Comment You can do it! (Score 1) 247
20 years ago I wrecked a motorcycle and bashed my head HARD. Huge concussion, memory loss issues, etc. Although I had programmed in BASIC since I was a kid, I found it very difficult to get back into again. However, these days I am a professional lead developer/architect in C#, so all is not lost - you still have hope. So my heart goes out to you and here's some of the stuff that I did to get it back:
- Your short term memory is going to be messy until you get it retrained. (The mechanics of your brain are smart, they will get better with use. I suspect new 'circuitry' is created by your brain to route around any past damage) Get in the habit of making notes about what you are thinking about, as well as lists about what you are trying to attempt. (For some reason, I found writing on paper worked better for me than typing in the notes. I think the mental processes involved in computing the physical act of shaping all the letters helps your brain get back in shape. Your mileage may vary, this is just what worked for me.)
- You were talking about reading the C# book then getting lost after a few chapters. I had that issue as well (Still do from time to time.), some times I found it best to read as much as I could comprehend, then sleep on it. Usually the next day it would make more sense. Sleep is excellent for a repairing brain. Do some experimental coding using what you've learned from the chapters you understood. Get good at that part. After doing some of that for a while, go back to the book and try reading what you had found confusing again. Read as much of it as you can understand. Also just brute-force read a chapter at a time, even if you don't understand it, then sleep on it. After sleeping, try reading it again. Too me, it seemed often like my subconscious part of my mind was understanding it, but the conscious part of my mind was having difficulty figuring out how to build a model to comprehend it. Keep at it. Don't give up!
- I agree that C#, with it's managed memory model (Meaning you don't have to manually allocate memory, keep track of allocated memory, and then release that allocated memory later on - the Garbage Collector keeps track of it for you. You create your objects, and the garbage collector will take care of all the memory mechanics of it for you. Which lets you focus on getting code written, rather that worry about esoterica.) will make it a lot easier to get your brain flowing down the development direction again. Same goes for Java, but then there's the issue of which of many IDEs you should/can use for Java. No matter which you pick, even Java developers will tell you that Visual Studio just smokes anything out there for Java, so I'd go with Visual Studio with all it's brain-assistance stuff and a single way of doing things rather that the myriad Java options. Every time I try to do Java, I get bogged down on all the similar-but-different choices (Eclipse, NetBeans, JBuilder, etc.) I have to choose from, and that's just for the IDE. Some people call that a strength to have all the options, but I find it just unneeded complexity. Visual Studio beats them all anyway, IMO.
- Another trick is to (temporarily) skip over chapters that don't make sense and try reading further chapters. Quite often C# books cover completely different concepts in different chapters. Just because you can't grok chapter #5 doesn't mean you aren't going to be able to understand Chapter #6 or Chapter #10. Some times you just work with what you can, and eventually just by using the other stuff, the next time you return to a problem chapter it will just make sense this time. Hard to explain.
- Just repetition. I've been doing that currently with Professional ASP.NET MVC 3. I've had it for about a year now. First time thru, there was a lot that I found puzzling, or just "Why would I do that??". After doing MVC 3 for about a year and a half now, I keep re-reading that book and gleaning more information. Not specifically shilling that book, that's just the one I've been returning to a lot lately and really making progress.
- Since you are wanting to go with C#, I would, at this time, focus on MVC 3 and Entity Framework. Ignore WebForms, they are really a pain for more advanced web 2.0 (AJAXish) stuff. The "desktop" metaphor of WebForms was great for its time, but that time has passed. MVC is where things are headed. And what's nice, are the concepts are the same for Java (They call their MVC stuff JSF (Java Server Faces, which is a weird name, but it's also MVC) instead, but it's just name differences.) and once you learn it in C#, you can easily transition to Java if that's where your life takes you.
- XAML, Silverlight, WPF - those are pretty much dying. The future is the web. Fill your head with the specifics of C#, Javascript (It's no longer the crappy annoying language it used to be, it's basically required these days), HTML, and CSS.
- You'll find that your brain works a lot like how you can magnetize a nail by repeatedly stroking a magnet along the nail, always in the same direction. Keep it up, and your brain will start to wire itself in the direction you are leading it. It's a long road, but it's more persistence than one-shot learning.
- Also, either find someone that you can watch while they code, and will put up with some beginner questions. That helped me a whole lot during my rebuild. (Thanks Jerry!!) An option you also have now, that I did not have then, is that there are many many videos on YouTube about C# coding to learn from. Some times, just watching someone doing something once makes you have an "Aha!!" moment of clarity.
