Topic: Bloody Wall ~ Bloody Forehead, anyone else?

Does anyone ever feel like all this web stuff is just too bloody complicated!?

It seems like at every turn you have to know so MUCH of everything to do any little thing! How do you learn all this stuff?

For example: I thought I wanted to learn PHP and MySQL. So I got a different type of hosting with Apache...and vhosts. Well, I find out I need to be a UNIX guru to deal with it. Transferring everything over, was a night mare, and I only had 3 sites hosted!

Now I am trying to figure out how to just get started with the mySQL stuff. Another series of errors and impossible to understand tutorials that either don't explain stuff or leave out vital points or something, cause I can never get anything to work.

Trying to deal with cross browser stuff also has be about ready to scream! And I'm trying to take a JavaScript class which is making me suicidal! Nothing ever works right.

Yes...I am frustrated, angry, and about ready to think the day decided to get involved with the Web was the worst day of my life!

OK....you might think I am exagerating...well I'm really not, at least not today...sometimes it is even worse than this!

Am I the only one who continually stuggles with feeling like a stupid idiot and totally overwhealmed?

Anyone want to help me mop up the blood?

*Hands e-maestro some pills I have been keeping because I want stronger stuff no the pills, give me elephant tranquillisers!! gets a mop out and help clean up)*

Yea I felt like this on the multimedia course I done for about a year and a half (might to be 2 years but the bastarts cut it short ), It's a bit different to your problems but I tell yea anyway .

The course I was doing was ok for the first few months till some of the teachers F*cked off to do some free lance work for themselves, them teachers that left was the graphic teacher and the web side of thing teacher, which I got very close to because I liked what I wanted to do which was graphics and the web side of things. But after they left there was one teacher that teacher director so for the rest of course all they want me learn lingo so I could do CD ROMS with director 7/8 which I hated, because I'm not a code person, never have been so naturally every think went worry with the lingo I was typing in and so on. The a mount of time I felt like saying to the teacher "f*ck it I can't do it, I can code" but if I said that I would feel like sh*t because she was really trying to help and learn it, as that was all they could teach now since the good teachers which I like was gone. I just wanted to do PS and web stuff that?s why I joined the course in the first place, so I told the teacher that was teacher me director and lingo code that " I don't want you teach me this any more I can't understand it and as you know every thing goes wrong and you have to sort it for me" so that was it for me not more learning lingo and director :-). So as I was ok then at graphics and new basic web stuff of the other teachers before they left, I start to learn every thing myself and off my own back, the only reason I went to college because of mates and the computers/software as I had not software them to learn at home. So for the rest of the course I just read books and tutorials for PS and dreamwaver, but as I start to learn this off my own back a start to more and more be in photoshop then learning code or web stuff. So every day I would be using PS so I just started to produce art work which more them selling products, so now I just do graphics and personal art work in PS.

I rambled on there but what the hell there is a piece of my life for all you to read . It's nearly the same as yours e-maestro, as in every thing going wrong and hating life and so on, but don't let it get you down have a break or do something you would not think of doing that day, enjoy life again till you go back to PHP and MySQL learning .

If it's that bad find an elephant tranquilliser and stick in you leg, I do :P

[Warning elephant tranquillisers are very dangerous and should not be use by under 18's, adults, aliens & humans. Elephant tranquillisers SHOULD be only used by inmates of the ozone asylum for extreme enjoyment at parties and other fun times]


Chris C

I don't know anything about you e-maestro, but why do you want to learn so much. Some of the best designed sites out there are straightforward html/css/javascript or flash, or maybe a mix of either. Unless you're a comitted back end coder who needs this stuff like a fix, then introduce it a bit at a time, instead of going for the jugular.
Simplicity is cool.

My 2 cents worth.

Phil

www.scansped.co.uk

[This message has been edited by Phil (edited 04-04-2002).]

I agree with Phil when he said "...introduce it a bit at a time...."

But, that does not mean, necessarily, giving up on it all.
One of the things that turned me on to this place in the very very beginning was Doc's tagline...
"Specialization is for insects."
I really dig that quote.
I don't know if Doc was the first one to say it, but I love it and have tried to approach my job with that in mind.

It is a lot to learn...in my experience, that is the fun!
Sure, it makes me want to bang my head against a wall every once in a while (actually, quite often), but the great feeling of accomplishment at hard work paying off at the end of a spectacular project is something that I haven't duplicated in any other realm.

If everything came easy, you would never appreciate the final product.
It's all about the struggle.

Keep at it, don't give up...on the other hand, don't get burned out. Fine line.

mobrul

Thanks guys for the encouraging words. Actually today went better. But I still wonder sometimes why I'm trying to do all this stuff....it's called trying to make a living.

I actually went to the MySQL site and was able to get some good out of the tutorial there...it was basic enough for me to understand. I then went to the one on Guru and started it...so maybe I will at least beable to start learning something about it after all.

You know, one thing that would be cool is to know more about what some of the regulars on here do. How they got there jobs etc. Part of my problem is that I do so many different things. Probably a big mistake, but that is just how my life is right now.

Anyway...thanks for being so understanding and supportive....I appreciate it.

One piece of advice (take it or leave it, as you see fit)...one thing, one small thing leads to another...especially in the web area, all the things are pretty much 'tied' together...especially coding and such. So a start in one area, allows one to 'build' the foundation for the others...just be sure not to 'bite off' more than you can chew. Not everyone here learned (or has learned) what they know overnight.

Never give up...just be sure to take breaks inbetween...

Darkshadow - I can relate so well to what you are saying. May be it's the same everywhere.... anyhow, I am in Australia, and I was looking for a course on how to build a website. The only accredited courses that contained what I wanted were in multimedia courses - which I definitely knew I didn't want to do (I didn't want to do the movies, audio and animation stuff). It was possible to do an expensive short course (around 20 hours total) on web design, but I knew these wouldn't suit either as I already had some knowledge of Photoshop and Illustrator from another course that I had done in desktop publishing.

Then a local college advertised a web design course put together from individual subjects from a variety of multimedia courses. This suited me just fine as all I really wanted to learn at that stage was some HTML and Dreamweaver. Which I did. However, lots of poeple who started the course dropped out, because they knew nothing about Photoshop or Illustrator, both of which were used. It made me realise that all this stuff is cumulative - you need to start off knowing the basics first then progress into the areas which excite you. I already know there is no way in the world I will ever be a programmer, so I'm not going that direction. In the future, I may consider a course in Flash and take it from there.

But that quote - specialisation is for insects - is good up to a point. I think it is almost impossible to be both a programmer AND a designer (graphics) - so specialisation one way or the other is good. If you enjoy Photoshop, then stick to the design side - this can still incorporate Flash or any other program where the coding side is 'done for you' in the same sort of way Dreamweaver can do the HTML for you. If you feel you haven't got the design side in you, go for the programming side, but small steps - don't try and learn everything at once. What you need to work out (and here I cannot advise you) is what are the basics, and where should I go to build on these?