
Becoming a better developer (2014) - ooooak
https://gist.github.com/prakhar1989/1b0a2c9849b2e1e912fb
======
scarecrowbob
"Musicians get better by practice and tackling harder and harder pieces, not
by switching instruments or genres, nor by learning more and varied easy
pieces. Ditto almost every other specialty inhabited by experts or masters."

At some level maybe.

But for most folks I know, there is a plateau that you get to when you only
play a single instrument in a single situation.

It is true that if you're intermediate at something, just practicing more will
get you further.

But learning piano (and the instrument's linear layout presenting a more
visual set of tonal relationships) helped my pedal steel playing immensely.

Learning cello (and the instrument's focus on pitch forced the lack of frets,
compared to guitar) immensely helped my harmony singing.

Playing in blues bands that call tunes I've never heard on the fly (which
necessitated listening intently to the form and hoping to intuit changes
before hearing them) helped my musicianship in more scripted forms because I
had to both listen much nore closely to the other players and to develop my
music theory chops so I could anticipate changes and develop language to
describe common musical passages I needed to play on-the-fly.

I feel like knowing several programming languages and frameworks yields
similar kinds of reactive benefits.

~~~
LeonB
“Range” by David Epstein goes into this at length.

Studies about “mastery” that indicate you should stick to a single instrument
tend to be about classical music where you’re playing (generously:
‘interpreting’) existing pieces, which is very easy to assess.

But qualitative research on successful creative musicians from a far broader
range of genres demonstrates exactly what you’re saying: a range of experience
in different instruments and genres is highly beneficial.

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azangru
Interestingly, the gist that this one is forked from has a more complete
version of the text:

    
    
        Imagine your proposal recast:
    
        * Writing Achievements
    
        ** Learn a variety of languages
    
        Learn Chinese
        Learn French
        ...
    
        ** Experience the ins and outs of various platforms
    
        Write a book review
        Write a product catalog
        Write a comedic screenplay
        ...
    
        ** Enhance your understanding of the building blocks that we use as writers
    
        Write in the first, third person
        Write poetry
        ...
    
        ** Write in the open
    
        Blog
        Tweet
        Publish essays
        ...
    
        ** Teach
    
        Conduct a writing workshop
        Tutor students in writing
        ...
    

These analogies have been lost from the fork.

------
commandlinefan
> Sorry, I have to disagree with the entire premise here.

Is this in response to something? He seems to be replying to somebody, but if
what he's replying to is included, I can't find it.

~~~
ceronman
This is what he's replying to:

[http://jasonrudolph.com/blog/2011/08/09/programming-
achievem...](http://jasonrudolph.com/blog/2011/08/09/programming-achievements-
how-to-level-up-as-a-developer/#comment-287120251)

~~~
angarg12
Thanks a lot, the point is lost a bit if you don't have the entire
conversation.

