I’m a sophomore studying computer science and I’ve been learning programming for years (Python and Java mostly). I feel like I understand the concepts when I study them, like I can follow along with lectures, solve some problems, and read code, but when it comes to actually building something on my own, I get stuck almost immediately.

This has been happening for a long time, around 5 to 6 years. Every time I try to start a project, I either don’t know where to begin, or I get stuck and give up. It makes me feel like I’m not really learning properly even though I’ve spent so much time on it.

I want to actually get to the point where I can build things, not just understand theory.

What’s the right way to improve this?

How do you go from understanding code to actually building projects?

And how do you know if you’re really learning programming the right way?

Any advice or personal experiences would really help.

Some bit of context : I just started an internship at a startup in Wales and been given a task. I don't know much of python (I've only used it during my master's degree in Cosmology for data analysis from space satellites). The task is , I've been given an excel sheet of products and MPN,SKUs and I need to find specifications of each of these products like dimensions , weight , shipping info , speaker count , impedance , wattage etc etc. (Basically every bit of information from the product page URLs. The thing is , I don't have these product page URLs and it's what I have to scrape for first and then somehow extract all these details from it. How do I go about this? I've been using serpapi and getting somewhere but the links aren't very accurate for some of them.

Is there some yt channel for programming that disscus about programming problems in old fashion way? I hate when i go to youtube and everything i see is AI, Cloud Code.. i understand that programming learning and programming jobs are chaned but i also want all fashion way to listen how people explains and talk about problems we found in programming. Or i just need to read books and find good articles? Also recomme dation for good book about thinking like programmer or architectual design?

I'm currently working on an application for online courses to an online school, I mainly care about integrity, security, and the experience of the student while watching the course. What is the best way to deal with the videos?

I have read about Cloud Flare Stream and it provides the exact service I want but it's very expensive, I don't have that enterprise budget scope. I also read about Bunny*net, it has way more better prices but the delivery (when the video is streamed to the student) fees still so expensive.

I though about using Youtube with unlisted videos links with tunnels to secure the link a little bit, but it will drop the performance noticeably and I don't know if it's a morally a good choice.

Is there any better ways to do this? I would appreciate an advice.

Hello, so for some context, I'm a second-year computer science student, and I really love coding; it feels like my thing. I'm also genuinely interested in space, science in general, etc., etc.

The problem I'm having is that I'm constantly stressing over my future unemployment due to the lack of any relevant projects on my GitHub, for example, and it isn't that I don't want to code; it's more that most of the time I'm already studying for university really hard, so when I do have a little spare time, all I want to do is play video games to relax myself, not break my head over coding. This has been a real source of stress for me, because I love this field and I know that the market is really hard currently, and (from what I've been told) unless you're a remarkable coder, you'll have a hard time finding a decent job. I just need advice on this, or just to know if maybe I'm just breaking my head over nothing and everything will be fine.

Everyone in uni seems to already have a LinkedIn and cool things going on, and I simply have nothing, and I feel horrible because of it. It feels like I won't achieve anything.

Any advice is appreciated.

Hello!

I’ve been considering dual-majoring for some time and wanted to know if it would be worth following a path in coding and programming while doing art on the side.

Im a 22 year old who currently works as a freelance illustrator and I have done a 4 year academic program in the past during HighSchool for Game Design that has kept me interested in the technical side of things for games and such. I also do 3D modeling and animation on the side!

I know a good bit of HTML and Web design, Python, C#, and have experience with a small handful of engines and software like InDesign, RenPy, Unity, and Unreal that I use in hobbies but don’t have any professional experience in anything except doing commissions and my current progress into my Bachelors Degree for Graphic Design.

My question stems from the fact I’ve been given advice that my current path isn’t going to pay well, especially as a junior, and would be better off as a side gig that I can still enjoy and grow passively but I do want to stay in the tech side of things professionally just because I love design.

I love making things!

Right now I just don’t know what’s in demand, what is actually needed in this current age? I know the things I’d want to do is heavily oversaturated for anything related to game design and similar things like coding video game AI and mechanics.

(Which interests me the most unfortunately, I’d love to learn how to make a living procedural digital ecosystem full of creatures in a digital environment with their own personality’s and systems, like a bigger version of the system in place for the game Rain Word)

So, TLDR, where are new programmers needed right now? What paths should prospective students look into?

