Tech is the new oil and everyone wants to take a huge chunk out of the cake. It is good, but the only problem is that most people do not calm down to know what they want, the route the want to follow or the language. This issue can be said to stem from lack of mentorship to which an extent I agree to. I went through that issue because I didn't know where to start from or what I wanted to do, I wanted something fast and easy to learn, but this field isn't something you rush into.
The Journey Begins
Internships:
The first time I wrote code was between February and March, 2020. I started by entering a hackathon: AfricavsVirus which saw me taking on the role of a frontend developer not only in my group, but in other groups that sought my help. I used templates to build the frontend because I wasn't really conversant with all HTML, CSS, Javascript and Bootstrap. This was a time of fake it till you make it and I was determined to prove my worth. Due to the fact that I was a novice, so many things wasn't sitting right such as mobile responsiveness of those websites and deployments.
The positive side to this phase was that I learnt how to use git and some of the groups I helped work on their websites got certifications and some went ahead and founded startups with their ideas. After the hackathon when I learnt how to deploy websites, I deployed one of the many websites I worked on using a template.
Afrimart : This is a multi-vendor E-commerce website that deals on food ingredients from Africa.
My next challenge was at HNGi7 when I registered as a mobile developer intern. I thought the internship was beginner-friendly, but that wasn't the case. I couldn't keep up with mobile development because nothing was being taught. It was expected that you ought to have been an intermediate to start the internship, due to this difficulty, I switched to frontend development. That was where I started learning on my own on how to convert designs to pixel-perfect websites. Juggling school work with my job and the internship was too strenuous coupled with the time zone difference. I rarely slept because I had to be awake to work on my school work while they were asleep in Nigeria, and do my projects when they were awake. I kept pushing on till stage 7, I couldn't take the stress anymore, I dropped from the internship. But along the line I met the most wonderful tech family whose constant encouragement made me better.
Lessons from HNG:
~I improved on my leadership skill as I was a project manager for a certain period of time.
~When you need help, do not hesitate to ask => I'm terrible at this.
~Connect with everyone, your surest pivot in life is through networking.
Post-Internships
After the internship, I started learning more and more on my own. I converted designs into websites with pixel perfection and also played around with animations. I got better at Javascript and Bootstrap, dabbled into Tailwind CSS a bit and flunked terribly at React. My inability to progress learning-wise in React was one of the things that pushed me into data science and machine learning.
In my sojourn as a frontend developer, I built a portfolio which consisted of all my HNG design template conversions and they can be found here . Feel free to look around and tell me what you think.
I love robots and AI, and seeing that machine leaning can give me that, I took a plunge. I started learning from the middle by starting with machine learning directly without going through the basics of data science. I took courses in Udemy, did so many projects bothering on different aspects of machine learning and data science. Some of the projects are:
~ Sentiment analysis using BERT
~ Brain tumour detection and segmentation model
When I felt that I have gotten the grasp I wanted, I started learning data science by enrolling in Coursera's IBM Data Science Certification. At the end of that course I did a capstone project which was bordered on recommendation engine.
This capstone project was my first article in Hashnode and can be found here . I started taking other courses on Coursera, and currently I have in addition to the IBM certification 3 specialization certifications and 1 professional certification.
My greatest motivation is the money, but dwelling in this alone isn't enough. I want to be the best I can be, I want to leave a legacy, so I keep pushing. No retreat and no surrender.
Lesson:
In all have a set goal on what you want and the path you want to follow to prevent running in circles like I did.
Conclusion:
Looking at where I was before and where I am now, I can say I had a tremendous progress. If you want to connect with me, you can do so by clicking on this link . Thank you for reading.