#gschool

And just as I expected, I completely forgot to post on this blog after the first week. I really want to be better at maintaining this thing weekly so I’ll start with a re-cap of what we’ve spent the past few weeks doing!

More HTML/ CSS , Client-Side JavaScript, J-Query, Object Oriented Programming, Callbacks, etc.

The sink-or-swim feeling of the program has definitely kicked in. Concepts like OOP and Callbacks are very complex and multi-facted and there’s just no way that I could wrap my head around those concepts in a single lecture. It’s become important for me to research and study outside the classroom. The Eloquent Javascript book continues to be a powerful ally in my journey.  

As far as the day-to-day goes: it’s become ingrained in my life. Waking up at 6AM is no longer novel. I’m in bed by 10PM and asleep by 11 most nights. My body wakes up like clockwork at 2AM and at 6AM every single night... I don’t quite understand it, but hey it works. 

 I have also been able to get into the swing of balancing health with the immersive nature of this program. Every morning I wake up with just enough time for some morning yoga which helps me feel more limber and active before a full day of sitting at a computer. I also track my calories via myfitnesspal so that I know what I’m putting into my body and can better manage my intake of nutrients. Another thing I’ve begun doing is getting off muni early and walking for 30 minutes back to my house - I wan’t to eventually work my way up to an hour of walking every day.

The hardest part of the first month has been completely re-adjusting my life from what used to be the norm for me: sleeping in until noon and staying out until 3AM. I’ve hardly gone out since the bootcamp started and my liver and wallet certainly appreciate it. 

It’s official. I made it into the best bootcamp that San Francisco has to offer.

Galvanize has created the perfect environment where to mix aspirant programmers with experienced ones, a place where you can learn, build connections or just chill and relax with friends. This is the future of the education, in the same way companies like Google or Facebook revolutionized the office environment, Galvanize revolutionized the classroom environment.

They are very attentive to your needs and make anything they can to make you feel comfortable. There are pool and ping pong tables, kitchens, couches, an amazing rooftop as well as comfortable class rooms, accessories for your computer, huge tv flat screens where to follow the lesson on and great, professional and motivated teachers.

Only a week has gone by and so far the amount of work and stress hasn’t been bad at all. I’m always waiting for the point when I’ll start crying and screaming, but all good for now! We played around with terminal commands, git and github, an introduction to javascript that led to functions.

This is the first time in my life that I do something that I really love and I’m gonna invest everything I have in it.

Today, I'll write about some observations between writing and programming.  The central thesis is that many attributes associated with good writing also applies to good coding.

Good writing conveys clear ideas succinctly.  Extraneous words and sentences are eliminated if they are unnecessary. This is typically performed through extra rounds of editing.  

Now someone who writes a lot may not need to edit as much.  However, someone who is comparable in ability and experience will put together a better piece of writing with editing.

Something similar happens in development.  You can write code in many different ways that can get the same thing done.  However, you can improve upon it by getting rid of unnecessary lines of code or combining repeated elements (re-factoring).

As someone new, you may not come up with the most elegant lines of code initially.  But if you're willing to edit (re-factor), you can outperform people with more experience and aptitude.

I'm writing this because most people reading this blog are unlikely to experienced developers.  You're probably a non-developer looking to change careers.  The good news is you can do this.  You just have to be willing to set high standards for the quality of work you put out.  Not only can you catch up, but you can outperform.

Quick Daily Overview:

We spent a lot of time on gaining familiarity with command line usage.  This happened at the atrium of Galvanize's Denver office.  Our instructors and teaching assistants roamed around as we went through exercises.  Sometimes they were working with other people, so the students worked together in small groups to figure things out ourselves.

One of the unique things about gSchool is that we're a sub-community of a larger developer ecosystem.  Most of the people working in the atrium were experienced developers working at start-ups and established technology companies.  As students, we got a chance to network for future job opportunities while learning.  This is happening on day two which is very promising.  

After class, our lead instructor (Bobby) stayed around to teach us more stuff for an extra two hours.  It was optional, but most of my cohort took advantage of the extra instruction.

The day begins with me walking to class.  It's January in Denver, which means the air is frigid.  I'm greeted by a warm welcome from my new instructors and teaching assistants.  The air is filled with good vibes already.  After I drop my laptop down, I head out to the coffee shop just outside our classroom.  Even the person at the coffee shop somehow knows my name! 

The remainder of the first day is filled with ice-breaking activities with the rest of my cohort (which is known as g6).  We have our own theme song courtesy of Far East Movement's "Like a G6".

My cohort consists of a wide variety of backgrounds.  Roughly half of the class is women.  For women interested in programming, gSchool is a great place for learning because you won't feel like the only the lady in the room.  Admissions did a great job pulling together a  diverse and inclusive set of future programmers.   Pizza is served at lunch.  Hooray! 

After the ice breaker activities, we rotate in groups through some administrative activities.  A tour of the Galvanize building is given.  The building itself hosts  a mixture of start-ups and satellite offices of larger technology companies (like Pandora).   The building has high ceilings which gives the impression that you are in a giant loft.

Around 5 PM, we are given beer from the keg in our classroom.  People mingle a bit and disperse.  A classmate of mine tells me about Go meetup.  For those of you not familiar, Go is a language which is gaining popularity.  I decide to stay since the meetup for Go just happens to be in my classroom at 6 PM.

In between the end of classes and the Go Meetup, members of a previous gSchool cohort working at the companies inside Galvanize drop by the classroom to play ping pong.  I greet some of them as ping pong balls occasionally fly over to my seat.

The Go meeting is hosted by friendly people from the greater Denver developer community.  At the Go meeting, more pizza is served.  We also get a free drink token.  I receive a recommendation to use my drink token on a Moscow Mule with Bourbon instead of vodka.   The token is cashed in by bar inside the building.   The Go meeting begins and I hustle to try to keep up since I have no previous background knowledge in Go.  A fellow named Kevin tells me to join the Go slack channel.  I oblige.  Kevin ends up helping me install Go onto my MacBook as I get stuck midway through the process.  I get some further help integrating MongoDB as well.   The Go meetup has lasted for three hours and it's closing on 9 PM.

I wasn't planning on writing again until next week but we were assigned to write a post about the end of our first week during our 20% time today.

So to wrap up this week in a few words, it has been challenging, inspiring, intimidating and exciting.  I had a quick chat with one of my instructors about the things I find hardest and questions I have today.  One of my biggest challenges professionally and personally is public speaking and articulating my thoughts in a well presented way.  To work on this, I volunteered to give a 5 minute lightning talk next Friday about a topic of my choice.  I hope to give as many talks & presentations as possible between now and the end of the program so I can work on my confidence and not get so nervous.  

We also chatted about my future career options in terms of location.  Having to consider my partner when choosing a job will significantly narrow my options but he gave me some great tips to start networking with people in the industry in the locations we're looking at.  I'll have a lot of research to do before I start looking for jobs but I'm glad to have a place to start.