INTERLUDIUM: Learning the Flutter puzzle.

Learning to code can best be compared to puzzling. It's like a puzzle with thousands of pieces.

Obvious pieces

As with most puzzles, you start with the most obvious pieces. The four corners and the contours. That's the most common thing with Flutter, and that's building the UI. You will find hundreds of videos of it. So that's a start.

The next row of puzzle pieces is not too bad, if the photo on the puzzle is colorful and varied. But that is precisely where the problem comes with Flutter. There are several different puzzle pieces that can occupy a certain place. Well now it is getting a bit more difficult. But there are also videos of that.

But don't worry, after careful weighing and isolating the puzzle pieces, we will get there. So also with Flutter when I build the UI.

Put these puzzle pieces aside

But the closer we get to the core of the puzzle, the less variation of colors in the puzzle picture. So it gets a bit more difficult. Also because, again, different puzzle pieces can occupy different places. But don't worry, we put these puzzle pieces aside and continue.

The moment you think you can grasp the idea behind the puzzle, it turns out that the puzzle picture changes in relation to the viewing direction! But don't worry, we also put these puzzle pieces aside and continue the puzzle.

Only the difficult ones remains

At some point, all the obvious puzzle pieces have been used. And only the difficult ones remain. Just like with learning a programming language like Dart and Flutter Framework.

Yet nothing bad is going on. We are going to ask for advice from puzzlers. How do we tackle this problem. And then we get the following. Everyone does it their way. And the last, but basic puzzle pieces, are only laid slowly. Or not laid at all.

Now you can do two things, leave the puzzle for what it is or manage to put those basic puzzle pieces. Perhaps by looking at it differently or taking a few pieces back from the puzzle to perhaps put a part of the puzzle outside the puzzle. Thinking out of the box.

What have I now learned from this puzzle and thus Flutter.

The four corners of the puzzle are the basic values ​​of the puzzle for me. The Syntaxs of Flutter. That's for sure. Like those 4 corners.

Then there are the edges of the puzzle. The boundaries within which Flutter takes place. The classes, containing the methods. The dependents you can use. And so on....

And then the center puzzle pieces. Which are different from every viewing direction, whose puzzle picture is constantly changing. These are the basic pieces of Flutter, the statemanagement, the performance, the correct tweaked of the code. Testing and excluding errors. Those are the least described puzzle pieces, and if they are described, they are described in 100 different ways. Which makes it even more complicated. And no one tells you which is the right way and why.

After a very short time in studyin on your own, you will see the value in some Youtube channels and websites. You have to sort out the professionals who are telling the same thing. Find common ground in teachers. Find teacher where you can follow the thinking process, who shows you the errors insteat of the 'golden code'. 

But you can only do one thing, and that is to be selective and study in the “now”. Which is to say, study only what you need to know “now”. And do it as simply as possible. If what you understand works, then it is initially good. And from there you move on. Learn a programmimg language by creating a project.

Programming is like a book. There are no two, that arend copys ;-) , identical books. They are written in a language with rules for vocabulary and sentence structure. But the story is unique. If you can learn a language, French or Spanisch or whatever, you can learn programming!

So follow your own path, write your story, express your creativity in the rules of language. And let everyone enjoy your story.

Do, believe and be Happy,

Stefaan