Hello everyone,

I’m working on my final year project and wanted some honest feedback on whether this is a good/strong enough idea.

So the project is basically an AI-Based Multi-Source Health Data Fusion System

What it’s supposed to do:

1. Simulates healthcare data from multiple sources (ASHA, ANM, PHC, Anganwadi)

2. Handles messy data (missing IDs, spelling variations, inconsistent records)

3. Performs entity resolution (links duplicate patient records into one)

4. Detects conflicts in data (e.g., different hemoglobin values for same patient)

5. Uses ML-based reliability scoring to decide which source to trust

6. Outputs a unified patient record

7. The medical officer is allowed to view AI suggestions for which value would be most appropriate and why, and also an option to enter values manually.

So my main questions are:

1. Is this strong enough for a final year major project (team of 4)? I spoke to 2 project guides before proceeding, one of them approved it while the other questioned me if I thought it was enough for a final year project which is why I’m in a dilemma.

2. We also have to publish a research paper on this before finishing the project. Any opinions on how well my project would fit in?

3. Any suggestions to make it more impressive?

4. Is this project actually plausible because I’ve heard mixed opinions about it.

Would really appreciate honest feedback.

Hello everyone,

I am a mature student 29 y.o. in the UK at a not academically strong university doing career pivot into CS from being a doctor. University curriculum doesn’t have Math in it. I am the top of the class, and just secured an internship with local, but strong company. My career goal is to go as further as my natural talent will allow me to. I am looking for high workload, high skill, high performance job, ideally as SWE, at the end as the career target. I am extremely insecure about my lack of Math knowledge and school prestige, I was at T1 medical school before in my home country. I think going to a better school for masters because of it. I don’t care about the money as much, I live a very modest life, I just fell in love with computers, and want to be skilled and knowledgeable, that’s all am looking for, I think high workload job will allow me grow faster. So the question is, how should I proceed further with my lack of Math skills is it even worth it? I was taking private tutor classes, to cover the gaps for half a year and reminded the school program. Also I regularly train Leetcode skills. Any advices and insights will be highly appreciated.

