This is just a space for me to document my journey through CWC’s courses. I have just completed the 14 day beginner challenge where I created the War Card Game with Swift and have now purchased CWC+ membership. I am now on my way starting the iOS Foundations (SwiftUI) course.
My primary reason for getting started on this course is because I - like many others - have a burning desire to create an app. I have an idea… and yet lack the knowledge to spark its creation. I could have paid someone to make it for me - but that did not seem to be a very good long term solution. So… I figured it was time to get my hands dirty and do it myself!!
Hopefully, this journal can serve as a resource for any other coding newbies who are looking into Chris’s courses. Not only is this journal a way to keep myself accountable, but I hope it can serve as a solid reference as to what one can achieve after paying for membership and learning all the modules.
This one was particularly hard. I was way off the mark on this one. After spending a good hour trying to write a few things - I caved and took a look at the solutions. Yup - clearly I had no idea what it was that I was doing.
It’s quite clear that, perhaps, I was not paying enough attention or perhaps have not been taking enough notes during the 14 Day Beginner challenge and past concepts. I will make it my goal to rewatch previous videos and try to make sure I understands the concepts more deeply before proceeding.
I passed through most of the challenges in the 14 Day Beginner course without toooo much difficulty - even though sometimes it just feels like I’m blindly stumbling across answers when something I try out ends up working. Maybe such tactics won’t work anymore moving forward. Gotta dig in deeper now.
Things are tough. The syntax of how swift is written still confuses me somewhat. When I think i understand something - turns out that i dont understand things at all.
I am hoping more practice and more consistently hopping onto Xcode on the daily will help me get over this hump.
The challenges are still as challenging as ever. To be honest, I feel quite dumb HAHA - the confidence I had in my coding abilities from completing the 14 Day Beginner Challenge challenges without too much help (save for the more mathy ones) is mostly shattered.
But let’s keep pushing. I am hoping things will click more with time.
If there is anything that you don’t understand then you should ask a few questions to get some clarification. That’s what this community is for.
We’ve all been down the learning path and for some of us that’s been a long road to get where we are. Don’t feel bad that you are struggling. Everyone gets to the point at some time where they say, “What the heck is going on here?”. Pretty normal. That’s when you either ask a question here or go searching on line to see of you can find another explanation that approaches it from a different perspective.
Person A might explain something one way and you end up with a blank look on your face and then Person B explains it a different way and you go, “Right, now I get it”.
Thank you very much! I do feel like I’m not quite learning at the pace the course seems to expect me to - and it does make me feel a little dumb bahaha! It definitely feels good to hear that questions are welcome. Will definitely get over my self imposed intimidation and just ask without worrying about sounding stupid
I FINISHED THE WRAP UP CHALLENGE!! And I somehow managed to do it WITHOUT going onto the forums for help. Admittedly I had to stare at the Recipe-List app quite a bit and had to refer back to the video lecture and notes.
And the app looks ugly. BUT the functionality is there and it is supposed to do what it’s supposed to do. Could use some minor tweaking - but im mostly just excited that i managed to do it without asking for help. Now… tis on to Module 3
Been doing pretty well going through the challenges and content for this module. For this lecture - my Reciple List View was not showing the actual Recipe List for some reason.
This was the first time I used Breakpoints and after some fiddling, I manage to find the issue and debug my code. Definitely boosting my confidence in my coding abilities.
iOS Databases Module 2 Lesson 2 – Stepping Out of the CWC Bubble and First steps in Creating my Own App
WOW! It’s been a long time since my last entry - so much for having this be my method of being accountable. Thankfully, while I may have been slacking in terms of writing in my journal, I have remained consistent in taking the time to code 6 days a week without fail. Since then I have completed the Foundations course and have moved onto iOS Databases but have momentarily stopped on Module 2 Lesson 2 only because I have been working on my own app idea which im super excited about and I feel like I have made quite good progress on.
With the iOS Design course - I created a wireframes design template and built pretty much all of the UI with hardcoded mock data on Swift. Not the cleanest or most organized Figma wireframes document - but it serves
Now I have been steadily re-watching CWC videos and perusing other sources of information such as Stack Overflow, Youtube and Udemy in order to build functionality with all the UI I built.
CURRENTLY:
You can register for an account on the app, and also log in with existing credentials. Used firebase for this. Upon sign in you can “use” the app, and by use I just mean you can look at all the mock data and the visual template of all the views
You can sign out of the app and get redirected into the log in screen
Can geolocate user. Upon first opening the app you will see the onboarding screen and get requested for permission to locate the user (thank you CWC!)
Funny thing is - I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how this log in system works (lots of courses and a lot of resources dont do a good job explaining things) but then I realized that in the iOS Databases course, if I had just continued on… literally the next Module is all about Firebase Authentication LMAOO. Serves me right being too impatient.
