A bit of a late reply, but I figured the “years of experience” thing was worth replying to, plus I wanted to indicate how this title has been going for me since starting it back in late May.
Even though I have written plenty of software in my time, collaborative work in a team using a VCS doing things like submitting pull requests (PR), working with other developers using modern methods, and generally doing anything other than designing the entire software product myself from start to finish is something I have had very little experience with.
Similarly, even though I have written banking software in the past (submitting direct debit files, working with secure payment solutions etc), writing graphics software or software that relies a lot of graphics and physics is a whole different ball game than doing something where you are certain of the inputs and you’re just manipulating data.
I think even people with “years of experience” are going to benefit from the ability to quickly switch gears and think algorithmically using this sub. Because it doesn’t matter how many years of experience you have with (insert your favourite framework or API here), there is always more to learn if you’re not going to simply “specialise” in writing one particular type of code very well. You need to be able to very quickly switch gears and grasp very complex mathematical ideas in order to “keep up” with modern APIs.
I spoke to a local programmer who wrote the library I am using to write my own VR programs. He admitted to me that the process of learning Vulkan (a graphics and GPU API) for him was an extremely painful process of trial and error and that they could not recommend any particular tutorial for getting up to speed.
If you’ve ever tried to read the specifications for OpenXR or Vulkan, they are long meandering paragraphs of incredibly concise, precise and yet largely indecipherable language which are frustratingly under-illuminating until you read and re-read the paragraphs multiple times (or stand on your head and look at the paragraphs in a mirror, as if you were receiving a riddle from Entil’Zha
ffs). And yet I have managed to get enough up to speed with them in the past month or so to feel confident with writing the custom rendering code I need to write to begin my own app over this next week. I couldn’t say that literally a couple of days ago, but its an incremental thing where every new tutorial you read gets you a little closer towards your goal.
I would say using the sub the small amount I have in my stack has definitely helped. What I’ve noticed the most is how this sub will help you grasp on to a problem like a bulldog and just not let it go, even if it is painful to your mind (full disclosure: definitely take additional supplements if you’re not solely using IG UPX, particularly choline/ALCAR or whatever your doc/adviser recommends) until you have a solution. This can be particularly difficult if you have a sedentary lifestyle or if you are running a sub like Khan Black along with it, because the intensity of thought goes through the roof. But that dogged ability to find a solution is something that so far I can only uniquely ascribe to this particular sub.
Curious to hear how this compares to other peoples experiences.