MA Precourse Week 1

What was learned

• Introductory material from MA
• Command line interface (CLI)
• GIT and GITHUB
• Working with others to learn from and help solve problems
• Improving problem solving in programming

Activities

• Communicating using Slack
• Work through command line tutorials (See links here) and Git tutorials (See links here)
• Setting up my computer with required software (Sublime Text, Ruby, Git etc)
• Went through Git immersion tutorial (still need to finish)
• Finished the challenges for Git and CLI
• Write up reflections for the week for the coaches at MA to help me with my learning (sort of like this blog)
• Pracitised my typing skills during the week
• Worked on some ruby kickstarter, code wars and Chris Pine
• Wrote flash cards for key commands for GIT and CLI (use Anki)
• Spent Thursday at Ace Hotel, Shoreditch with Gaby, Kevin, Tobenu and Patrick. Went through command line and Git immersion together. 
• Spent Friday at Forge, just across from the Ace Hotel. Although no one came by, I got loads done and using a table is far better than a sofa. 

Struggles

• I got stuck for ages on a couple of the questions on this weeks challenge on comand line, one I managed to solve (forgot speech marks, duh!) and the other was a unix problem (solved using nitrous command line). Big thanks to Adil!!!

Most of these commits were for one question!!!

• Really need to be more strict with my breaks. I just plough through and it is not great. I end up feeling really tired and straining my eyes.
• Got to level 14 on git immersion, and had to restart as I changed the .gitconfig in my folder instead of doing it for my profile...annoying, but at least I did not have to restart level 50!!
• When going to cafes or hotels to work in, need to do so early in the day, as the lighting is crap and really tires me out.
• Can be hard learning in public venues, lots of background noise which is distracting, need to bring some headphones and play some pink noise to drown it out. Click on the video below if you want to be bored...

Successes

• Finished most of this week's work early, so I got started on Chris Pine and Kickstarter.
• Working with some guys during the week was great, everyone was friendly and we all helped each other when stuck. Special shout out to Tobenna for looking after our stuff when going out for breaks.
• Good at switching to different topics to keep fresh (should stick to 30 minutes rule). For example, not doing one tutorial on command line all day, but doing something else.
• Avoiding spending all my time on one topic and mix up topics studied through the day (interleaving effect - good for learning)
• Keeping a log of what I need to do for each week and what needs to be completed.
• Helping guys on slack.

Other stuff

• Before the start of MA, I already started to play with Git and started to push some code to Github. This is the basic stuff, but there is so much more to Git than meets the eye (ie Git immersion).
• I have used command line before (not to the extent used in MA), the first computer I used was DOS based so everything was done on the command line, no windows and monochrome (yellow) colour.
• The pre course website is fantastic and is really helping me organise my activities for the week.
• Everyone is really helpful

Need to do:

• Pair program on ruby problems
• Memorise commands for tasks in CLI and GIT
• Stop using my mouse and use keyboard commands instead. Also use CLI to manipulate files and folders instead of "My Documents". 
• Read some books on ruby.
• Set a time limit for my work, so I can have regular breaks.
• Finish Git immersion course

Here are some more videos relating to this week's content (hard to find anything good that had some link to the GIT or CLI):