Phase-2 down, 3 more to go...

This phase of Flatiron started out exciting and intriguing, took a turn towards frustrating, and then made its way back to a pleasant experience. I expected these types of experiences when I came to Flatiron, but at times it starts to feel quite overwhelming. All in all, I'm still happy about the decision that I made to come here.

The way that I first understood and thought about React was as an almost shorthand for JavaScript. I quickly found out that that wasn't quite the way it works. After getting a little better of an understanding, picking up the basics came to me pretty quickly. I found that I enjoyed using JSX. The ability to mix HTML and JS at the same time felt far more efficient and for me, it was easier to read and understand. Passing down properties down through components and child components was one of the easier concepts for me to catch on to, which was a peaceful change of pace.

After getting a handle on the process of components and properties, we started working with State. This concept was pretty confusing at first. Just the fact that it is a constant but is supposed to change along with coming with its built-in functions. We started using this because of the more common use of POST requests for updating the database. We learned some useful tips and tricks for collecting and using the inputs from forms in more efficient ways.

The third major thing that we started to implement was React-router. I wish that I could explain why this absolutely shattered my understanding of React. It took a couple of days for me to finally wrap my head around it with the help of some one-on-one help from my instructors.

Styling has always tended to be my least favorite part of this process. Bootstrap was very helpful with this but still had some headaches of its own. The shorthand and almost shortcut-like commands that it gives you for styling made it a lot more friendly for someone like me who doesn't have much of a creative side.

All in all, React was an interesting area to learn about and has a lot of interesting avenues to explore. The next phase will be about Python which I have no experience in. It's a little daunting to think about but I have faith in the program to get me to where I need to be. Until next time....