What do I do when I stuck as a Developer? Which online communities are helpful to me.
Communities and docs are best friend of developer.
As a developer, I stuck many times while working on something.
Sometime even a semi colon error, can take up your whole day.
Don't feels only you struck everyone struck, everybody have their own way to figure the solution.
My Experience
Let me share my experiences.
It depends. If is still daytime I go for a ride on my bicycle and click photographs of nature and moving object.
if its night-time I manage to have some sleep.
Usually after that I find a solution.
If this doesn't work then I call some close friend that knows nothing about it and I try to expose my situation. This force me to face the problem under different prospective and usually I end up with new ideas on how to solve it.
Most of the time i just do one simple thing.
Leave. Take a walk. Have chill and contiunue tommorow.
Why?
Sometimes i lose all of my concentration.
Sometimes I cannot see the bigger picture.
Sometimes i'm just plain tired.
Walking away from my problem can fix most of those problems. And when i return i'm refreshed, regained som of my focus, and most of the times i fix my problem in a very short time.
Simple Rule
If all this don't work follow these simple rule.
- Ask colleagues (if you’re working on your own then not having someone else to discuss it with can be frustrating).
- Break it down into smaller problems.
- Search stackoverflow for the smaller problems (or similar).
- Google the smaller problems, search various forums.
- Go back to the documentation for your own code.
- Go back to the documentation for whatever 3rd party tools you’re using.
- Go and solve a different problem. Do something physical (out for a walk, play squash, go climbing, etc.) - the physical activity helps your mind switch off for a bit.
Depending on the problem, and how long you’ve been stuck for, these steps change order.
Communities developer helping hand.
1. GitHub
If you’re a developer, you’d already know about GitHub. One of the largest communities for developers, GitHub has over 73 million members. Among code sharing and other features, GitHub has a forum with quite active and supportive members.
Here, you can find the events happening near you, ask your programming questions, and get help regarding GitHub itself. There are discussions about different programming topics like languages and API development.
Since there are already hundreds of thousands of questions posted here, you can first search and see if someone has already answered your question. If not, you can post in the relevant categories with the right tags to ensure that you get replies.
Users here are awarded badges for their contributions. Thus, if you're looking for help, these badges will help you gauge whether the person is reliable. With millions of active members, you can bank on this community to get help or answers whenever needed.
2. Stack Overflow
Stack Overflow is a Q&A site for developers that aims to create a library of answers for every programming question. There are questions on hundreds of different programming topics and languages like JavaScript, machine learning, Nginx, debugging, networking, etc.
The up-votes and down-votes system, similar to Reddit, ensures that you get to see the best answers. Similarly, Stack Overflow gives badges and measures the reputation of each profile, displaying it with their name.
More importantly, these reputation points can earn you privileges like the ability to edit others’ questions or answers, access to moderation tools, and the ability to create chat rooms.
Stack Overflow allows you to build a private community for collaborating with your team. Moreover, Stack Overflow has a job board for developers to land their dream job.
Though Stack Overflow has a huge library of answered questions, if the question in your mind hasn’t been answered before, you can ask it and get replies within no time.
3. DEV Community
DEV Community is a social network of developers where you can discuss, learn, and collaborate. Built on open-source software, DEV Community has nearly 800,000 developers.
In the DEV Community, you’ll see a lot of articles about developers' opinions, experiences, and stories. But there are listings for multiple other purposes.
Here you can find a contributor for your project or contribute to someone else's, hire or get hired, and offer or get mentorship. You can get help by asking questions, too. Moreover, there are listing for tools, events, stuff for sale, and education.
DEV Community lets you watch community videos, listen to podcasts, and purchase its merchandise. Best of all, it regularly hosts challenges, so you can take part in them and win prizes.
Unlike most traditional online forums, DEV Community has a beautiful website with a great UI. So whether you’re learning to code or a seasoned developer, it’s worth joining the DEV Community.
Inviting @sofwancoder @rehansattar @kumartul @Netasha to share there experience🚀!!
NB: This article was published as my #week2 article for the Hashnode #4articles4weeks Writeathon.
Ta da! Until we meet again Happy Coding! ❤️