New Relic has some advice for programming concepts to learn for newly graduated software engineers. While they target degreed engineers, I think these topics are quite practical for anyone that considers themselves a programmer or developer. Some of my favorites:
- How to write (More than just code!)
- Regex (The justification here was fantastic, and has me inspired)
- SQL (Everything is on databases)
- Teamwork (A great prerequisite for a job that is probably not focused on enough)
There are ten total items. This post gives me a bit of inspiration to re-think my own learning priorities. Maybe it will for you too.
That’s a great list, and I like the fact that you picked ‘how to write’ as the first one to list here. That can’t be overstated enough! If you’re a developer, I guarantee learning to write well will have a disproportionate impact on your career, whether you work for someone else or are self-employed.
Personally, there are a couple of things on that list that I know I’m a little weak on: SQL and Regex. I’ve been able to get by without strong SQL knowledge because WordPress makes it easy to avoid for a lot of things, but I’m sure getting stronger in that area would help me overall. As for regex…my brain just goes “Nope!” whenever I try.