Making Code Cheatsheets
I used to be a Google / Stack Overflow junkie for syntax issues or finding configuration/compatability issues in the vast amount of dimensions software gives us.
An approach I used to solve this problem was to document snippets once I have solved the problem (don’t forget to upvote the answer on SO). This is especially useful when you start learning a language. When you start learning a language, there are
- Syntax
- Style Guide
- Bad Practices to avoid
- Good Practices to start with
- Test cases to cover
- Libraries to use
- Libraries which are not upto date
- Highly opiniated frameworks
- The philosophy of the community
- Tooling
- Vendoring
- Advanced Syntax
- Backward compatible changes
- Where to find help instantly (when stuck)
- How to maintain, build and deploy
- The Database interaction
- The Spec (may be)
As a curious person wanting to learn everything you can with tens of open tabs, believe that once you start doing a project, you will eventually get to all these.
I started learning Elixir and it took me a while to get over syntax itself. I thought I would make a different approach while starting Go. This is about in August 2016 that I started to write down (copy often) the code snippets and what they mean from the books I was reading.
Maintaining a cheatsheet in a 3 column layout for code snippets has been a huge time savor when I was searching on how was this done here. (well, may look better with Borders)
Example:
| What | Code Snippet | Reference Link |
|---|---|---|
| H1 heading | # heading 1 |
Ref H1 Link |
| Links | [link](text) |
Ref Link |
I use a table structure in Evernote for now which I will have to soon move to a Git Repo in markdown. Inspired by other cheatsheets I find, I have decided to make my own so that
- Help others work like me so that they dont have to search SO
- I can reference them from any where outside my private laptop
- Try to make the development world a better place
This approach has worked well for me when I was learning the Go language and resuming my work on Ruby has made this better.
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