When did you Really get the Hang of Programming?

I think I “got the hang” of it when I discovered server-side web development.

Helped me see the whole thing come together. It’s when I could produce something that seemed fundamentally useful all by myself. That helped a lot.

I remember mine was an ‘Adventure Game’ in Python, never released it. I do other kinds of projects now but I've stayed very interested in game developers and their processes :)

Teacher asked us to do the inverse of a matrix in python, we (the class) had almost found all the steps except one regarding columns and I somehow.... invented it? something clicked in my brain and from there on out thinking new stuff to program hasn't been really hard, but before that? I didn't even understand functions hahaha

I think I got hang of it when I learned how processors work and learned how to write stuff in assembly, I then started to build on top of that, slowly moving to higher level programming languages which allowed me to make more complex software instead of focusing on fundamentals.

To me, the moment in which it became clear to me that user support was an ending story, with the outsourcing at my work, was the moment I decided to go for software development.

Still a (long) way to go, but with some ideas in my mind, I think there is lots of fun stuff to learn and more to come.

I think I got an idea of programming when I had to draw a flowchart and then convert it into a computer program - as I was learning. More hang of it as I had to work at a client site as a freelance programmer and modify their existing programs with new requirements. More and more of it when I had to study an existing system and re-engineer it in given time period. The thing is you get to know more and more as you are still interested in programming.

The first time I really enjoyed programming was when I tried to make puzzle-like game in Python with PyGame.

The first time I really understood what was going on in a programming language was when I took my first C++ course. I made a short turn-based text RPG that had a grid of tiles for a map the player could explore. I added in items you could collect to unlock a secret area and boss battle, if you found them all and figured out how to use the items. I learned a lot just from making that one game.

It took me four years to get the hang of programming. Year 1: I typed "hello world" in C into the mainframe computer at my boyfriend's workplace. I decided then and there that I didn't want to do programming at all. Four years later I realized the only thing standing between a bachelor of science degree and a bachelor of arts degree was an intro programming class (I had all the qualifications for a double major in math and physics). So I signed up for intro FORTRAN. The only problem was I was out on my back for the first three weeks of class. So I got a programmable calculator and started doing the intro assignments at home, on a programmable postfix notation calculator. I would say that's when I got the hang of programming. I was way ahead of the course when I got back, but I had to program everything all over again in FORTRAN. So I did, easily, and then went on to take a slew of programming courses, got my first job in software before I graduated and the rest is history, except I'm not done yet.

20 years in. Haven't yet.

You stop learning when you start thinking you've got hang of it