My final impressions on Bloc and ongoing journey

12 weeks ago I started Bloc with high expectations of learning Ruby on Rails and being equipped to build my own web apps as I pleased. My hope was to also begin applying and interview for entry level developer positions and gin employment by this summer. My original goal is was set for October of 2014 to make the career change.

So what do I think now?

I highly recommend Bloc if you have an idea for your capstone prior to signing up. If you are only learning Ruby just to learn Ruby there are other programs out there. Bloc's focus is on learning how to learn, which is interesting for an approach. I am no where near Ruby expert and barely know the "programming." I no have the ability solve problems using Ruby, but I will most likely fail a programming test in an interview. I don't completely discourage using Bloc to learn the Ruby language but the focus is on web development and a lot of concepts in the language are overlooked with the use of Rails.

I do also only recommend Bloc if you can dedicate 3 hours a day to learning. I started the beginning of the program with no issues with my time dedication and easily over exceeded my time commitment. I did get promoted at work which requires more of my time and required me to travel to Costa Rica during the latter part of Bloc. I was very dedicated to completing my web app that week, but still was delayed due to the spotty internet and travel delays.

With that being said, having a mentor exponentially increased my knowledge base quicker than I could have ever done on my own with the same time restrictions and job promotion. I do believe without Bloc I would not have been as dedicated towards, most likely because I paid a lot of money to do complete the program. Because of Bloc I was able to create 4 apps in 3 months and learn things like how to work with API's and useful gems like acsts_on_taggable and pry.

I am an outsider looking into the world of programming and now have a better understanding on where to go for continual learning.

I recently took a programming test for an apprenticeship and the guidelines were to finish 3 problems in less than 45mins, I solved one problem in about 50mins. I have a lot to learn in the Ruby language and look forward to working through the books I have acquired. My background is in sales and that is what I do for a living, In sales its all about "at bats." The more attempts you get to hit, the better chance you have at succeeding. The same is in play for learning programming, it's all about how many attempts you have.

I remembering finishing my initially finishing my Bloccit app, I completed it while carefully reading their step by step tutorial, I still felt inept when my mentor laid out the guidelines for approaching my next project without a tutorial. When I completed Taskoff I felt accomplished in completing that app in less than 25 hours of work. The majority of the app was completed on my own within 2 days. A month earlier I attempted to create a similar task app and failed even after following a provided tutorial and referencing OMR.

So back to Bloc's "learning how to learn:

I can not complete an app without the use the Google and I can't solve Ruby problems without referring to my previous projects, but I am confident within a year I will be solving beginner problems without the use of reference material. My hope is very confident in Ruby by this summer.

What's Next:

To my surprise my mentor expressed to me that he would like to still assist with my capstone project. He found my approach to this idea rather intriguing and would like to see the completion of it. He provided his personal email and recommended reaching out via Skype anytime I need help and pair program. I looked forward to the continual learning from his knowledge and completing this app in the next few weeks. At this point it is in its "Minimal Viable Product" form, but I would like to add a few extra features and front-end design prior to opening it up to an Alpha.

I have applied to a few apprenticeships and working on the prep work. I plan to complete my applications to those in the next 2 weeks and to keep my options open I have also applied to a junior developer position out of state.

The Unlikely Developer gained employment within only 8 months, I hope to eventually gain employment, but also hope to build Chuych into a viable business. I have been greeted with excitement when I explain the concept to others and look forward to having real people use it. I understand if this is any bit of a success I will need to devote more time to scalability planning for the app. I dislike my current job and love the opportunity to sell a product I created to churches across the country (I have not yet announce my business plan, but stay tuned).

Thank you for reading my thoughts, I look forward to my continual journey and pursual towards becoming a junior developer.

*FYI, after my first app within Bloc, I change my bio from "Aspiring Web Developer" to "Web Developer." Although I am not best I am a developer with multiple apps completed. I recommend you do the same if you have done the same.