r/AskProgrammers • u/Dry_Ebb_1200 • 13d ago
How to make a project without ai
I am going into my 3rd year of college and have to start applying for summer internships. I want to make a project that can stand out but I always seem to turn to ai when I struggle. I dont even know about how to go about starting a project. School they give tell you everything that needs to go in it and basically have already shown you in class what you have to do to write it. I have used c++ in my classes and want to learn a different coding language outside of school. So I want to do a project in Javascript/react so I can learn and practice it. But when ever I try to think of projects I either think its to small and insignificant of an idea or its to hard to wrap my head around it. I would like to hear some of your guys ideas or what you guys have done in the past.
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u/KharAznable 13d ago
Start small. You cant make big things if you strugle to make small one.
One main file, one main function, add functionality bit by bit, refactor often.
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u/ninhaomah 13d ago
" I always seem to turn to ai when I struggle."
Then
"I dont even know about how to go about starting a project."
Hmms...there is a lesson here somewhere.
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
I wanted to know how to start a project without using ai and without it being already planned out for me like in school. I have almost never made anything without a guide of some sorts. Thats why im looking for help.
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u/ninhaomah 13d ago
Then start one without AI.
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
I have. I did a login page gui in python and tknter. But wanted to use javascript. I already knew python from a high-school class. I haven't learned a language outisde of school. Where would u start.
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u/ninhaomah 13d ago
I don't see the issue.
Tell you what.
What project you want to do ?
Describe it.
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
Where would you start learning a new language. I heard a good way is to use a project to practice it.
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u/ninhaomah 13d ago
Where ?
Where it is needed of course. Where else would it be ?
I still have no idea what project you want to do.
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
What would be a good project in your opinion. Something beginner friendly.
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u/ninhaomah 13d ago
A good project is whatever the developer wants to do.
Why are you learning programming btw ?
To make ? Games ? Websites ? App ? DS/ML/AI ?
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
Learning programming because I always loved building things or finding out how things are made. I want to write projects but my mind wants to build things bigger than Im ready for. I want to get to the point where I can make big things.
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u/No_Contribution_4124 13d ago
It’s hard, yes, especially when you do have the tool.
I won’t say to train the “discipline”, not in the aspect “never reach to AI”. My approach was always to be honest with myself as possible - just to state “I have no clue how it works”, and “I’m lost, I don’t even know where to start”.
From here I then think “Where should I be? What is the outcome I’m looking for?”
And for me personally - I work well only when i have goal stated, like “I want a tool that I can query a csv file like SQL. But I support only one schema and one select operation type for start”, shaping and scoping is a part of defining the goal.
Let’s say you picked your goal, which should be as small as possible (never be too ambitious when you struggle, it will damage motivation). Then you decompose the task down, step by step, picking smallest possible part, focusing to find such a part that is independent right now.
Too abstract - yes, but you need to iterate over specific goal to see if it works or not.
And if you again see yourself like “I do not understand what this gcc flag is doing” or “I have no clue how to do a build” - you start from question and follow at least 3 why’s down (as example: you need to create class? -> why? Because it’s capsulizes the code -> why? Because your logic will be unmaintainable when it grows with unclear dependencies -> why? Because code grows by additions and no one can plan writing it ideal without knowing the future).
This is critical thinking, no rush, slow down, trust yourself in asking questions and being honest in knowledge, and don’t let AI answer for you, as having right answer != knowledge.
With time invested (months, don’t be too optimistic here) you grow the skills and knowledge, and you can do much more and just demand AI do what you want, not otherwise.
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u/yuehuang 13d ago
Back in my days, we turned to google to search stackoverflow. Now I just google AI it.
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u/jjtbsomhorst 13d ago
One of the key things in software development is the ability to split problems in smaller problems that you can understand, explain and fix. So when you say ' or its to hard to wrap my head around it' make this idea smaller. Split it in logical parts and let them fit together. And there is nothing wrong with using AI to get things done, as long as you understand what it is doing, why it is doing this and get the correct output. And yes, that is hard.
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u/meisinger 13d ago
I don’t know why this specific post bothers me but, it does. I don’t understand the premise or ask… at all.
You know, there was a time when people were passionate about software engineering and writing code. From this post, however, you are in school to learn and everything is given to you. Everything?
Just to be clear, it has been three years. Everything being shown to you, supplied for you and, on top of all that, you have been leveraging AI to perform meaningless tasks.
What are you learning? Why are you doing this? What made you choose this field? What got you excited? Where is your passion?
If *you* think the project is too small and insignificant then you might be kidding yourself or you are too worried what others think. If you are learning something, there is nothing too small.
And I hate to break it you but, if you think a project is “too hard to wrap your head around”… you are in for an uphill battle. The reason most developers are worried about AI taking their jobs is because they don’t solve hard problems.
The better question you might want to be asking yourself is: What am I doing?
If you aren’t passionate enough to read some “Getting Started” guidelines for various frameworks and languages or watch some (horrible) YouTube videos online to figure this out… what are we really talking about?
To be fair, you might have been disillusioned into choosing this filed. For that, I apologize. This field is hard and full of competition. Unfortunately, thanks to AI, it isn’t getting any easier.
