Half way done with CS50. My thoughts...

If you are new to coding and taking CS50 and are feeling like you want to quit, please take a moment to read this.

So I've just finished Week 5 of CS50, and it's been a grueling 6 weeks. I always knew that I was no genius, but I used to always be fairly confident that I could learn almost anything if I put my mind to it. But these past few weeks have made me question myself, and ask myself if I was just wasting my time trying to learn how to code.

If you are taking this course and feel like you are not smart enough, you are not alone. There were many times when I felt completely lost, pulling my hair out, and being close to tears from frustration and defeat. But fortunately, I did not give up, and just kept coming back at it, and I would always eventually get it after a couple of days of digesting the material.

Here are some tips that might be useful -

1. If you don't understand something, ask ChatGPT. This has been a lifesaver for me. If I have a simple question like, "why was this variable declared this way?" or "what does this function do?" or "why is this code giving me a segmentation fault?", I just ask ChatGPT and 9 times out of 10 it will give me a useful answer. Just copy and paste your code into ChatGPT and it will tell you how it works.

2. Watch the walkthrough videos. These videos are there for guidance, not to give you the answers. I would suggest trying to figure out a solution on your own first, but if you really get stuck, watch the walkthrough.

3. Try to solve simpler versions of the problem. For example, if you are being asked to spell-check a list of 10,000 items, try solving it first for a list of 1 item. Then try 2, then 3, etc.

4. Use printf() to see what your program is outputting along the way. Sometimes I like using printf() as a debugger, and placing it in certain parts of the program to see if the program is working properly at every step.

This morning I started watching the lecture for Week 6 on Phython, and what a breath of fresh air it is, after weeks of recursion, linked lists, and hash tables. It felt like I have been "working out" my brain so much the past couple weeks, that this week feels like a breeze. I look forward to the assignments for this week, and look forward to the following weeks learning other languages.

So in conclusion, as much as I suffered trying to get through CS50 so far, I am really glad that I have been pushing through it, and I feel proud of myself for having the grit to do so. They say that hard work beats talent every time, and so I am hoping that this will be true for me. If I can do it, you most definitely can, so don't give up!