On Your Mark

I don't know what has gotten into me that I am now creating vlogs. Maybe something has bitten me, or someone has transfused a vlogger's blood into my veins. I don't know. But I think it's a good thing. Right? Righhht??? Vlogging has always been listed at the far end of my bucket list. Maybe it was caused by my lack of correct equipment, which was why it got to the lowest part of my priorities. But it ranks higher in the list of my wants and I am so proud that finally, I was able to do it last Sunday, July 26, 2020. If you haven't watched it yet, here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYHKM3upNcI&t=1s The reason why I pushed myself on doing it was that I checked with my new netbook that the test video recording I saved was qualified for a somewhat-okay vlog standards. The audio wasn't as convoluted as the one usually recorded on my phone, the video wasn't grainy, wasn't blurred. All I needed was the initiative. And maybe it was the high ...

You heard me right. And I am not fooling around, there’s no one behind my back forcing these words out my mouth. Bug fixing is actually fun. In my work I prefer tasks needing bug fixes rather than creating a new feature in our project. New features demand too much time analyzing what needs to be done, what alterations to be performed on the database, unit tests to write, and ensuring the design meets the company’s standards. Bug fixing on the other hand is like a game of cat and mice. And you get to play the role of the cat, which is kinda exciting. At first it’s scary, like searching for a needle in a haystack of codes, but done right, you’ll be able to get the hang of it. First of course, you need to replicate the scenario reported, need to see the error yourself. Then read the error message. What exception was thrown? Where? Which file? In my experience, I always see NullPointerException as the number one culprit. Others were ConcurrentModificationException, and o...

I bet you thought I'm already involving myself with the software development process of the company, with sweaty hands, sleep-deprived eyes, and over-caffeinated blood — but no, I'm not there yet. My first week in my new job was focused only on my training, on getting me familiarized with their workflow process and in their environment. Since I'm new, no one in their right mind would allow me to tinker with their high-quality product. They must first evaluate where my skills stand and whether I'm really ready to be assigned those work-related tasks. But that's not saying I'm just sitting there idling in front of my laptop. The complete silence and shame of doing nothing would surely kill me. So I immersed myself in intensive training in order to catch up to them. On my first day, our team lead programmer tasked me to read a few books. Some of which were about cleaning codes and effective java programming. I was actually hoping that I would only get to r...

Choosing the programming career was one of the huge steps I made—since I came from the academe world. So when the software company called to invite me for an on-site exam, it racked me, I wasn’t able to sleep well for straight days as the idea of me coding in front of them terrified me. What if I wouldn’t be able to answer it? What if it’s something I am completely unaware of? And then that day came and I was right. It was totally something I wasn’t expecting. Please note that I am only trying to get an entry-level kind of java programming job, so when they asked me to write a REST API documentation for the scenario they made, I was like, “Shit, I’m in danger.” Nail-biting was never included in my mannerisms, but in that moment, you could imagine me doing that. I was expecting more of coding problems involved in hackerrank.com, where it mostly tests your logical thinking skills, utilizing the basic java utilities existing, such as rotating the contents of an array or recur...

Programming belongs to the most hated subjects of IT students. And I don't need to conduct a survey for proof. Sa loob ng two years kong pagiging IT instructor, pagsinghal pa lang ng mga studyante ko sa oras ng lab activities namin, alam ko na. Well. Worry not! Dahil likas akong mabait, bibigyan ko kayo ng mga tips para imbes na kamuhian ninyo ang programming, ay baka ma-in love pa kayo rito in the long run. 1. Master the basics. There's a reason why your teachers keep on repeating the if-else and for loops topics in every subjects na meron kayo, kasi, fun fact: kakailanganin niyo talaga iyon sa software development. A lot of times, actually. Your subjects are structured step-by-step. Usually, C++ basics lang muna, then Object-oriented programming concepts, Data Structures, and so on. Wala namang tangang magtuturo ng advance agad. Malamang by leveling process iyan. Kaya para makatagal ka sa college, kailangang basics pa lang ng programming, master mo na; dahil ...