Week 3 - PHP and Forms

This week I got to learn a little bit more about back end web development. It was a bit of a struggle for me especially compared to last week because I was already pretty experienced with html with my last job giving me a head start in the class. However, I had never used PHP before and found myself making classing programming day 1 style mistakes. It was certainly a good learning experience though and a good reminder that I am an idiot. Don't get me wrong, I think I'm a pretty smart guy but it is always good to remember that nobody on the planet is immune for making stupid mistakes every once in a while.

Week 2 - Introduction to PHP

PHP is awesome. I desperately wanted something like this at my last job. Unfortunately, php was not supported on the platform the website I was responsible for was on so I was extremely constrained in the amount of stuff I could do. I have always enjoyed scripting languages and PHP is no exception. I can think of some pretty cool ideas for different ways this could be implemented so I can't wait to see what else we can use this for. It is also making me excited for JavaScript because I like the idea of something I create running right there in a web browser.

Week 1 - Basic HTML and CSS

This week's content got me very excited about this class. I have experience with HTML from a previous internship so I am looking forward to learning the material in a formal setting. My previous training consisted of my boss walking into my office and saying

"Hey Kev, you're building this website now. You should probably learn some HTML. I need it done in two weeks."

It was nice to learn this stuff academically instead of just hacking together stuff that just kind of worked at 4AM.

Week 15 - Finished

This was a pretty fun class. I enjoy programming so needless today I enjoyed it quite a bit more than the writing class. I learned quite a bit about how to program in python as well as how to work with images and audio; something I had never done before. As for my future career, I was not planning on ending up in any kind of multimedia work so that is not terribly useful but python is everywhere so being familiar with it is definitely helpful.

Advice for future students would be to make sure to save your code since about a third of the labs are basically restructures of stuff you have done in a previous lab.

Week 14 - Heavy Lifting

I absolutely loved the assignments this week. Nothing but coding and it was all new challenges for me and the team. This was the kind of week that makes me happy I have chosen this major. Lots of fun problem solving and lateral thinking. I hope more weeks are like this. I am a little worried about the final project since it seems pretty ambitious but I'm sure our team will do fine.

Week 13 - Adventure Time!

Oh I hate myself for titling this blog after such a terrible show but it is fitting none the less. This week was our first big project as a team. I am a very happy with how it turned out but a little disappointed with my own contribution. Of course, there have been weeks where I did my fair share and some extra but it never feels good to feel like you aren't pulling your own weight. I hope for the next big project I can contribute in a big way.

Week 12 probably - Midterm Complete

Rough week in the town of Kevsville. Work went nuts and as I am writing this, I have had four hours of sleep out of the last 60. On the bright side that should subside and this weekend I am in a Hearthstone tournament like an adult person should be. As far as what I've been studying, this week we delved into audio which was really cool for me because it isn't pictures. I got to write some new code and felt like I learned a lot.