually know what you are talking about, which is not a bad thing right?

Yesterday, I did a lightning talk about the Observer Pattern. The idea is that it is a solution to the problem :

I have objects that must be aware of changed of a particular object

The solution is pretty simple. You actually give all the info to the observed (called observable) object.

The observer gets an "update" method that will be triggered by the observable with the info it sent.

The observable gets a "notify" method that triggers the update method of the observers

The observable has a list of observers and relative methods (add/remove/number of them)

And that is it. According to the language you'll use, you will have modules to do so (Observable in Ruby), Interfaces (like some implementations in Java), but the idea will always be the same.

Now go on and play with it !

Engineering Empathy Aftermath

We still have Engineering Empathy in phase 2. Yesterday was the last session, about what triggers us and how to respond accordingly.

I did use that without even knowing about what I was doing. The idea is that when something triggers you, you stop, breathe, think about what's happening, then select the best response and respond. I tend to do that myself, mostly because I am overthinking everything.

Now, yesterday was also 3rd EE session for the phase 1, the Golden Bears. It is a really strong and heavy session, even though it is also a very liberating one. I felt like I wanted to be there for the people and so I spent my evening with anybody I could find, and that was nice.

They are affected, but they seem ok... You may find it strange, but just like a big brother about his younger siblings, I feel relieved to see they are doing fine...

Looking for a job

Things are going well at DBC, but yesterday I had a bit of time and ended up thinking about jobs. After all, that is one of the endpoint of this program, a reason why I came here.

I know that before I came here, hired was the only site I tried to join, and I just not being accepted. But now, things have changed. I have good proofs of what I can do, I have more mastery, people that can vouch for me...

I am thinking about that way in advance, but I feel like I want and have to. Being a foreigner, these things may be trickier, so I need to be better, and faster.

Engineering Empathy Cooldown

Two days ago was our last Engineering Empathy session of Phase 1. Like the other cohort told us : "You thought the first session was heavy? Wait 'til you see session 3".

First week was "The superego", and the exercise that we got was "Share what your inner voice tells you". This week was "Dive deeper in what you let people know about you"... And so we sat in circle to tell people stuff, while starting every sentence with "If you really knew me". Now let me tell you guys... There were tears, hugs, revelations, but no shocked reaction, no judgement, nothing like that. And everything told in this room stays in this room.

Diving deeper than the usual in what you tell people is an exercise that does make us grow, but that also hits you hard at the moment you do it. And listening to all of the others' is not even easier. I think I can safely say that I will keep that day in my mind for a very very long time.

ActiveRecord

ActiveRecord is the design pattern I told you about yesterday. In Rails, the most well known web framework for Ruby, this design pattern is implemented in its own. What it does, in short, is mapping a database with an object. Columns of the database become attributes of the objects, you can create objects and save them to the db, or get objects from an entry in the db. Quite easy and practical!

Yesterday, we worked on that for the whole day. The morning was the introduction, and the afternoon the application. I'll say that it was a pretty good day, I learned a lot, and ActiveRecord is cool... Wait... Better than that : ActiveRecord is coolER than SQL!

My first solo day

Wednesdays are optional solo days. That means that every other day, we have to pair or group with more people, but on wednesdays, we choose our pairs/groups. I did not solo until then, but I thought that to save my voice I'ld try and do so yesterday.

In the end, I did finish the exercises, which was my goal. I had to go to other people soloing a couple of times, to get my mind off of the problems that were blocking me, and to help me figure out solutions sometimes, but I did it and I am pretty happy about it.

The beginning was hard and I just ... felt like I did not know where I was going. But I got on it after I expressed my incomprehension a first time, and then I just worked, with a decent speed.

I don't know if I'll do that again, probably not next week, but probably another time. It was a good day but I prefer picking my pairs in the people I do well with (Looking at you Irene!).

Cries

So today we started Engineer Empathy courses. The idea of this course seems to be that the better you are with yourself and the better your ability to work with others, the better engineer you will become. Now, just like everything else in this program, EE is freakingly intense. Yesterday we had a session about the Superego and how to recognize attacks from it and defend. That does not sound much but... I just ended up almost in tears thinking about strange attacks against myself. Sometimes we just don't really think about the things we put ourselves through, but then when these come back, that's when you have a bad time. Well, let me tell you that people who are crazy enough to join Dev Bootcamp have a lot of

Now if that was not intense enough, I had decided to run a bit too far 2 days ago and so now I just look like a 3rd age dude having a hard time walking all around. That brings some tears too haha.

Laughter

Today they gave us a pairing buddy for the whole day. Mine was ... Matthew! I spent most of the day enjoying what I was doing, at least for the fact that I was doing it with somebody I appreciate and really have fun with. We joked all around, and even though some may say that it is quite counterproductive, we finished the challenges right at the same time as others, and I got the feeling we learnt exactly enough!

Code

So, today we spent the morning reviewing the code some used to complete the challenges of yesterday. We ended up comparing hashes + #each with no data + if (The if waterfall seems to be faster...), and all that with or without recursion. In the end, we can say that in this small exercise, recursion was a waste of time, and not maintainable, hashes + #each keeps the code organized so maintainable, but then the If waterfall was just horrible to watch but a bit more efficient... The world of code is a strange place, guys...

In the afternoon we worked on sorting algorithm. After a bit of time going crazy over explanations not explaining much and hurting our brains and souls, Rao, a coach with a nice and funny meow-like name gave us some more options and we found out how to do all that. We implemented the merge sorting algorithm and that did not take us much time from here. The funny surprise though was that at the end, we cleared the 3 170k words files in around 1.5 seconds each... While every other algorithm just took at least 10 minutes. Some even calculated that theirs could last for a day just sorting one of the files. Algorithms are crazy and are to be known!