When I first decided to get into web development after taking a couple of years off from software (after doing Java development in the finance world) I started with Ruby on Rails because it was hot at the time.
I spent several weeks going through about three books on Ruby on Rails and working endlessly on tutorials, etc. But I got nowhere and I couldn't stand it.
Then one day I read the Django documentation and it took a completely different approach. The approach that the Django documentation took just made sense. It began by explaining what the problem was from a high level and then explaining different solutions that had been tried over the years and what their drawbacks were and how this led to further approaches, and so on. By walking me through the system that way it made Django clear and sensible to me.
All the Rails stuff I had been reading seemed to assume that I already knew everything but just needed to understand some magic incantation. Django treated me like a child, which meant that it actually treated me like an intelligent adult.
I'll never forget the experience of reading that Django documentation. It was crystal clear and it changed my life.
I spent several weeks going through about three books on Ruby on Rails and working endlessly on tutorials, etc. But I got nowhere and I couldn't stand it.
Then one day I read the Django documentation and it took a completely different approach. The approach that the Django documentation took just made sense. It began by explaining what the problem was from a high level and then explaining different solutions that had been tried over the years and what their drawbacks were and how this led to further approaches, and so on. By walking me through the system that way it made Django clear and sensible to me.
All the Rails stuff I had been reading seemed to assume that I already knew everything but just needed to understand some magic incantation. Django treated me like a child, which meant that it actually treated me like an intelligent adult.
I'll never forget the experience of reading that Django documentation. It was crystal clear and it changed my life.
This all happened around 2012.