Category: Uncategorized

Speaking of Priorities

I love doing fun things. Don’t we all?

And, all else being equal, I like doing the “more funner” things more than the “just plain fun” things.

However, sometimes priorities dictate doing the “just plain fun” things first. This is one of those times.

For the next few days I’ll be putting my React learning on hold, and dig up my Java programming knowledge from back in my Amazon Prime days. You see, I have an interview coming up with a Java-based shop, and I’ve been told that their coding challenges and questions are strictly Java based.

I’m currently reviewing some of my old Java code (an example of which can be found here : https://github.com/rgmarquez/redis2-codechallenge) to revive the Java side of my brain. I need to be reminded of the the syntax, coding conventions, and concurrency best practices that I used to have in the forefront of my mind, before C#, C, and JavaScript pushed it all to the back.

My next post will most likely be my thoughts on going back to Java after the joys (non-sarcastically) of C# and JavaScript async/await programming. I do remember that with Java SOA, we tended to use dependency injection a lot more than I’ve see in C# or JavaScript. I also remember that DI was particularly useful for decoupling dependencies, and for test mocking with little to no change to the target system.

Hmmm, maybe I should do a future blog post describing Dependency Injection, to what extent each developer community (Java, C#, JavaScript) seems to use the DI paradigm, and why.

But for now, on to refreshing my knowledge of Java syntax, memory model, concurrency, automated tests, and best practices…

The pragmatics of priorities

In looking at my list of projects, it occurs to me that in order to make a dent in most of them, I really should step up to the plate and learn the front-end Javascript framework “React”. I’m choosing to learn React over something newer (like Svelte) as a great deal of companies use React, and I’m trying to make myself more marketable as well as learning front end coding for my projects. A two birds with one stone kind of thing.

I actually know a bit of front-end coding with both straight HTML/CSS/JavaScript and with Angular.js, but again, I believe that React knowledge will get me farther with prospective employers, while allowing me to create professional quality front-ends for my projects.

I’ll be using Mosh Hamedani’s “Code with Mosh” videos to learn React. In theory, his videos will be building my knowledge up to coding a “production grade app for discovering video games”, and I like the idea of learning enough about React to be able to code such an app:

If you are interested in Mosh’s coding courses, they can be found here: https://codewithmosh.com