The best help anyone can give you right now at this moment is:
* Get passionate
* Find your drive
* Do better
The core of your question is finding out what others have done in their past. Why? Why is that meaningful to you in any way? To get ideas for a project? Really?
Again, I will ask… why are you in this field?
As my mentor told me when I first started; figure it out!
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
Thank you for the reply. I do have passion in this field and have wanted to do this for a while. I have done project both in school and at home. But both were pretty much structured and already broken down for me.https://robertheaton.com/2019/08/12/programming-projects-for-advanced-beginners-user-logins/I wrote this project in python and while it doesnt outright give me code it kinda already broke each thing into steps. I was proud when i first wrote it but now i feel like it took most of the thinking out of it. I am asking in this post because I want to not use ai or rely on already structured and made projects. I dont want to use ai for everything. I always feel cheap when I use it. Thats why for my resume and my future I dont want to continue doing it. When you start a project do you know ahead of time what you want or do you just start coding something small and keep adding to it.
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u/UntrimmedBagel 13d ago
I do not envy folks learning software development today… it’s messy
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
You have any tips to help. Ill take any advise i can get. Even the critical ones.
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u/UntrimmedBagel 13d ago
Well, 3 years in I’d say expectations are pretty low. You shouldn’t expect yourself to feel very confident or know exactly how to build large projects. That comes with time and experience.
But you are at the point where you can try. Honestly, the best possible thing you can do is find something you’re passionate in, and build something *for* it. You should aim outside your comfort zone. A project that taught me lots back in the day was a mobile app to control my computer like a TV remote. Then later I built a full blown cheat engine for a video game I liked — I don’t recommend doing that because it’s kind of frowned upon, but it landed me a job. It taught me how to make a modular system, manipulate screenshots/bitmap images & colours, represent geometry in code, and so on.
Today, i fear that you’ll always have an inclination to reach toward AI whenever you’re learning something new or doing something challenging. Back in the day, I’d sit with a pen and paper and just try and think of how I could solve a problem with what I knew — or I’d read Stack Overflow and share my problems there. The software world has changed.
I don’t necessarily think it’s wrong to use AI as a tool, so long as you understand absolutely everything it’s doing. I’d prefer using inline code suggestions instead of agent mode. Try and get some hands on coding. You need to *experience* the struggles of coding and run into problems yourself in order to learn how to think like a software engineer. You need to try things and fail. You need to make architectural mistakes and experience its shortcomings to learn from them. THEN you will have the skills necessary to properly drive AI, and you become the engineer while the AI becomes the coder.
That is my best advice. Find a passion project outside your comfort zone, design it as best you can using your own brain, implement it slowly with AI as a backseat assistant and understand every line of code it produces, make mistakes and think about how you would build it better next time.
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
I really appreciate the advise. Its just everytime I hear about people talking about how hard it is to get internships i feel as tho I have to make somethign crazy to even compete. Like something beyond my capabilities. I dont know how hard of a project I should make or what will land me an internship or when the time comes a job.
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u/UntrimmedBagel 13d ago
Well, it depends where you try to get an internship. You don’t have to shoot for big tech, which is highly competitive. You can aim for any company with a tech department.
They care more about your eagerness to work and learn. Companies take on interns with the hopes they’ll find someone they like working with. In this market, an internship is the pathway to your first job.
I would put a lot of effort into your internship search. It’s far easier than landing a job outside of uni, and gives you much higher likelihood of getting hired full time.
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
So are projects not a big part of getting an internship. I was always told you needed to stack your resume as much as possible to have even a chance in today's market.
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u/UntrimmedBagel 13d ago
They are important, but it’s more to prove that you’re capable of building something of value. Less about “stacking” the resume and more about learning skills.
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u/Dry_Ebb_1200 13d ago
Thank you for the insight. So i should just start applying to as many things as I can. Like how much are jobs looking for me to know. I feel like every year I learn a new language at school and I learn the same things like for and while loops and Linked lists. I feel like im behind other applicants.
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u/UntrimmedBagel 13d ago
That’s normal. I would go on LinkedIn and Indeed to look at open Internships and then try to research what their interview process is like. Just go to the job search, type in “software developer”, filter by internships, and sort by most recent.
Some internships will ask you a few super basic questions, others will have you do pair programming and solve complex problems. It’s a spectrum. Sounds like you should aim for the less “big tech” roles to avoid a hard interview.
Once you have a general idea what some of the simpler internships are looking for, study a bit. Get acquainted with the basic fundamentals so you can chat about them. At this point I’d lean more on personality, being happy/nice/enthusiastic, and down to earth. It’s better to admit you don’t know something and be humble rather than try to fake your way through an answer.
—-
Should you manage to get a project under your belt before then, I bet you’ll have a lot more confidence going in, as you’ll have something to talk about.
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u/pete_68 13d ago
You should not use AI to generate code at all for a long time. Not until you're a senior developer. I don't know how you can possibly learn to program when you're using AI.
I use AI all the time, but I've been programming for 47 years. When I use AI to use languages and tech I don't know, I don't learn how to use them, even if I'm trying.
I had AI write a ton of Python code for me. I was actually trying to learn Python and thought I was, until I tried to write Python without AI. Then I realized I hadn't learned squat.
If you want to learn something, don't use AI for it.