Colin Di Meo

Shit. I forgot I was trying to do the blog thing while I was in the Iron Yard. Being in a gauntlet of learning and staring at a computer screen all day, rummaging through Stack Overflow and Google searches to figure out bits of code tends to dull your desire to hop on the computer for leisure.  It's been a huge gap between my last post and now, and between those times I've learned heavy amounts of HTML, CSS and Javascript. We're currently working on Node.JS using Sessions, Mustache and Body Parser as well as a few other things (Mongoose and MongoDB are next week!).  The pace at which we've gone, and the amount that I've learned has been immense. So immense it's precluded me from writing any of this kind of stuff. I'm dreaming about code. I'm thinking about code over my cereal in the morning. I'm thinking about code while I use the restroom. IT NEVER ENDS!!! I'm in the process of building a Mystery Word game using Node, Sessions & M...

We got the news half way through our first week from the campus director. The room felt funny afterward, everyone who had been wide eyed and excited the day before was visibly distraught. "What does this mean for us?" I chewed on that question for the day, not much longer than that. I realized that while it was unfortunate news, we weren't getting locked out of the facility that day. We would be the last cohort in Durham that was serviced, and the doors wouldn't be shut until we were finished with what we had signed up for. We lost one class mate the next day, and I appreciated that. However, I realized that what does the closing of this business have to do with me? Why should I be worried? If I can leave The Iron Yard with the skills that I signed up to learn, and I can take the momentum from that process to continue my journey as a developer...who cares? I came from a music background, and never in my career was I stopped because I didn't have a piece ...

I just walked through the door after my first day at The Iron Yard. Wow. My brain feels like it's swelled up like a sponge. It feels like it turned itself on for the first time in years. Even after the first day, you can tell the pace is going to be on the quick side. You're just hammering into material, not expected to comprehend it deeply, but at least conceptually in some regards. We tore into Git & GitHub quite a bit - which was funny because leading up into the course I had brushed off terminal usage as a trivial component in the face of learning HTML, CSS & JS. Oh how wrong I was! Tonight and the rest of this week I'll be making sure I'm maximizing my time in the terminal so I can really get that down pat. We got into some of the structural realities of HTML in some of the homework (which I worked on during our free work time) which was easy enough after pounding through Ducketts book last month. This is rambling and ill conceived, but I have to admit I...

Class starts Monday morning...tonight there's an install party for my Iron Yard cohort at our campus in Durham. The past few weeks have been hectic, between family visiting, friends moving into town and a small vacation to the beach. I'm pleased with the work I've accomplished thus far, between getting a website live with the help of  www.teamtreehouse.com  and their website tutorial, a good intro grasp on HTML & CSS fundamentals from Jon Duckett's wonderful book and some really great JS basics with  www.codeschool.com . I decided to end today after their Part 3, Level 1 section as to not get too far ahead of myself. I wanted to become familiar with it, but I also didn't want to burn myself out on some of the headier topics, I think that'll be easier for me to tackle in a classroom environment. Can't say it enough, I'm just really excited. This isn't something I thought I'd be doing, something I always looked at as this unreachable, tech wiz...

With the weather starting to get nicer, the past few weeks have been hammered with friends and family coming through North Carolina for visits and vacations. I've been off the radar for just ~3 weeks, some spent at the beach - and some right at home with people passing through. It was hard to pull away from studying - I felt like I was just hitting a stride. However, that's life and it's important to spend that time when it's available...now back to JavaScript! 7 days until the Iron Yard begins.

Phew...had my intro to command line and Git today. My push kept going toward a repository I hadn't directed it toward (or did, and stupidly didn't realize). After deleting and remaking everything I managed to get it to work. I'm not entirely sure I understand the upside of using Git & the terminal for pushing files - but I expect that will become more clear as I continue learning and applying my new knowledge. The satisfaction derived from being faced with an issue and solving it is immense. Indeed, this must be a required bone in the programmers body. I finished Nick Pettits' Treehouse portfolio tutorial yesterday as well, which is currently live @ www.colindimeo.com - however, all the content is placeholder with that provided in the tut. I will be updating it within the week. Look out for that! (Maybe I'll sneak a little JS in there too!)