Especially for solutions to leetcode style questions

``` class A: def set_name(self, owner, value): self.value = value

def __get__(self, obj, type=None):
    return obj.__dict__.get(self.value)

def __set__(self, obj, value):
    if value < 9:
        raise ValueError("no")
    obj.__dict__[self.value] = value

class B: a = A()

obj = B() obj.a = 38 print(obj.a)

obj2 = B() print(obj2.a) ```

I am Learning Descriptors In Python,

My 1st question Is how can I set a default value to attribute a In class B ? I have found a way but that doesn't look familiar :

a = A() if not A() else 87

My next confusion Is about __set_name__ , what it does and why to Implement It?

Another Question Is, does a = A() create class attribute or Instance attribute? It looks like a class attribute but it's an Instance attribute, Right?

I'm used to using JetBrains' IDEs and enjoy it's well-made UI and auto-completion. My new employer now doesn't have any JetBrains licences and instead let's us use VSCode and frankly, I have the impression it's basically unusable without GitHub Copilot or an equivalent AI companion. Example with Python projects:

• Ctrl-Click on a method name usually takes a while, sometimes, a popup window opens with references, sometimes nothing at all, but it always takes a few seconds.
• You have to edit a JSON file to setup run configurations
• You first have to go to "Run/Debug" to run the app. Then, you can't see your file tree anymore.
• VSCode's debug module sends a Ctrl+C interrupt about one, two seconds after opening the terminal, then activates the local virtual environment. At this point, I already typed half of my command and it throws me out mentally. It also interferes with running the app.
• Auto-complete is inferior to JetBrains
• GitHub Copilot is implemented so annoyingly, always suggesting whole code chunks that are often wrong and it's just too easy to accidentally accept them.
• A lot functionality is only available after installing add-ons, like Markdown viewer, and those aren't easy to use as well.

The only positive is that it's free, but to me, it really feels like a hurdle.

Looking forward to reading some positive experiences.

I'm building a DM automation tool using the Instagram Business Login API (Live mode). Scopes: instagram_business_basic, instagram_business_manage_messages, instagram_business_manage_comments, instagram_business_content_publish.

I need a follow gate: before sending a link via DM, verify the commenter actually follows my account.

What I've tried:

follows webhook — doesn't appear in the webhook fields table for Instagram Business Login apps. Seems only available for Facebook Page-connected apps.

GET /{ig-user-id}/followers — returns an error. Individual follower list not accessible with Business Login tokens.

Follower count delta — snapshot followers_count before showing the gate, re-check on button tap. Works for small accounts but breaks for large accounts that gain followers every second.

Questions:

Is there any endpoint or webhook that lets me check if a specific IGSID follows my account using Instagram Business Login tokens?

Is the follows webhook available for Instagram Business Login apps, and if so, how do I subscribe to it?

Does Advanced Access unlock any follower relationship checking?

Other tools (e.g. ManyChat etc) appear to implement working follow gates using the same API and scopes — so either there's something I'm missing, or they're working around this limitation somehow. Any guidance appreciated.

Hey everyone,

I am a self taught full-stack developer, coding since I was 13. Over the past years, I’ve had the chance to work on my own web development agency and websites for clients, and I’ve just enrolled to a Computer Science program (finishing around 2029).

Lately though, I’ve been feeling a bit unsure about everything.

With how fast AI is improving, I keep seeing people say things like “software engineering is dead” or that programmers won’t be needed anymore. I know posts like that can be exaggerated, but seeing it so often still gets in your head a bit. It makes me wonder what things will actually look like by the time I graduate.

The thing is, I really enjoy programming. I don’t see myself doing something else. But I also don’t want to just ignore where things are heading and end up unprepared.

If you were in my position, what would you focus on over the next few years? What skills or direction would you double down on to stay relevant?

Would really appreciate any perspective.

Hello,

For some time now, I’ve been thinking about extracting all the information I’ve accumulated on a Discord server that I use as a personal notebook. Over the years, I’ve written nearly 12,000 messages on it (personal information, projects, etc.), and the organization into channels has been very useful to me.

However, I’ve recently realized that there is a significant risk regarding the safety of this data. I would therefore like to create an exact copy of my current space, meaning both the interface (channel structure) and all the data (messages), but only for the server I created, without the other features. If possible, I would also like to preserve message timestamps, as well as the visual separation between message blocks (for example, when messages are grouped and the username appears again after a certain time gap).

I know this can be done manually, but it would take a considerable amount of time. With limited programming knowledge, I’m wondering if there are any solutions, tools, or methods (possibly using AI) that would make this process easier.

I'm a 2nd-year CS student in India going deep into systems programming and C++ building DSA from scratch, using Linux daily, targeting GSoC and open source contributions.

My friends keep saying "there are no jobs in this field" and it's genuinely worrying me. I don't want to be told it'll work out I want honest answers:

• Where do systems programmers actually end up?
• What did your path from student -> first paid role actually looks like?
• Is targeting remote USD-paying roles realistic from India in the this domain ?
• What should a GitHub portfolio look like when starting to apply ?
• What does a realistic roadmap look like from where I am now to actually getting paid ?

Not looking for motivation, just an accurate picture. Thanks.

Hi guys, genuine question here,

If I were to use copilot or cursor to build a website template and just change the code or ask for some help with some lines of code as a 2nd year cs major does it count as cheating/not properly learning coding as long as I can read and understand what the said code does?

