Summer of Code: From Novice to Developer

This summer felt like a blockbuster movie montage - fast-paced, eventful, and full of personal growth. It was my mission to kick start my personal projects, and let me tell you, the journey was nothing short of exhilarating.

I started my summer break with an ambitious goal: to create a website for hosting a developer blog. I chose an HTML5up template as my starting point, but was quickly confronted with the truth - I was out of my depth. The template contained languages I wasn't yet familiar with, such as JavaScript and React. Adding to that, the concept of web hosting required me to familiarize myself with GitHub, another platform I was just beginning to understand.

Realizing that I needed to ground myself in the basics, I turned to Udemy. I enrolled in a web development course taught by the brilliant Angela Yu. Alongside this, I decided to tackle GIT and GitHub through another course by Colt Steele.

As an aspiring game developer, I also dabbled with Unity, recreating the classic Flappy Bird for my first project. There are dreams of a game trilogy dancing in my head, but that's a tale for another time.

Once I got a good grip on GIT and web development, I took my first confident step: I coded a simple, but effective landing page. The page served as a gateway for people to access my resume. I was ecstatic. I had created my first website - a tangible product of my learning journey. It was built using bootstrap and fully customized by me, a proud achievement.

But I didn't stop there. I updated my website daily, committing changes through GitHub, slowly transforming my single landing page into a multi-functional site. It now boasts a color palette, a projects page, and a contact page, all designed and coded by yours truly.

During this time, I also uploaded some projects I had done at Boston University to my GitHub. These included an eight-puzzle solver using Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) and a connect four game against an AI with varying difficulties.

As a developer, one needs to constantly evolve and learn. To aid this process, I discovered HackerRank, a website that provides coding challenges and helps in preparing for job interviews. Juggling all these tasks wasn't easy, but the challenge was worth it. I found it extremely rewarding to see my progress, to see my solutions work.

Looking ahead, I have also been brushing up on Java - a language I'm not too fond of - in preparation for my next semester. C#, which I used for Unity, felt more intuitive, but sometimes we have to adapt and overcome, don't we?

In the end, realizing that I needed to focus on other areas, I decided to pause my web development journey. And that's when this blog was born, separate from my website, but a part of my journey.

This summer has been an action-packed coding adventure, from navigating the seas of web development to diving into the depths of game design. It's been filled with highs and lows, with numerous lines of code, countless debugging sessions, and invaluable lessons. And the best part? This is just the beginning. I'm excited to continue my journey, and I can't wait to share it all with you.

Welcome to my coding chronicle - it's going to be one hell of a ride!