Learning Go: Tips for Developing the Right Mindset

How do I start? Where to look for resources and which to use? What are the best ways to learn how to program?

Questions like these circle in the brains of those who get their feet wet in the IT world and programming, and those who already program in other languages. Resources and the ways to learn are the most important questions!

How about zooming out and asking a more general question: What programming is in the first place? What do programmers do?

They write! They write, and they edit a lot! Each day, every day! They read! They read slowly, they follow the plot.

Does it sound familiar? Reading. Writing. Editing.

Learning to program is nothing more than building communication skills! Sure, computers execute the programs. But other programmers, including yourself, read your program far more frequently!

To become a good programmer, you must learn to become an extraordinary communicator!

Remember when you decided to learn another language? Was it German, English, French or maybe Spanish? You bought a book and CDs. You started reading, then writing. Word after word. Sentence after sentence. One dialogue at a time. Then you started talking with others - you started communicating!

Then, you decide to go abroad and immerse yourself in the culture, surround yourself with native speakers, and speed up your learning!

You don’t communicate in English by applying German or mixed language grammar. Do you? How would you sound to others?

The same rules apply to programming languages! You learn and apply grammar and style. You immerse yourself and learn idioms. You study standard libraries, write simple programs, and solve small problems.

Most importantly, be humble, master skills, and have fun! Why bother otherwise?