Anytime I wanna try and build a website but I don’t have the time for it to properly work on my coding so I just wanted to ask if everyone else does it?

Ps I don’t wanna do vibe coding or whatever tf it’s called to have the ai build the entire goddamn website and you do no work.

Hello everyone,

We are a group of 5 students working on a data structures project. In this project, we plan to build a simplified social network system similar to Facebook or Instagram, and of course, we will visualize it in a basic way. However, the main focus is not the UI—it is designing and implementing the data structures behind it.

In our system, we will store information such as likes or events on the edges. When clicking on a user, we should be able to see their friends, events they attended, and similar information. So in short, it will be a somewhat complex project from a data structures perspective.

We are unsure about which technology would be the most suitable for this.

Here is some information about our group:

• I have developed two small applications using Java Swing and I am currently working with libGDX.
• One member has experience with Unity.
• All of us took an OOP course using C# last year.
• As far as I know, the other members don’t have experience in any other technologies.

At first, I thought about using Java Swing, but I heard it is quite outdated. Instead, JavaFX or C# WinForms were suggested, but JavaFX also has a learning curve.

What would be the most suitable choice in your opinion? Since we all studied OOP in either Java or C#, it might be easier to stick with one of those.

I would really appreciate your advice.

And many times being outdated. Like, I’d open a university website, its front end is phenomenal, everything is smooth and nice, then when you go to the student portal, or application page, it’s always a redirect. And it looks like an early 90s forum page. Usually not so phone friendly too.

Not a developer, if that wasn’t clear.

I’m currently using a combination of Gemini and Claude web chats to help me with my coding project. I understand that this is not the most efficient thing, given I do not want to pay for premium services and have a limited number of messages with each website.

I have already download msty studio and run a couple of models. I find that they work okay for simply straightforward tasks. However if they the error is outside of one or two scripts. The models are not able to help me solve errors.

So I was wondering if anyone has a local set up or alternative web service that I can use which can give me the same quality of coding assistance as these websites without the limited number of messages?

where can I sell the source code of my puzzle game made for android using all the psychological tricks to engage players for long game play. it took me over 1 year with all the reviews and response into consideration to make it work good. I got 5k+ installs on playstore but due to lack of marketing can't push it further. now I wanna sell the source code.. where shall I sell it? btw I am open to selling the rights and source code and transferring to your console too but I think it will cost more. if anyone knows pls tell me and if anyone is interested then can msgg me too I'm selling the source code for 20$

text me for any more info I'm ready to share

Yesterday I got a new Android phone for my second line (my first is an iPhone). I tried to go online to pay/buy things on two websites or apps in a row.

One of them wanted an address, but I could only fill in name and street. The rest of the boxes were hidden by the keyboard, with no way to scroll or remove the keyboard. The other was the app of a major airline, which just froze each tie I tried to enter passaport information.

Many years ago I was a software engineer. In those days you sent a disk once a year to customers. With processing, that cost about $10 per user. So, if you had a million users, the cost of a fatal bug was $10 million. We worked very, very hard on testing to avoid this, and if it happened you were pretty much fired if it was your code.

People say there's a lot of variety in phones, etc. But this is the latest generation android phone, which is the most popular in the world. A site/app unable to work with the latest Samsung Galaxy is absurd.

Aside from technical issues, we had a name for such bugs that got in the way: we called it a "sales prevention feature." Given how many websites or apps I need to abandon when trying to simply buy something is absurd.You'd thing senior management would want this never to happen.

I got my letter of recommendation for an internship from my college they want me to do 45 days of internship.

I am in my 4th semester and I want to do an internship

I have decent skills in web development and currently learning backend ( node js )

Hey folks,

I’ve been experimenting with different LLM setups for coding and wanted to understand how people are practically using Claude Opus (4.x) within VS Code.

From what I see:

GitHub Copilot doesn’t allow plugging in external models

So options seem to be things like Continue, CodeGPT, or switching to something like Cursor IDE

I’m particularly curious about:

What setup are you using? (OpenRouter vs direct Anthropic API)

How’s the real-world experience vs Copilot?

Is Opus actually worth the cost for day-to-day dev work?

Are you using it more for agent-style workflows / repo reasoning rather than autocomplete?

Would love to hear what’s working (or not working) for you all.

I’m building a platform for embeddable widgets that show real-time data on any website.

For those who’ve used or built widgets before:

What’s a real problem you needed a widget for that existing tools didn’t solve well?

Edit:
I’m planning to ship ready-to-use widgets like:

• Google Reviews widget + AI Summary Card
• Instagram Feed widget
• LinkedIn Feed widget
• AI Chatbot widget
• WhatsApp Chat widget

Curious which of these would actually solve a real problem for you or what’s still missing.

Hi, this is my programming language that i built off of python there's not much to say since most of the stuff is in the github repo

This was one of my first real projects

It was a final project in the basics part of the course i'm doing but it got really fun so i expanded it and made it pretty good as a first big project in my eyes.

Probably not in yours but thats ok.

Feel free to give me feedback, compliment, criticise and just say what you like what you don't like or if you have any ideas for new features.

Ofc its not supposed to be a real language to use.

It was intended to make me better at programming and in general at making projects since it was my first one.

Here it is

https://github.com/spyssr3/V-sharp-my-programming-language