On the bright side - so far I am realizing that Chris honestly does a great job (arguably the best) in explaining the actual concepts of the code. Bouncing around different video tutorials, I find that when I come across a concept (take for example: EnvironmentObjects)… Upon being exposed to it first from another source (and being hella confused by it lol) and then coming back to Chris and watching him explain things really does enhance the learning experience.
All that to say: It’s probably a good idea to continue the iOS Foundations course and get to the Authentication Module. I’ll probably understand it a WHOLE lot better and fix up some code. Currently trying to figure out how to delete a user off of Firebase (Deactivate your account from the app) and perhaps the module will give me some insight.
Thank you very much Chris!! To be honest I still feel lost most of the time - but I’m sort of used to the feeling now! :'D Just gotta keep cracking and chipping away at it
I’ve still been trudging along with my own personal app. I’ve become quite adept at creating UI designs and doing the Front End, but this Back-End stuff is real hard. I admit that I caved at one point and hired a “code mentor” freelancer to take a look at my logic and to fix my work - but. He wasted my time and money by not doing what I wanted and recreating the work I already did on Storyboard LOOOOL. And to my surprise, this “professional” made it look worse!! I suppose that’s a bit of a confidence booster… but it doesn’t help that I feel like I went no where in the past few weeks.
Lesson learned. I have to rely on my own skills and be more picky with who I hire to see my code.
I feel like I haven’t made very much progress in terms of my own app - but I am trudging through the database course, albeit at a much slower pace than the Foundations course. I suppose it is to be expected. I’ve always been more of an artsy kind of guy, so I expected this material to be harder to grasp and harder for me to keep interested in.
Still. Progress is progress even if it is small. I’m gonna finish this app if it kills me hmmph
On the bright side - I had to dedicate a lot of time cleaning up my Figma document (because i wanted that freelancer i hired to know exactly what i was aiming to do), and it’s a lot more readable now! It makes me happy that I was at least able to translate my design into Xcode with great accuracy
Yes!! You should definitely rely on yourself first. You can do this, you can figure it all out!!
E-ve-ry-thing is already available on the internet, and you can reach out to people for help or guidance as to what to research.
For me back-end dev feels natural whereas front-end things drive me crazy. I’m lucky that Flo feels the opposite.
It must be extremely difficult to do it on your own, I don’t know if I could so kudos to you, keep it up!!
Totally relate with this, just gotta keep coding and trust that we’ll make it, one bug at a time
I know right I have redid the first 10 lessons of module 2 2 times now. But I literally completed every single challenge in module 1 so easily ( including the last one and the first one where you had to build the war card game UI ).
Yes!! You should definitely rely on yourself first. You can do this, you can figure it all out!!
E-ve-ry-thing is already available on the internet, and you can reach out to people for help or guidance as to what to research.
Thank youu!! Uhuhuhu - it’s been a challenge, but Stackoverflow and youtube has been my best friend. It does get scary when I can’t find the exact answer / thing I need to learn in order to implement something specific on the internet, hence why I caved initially and got a freelancer. Then again… I havent even asked my first own question on Stackoverflow yet, so maybe i shouldve done that instead of jumping for a “professional” to help me.
For me back-end dev feels natural whereas front-end things drive me crazy. I’m lucky that Flo feels the opposite.
It must be extremely difficult to do it on your own, I don’t know if I could so kudos to you, keep it up!!
Ahh thank you for the encouragement! Im definitely… trying ahahaha.
I know right I have redid the first 10 lessons of module 2 2 times now. But I literally completed every single challenge in module 1 so easily ( including the last one and the first one where you had to build the war card game UI ).
I’m glad you felt the same way!! I dont feel like a total idiot now :'D
Yea, there’s a definitely a difficulty spike, but don’t panic! The more you do it, the less you get overwhelmed with those ‘what is happening?!’ moments and it just becomes something you know you’ll get eventually. As you progress, you’ll see the same things that confused you before again, and when you see it written over and over a few times, it’ll eventually sort of sink in. Sorta hahaha!!
But also everyone here is super nice, so getting help is never an issue!
Yeah true. One thing I like about the course is that you are actually learning how to code. It is kinda weird that when you watch the video you feel like you already know the concept but when you attempt the challenge you have to rewatch the video all over again with a renewed sense of attention
What back-end stuff confuses you? Where do you feel your code has weaknesses? You have a strong community here. You can always post any issues that come up
The back-end stuff is normally easier for me, while the designs are a weaker point. If it has to do with the database layout/ design, you might want to make a schema for that separately, or model how your data works in Excel. I saw the Excel method used in this YouTuber’s quest to make an app a business in the third video around the 11:27 mark. @mikaelacaron told me about this Creator View Chronicles series, where he gives the overview of his app’s launch.
