When I was a kid, I occupied my time and exercised my imagination by playing with Lego®. It was the only set we had, which my mother bought (she had someone buy it from USA), which I played with my sister for years.
I started by replicating the system just shown in the box. When my brain found it less entertaining because I had already memorized which brick went where, I began experimenting with making new things out of the same blocks.
How empowering it was to build something tangible out of an idea!
And yesterday gave me the same feeling.
While reading through the existing script my colleague gave me, I was overwhelmed by the syntax because I had never really practiced programming. I have a basic idea of how things work, such as the importance of importing modules and closing a loop. But beyond that, like making something from scratch, I’d end up scratching my head, wondering where to begin.
So, I asked my colleague to run me through instructions on downloading satellite data through an API (application programming interface). Before everything else, he taught me how to create a virtual environment (venv) to isolate modules I’ll be installing for the specific task I am working on (which allows ease of documentation later). Then, he taught me to verify if it’s working by typing ‘pip list’ where nothing in the list means I have successfully activated venv.
But because he’s working in cmd while I am working via terminal, I had difficulty following through the exercise after failing to activate the venv and consuming more of his time. So, I told him to call it a day, and I’d figure things out as we wrap up his demo.
After some experimentation (and intuition), I clicked the right buttons and successfully created a virtual environment! So immediately, I started experimenting by gathering pieces of code together (from various sources on the Internet) and integrating them into the script so that they would do what I intended (which, in this case, is to download satellite data from Copernicus Data Store).
What’s more, when a line of code doesn’t work, I ask AI Chat (I am using the ChatGPT engine at the moment) to fix it.
And tadaaaaaaaa!
After combining pieces of code, like I did with Lego® bricks as a kid, I got a working script!
I may not be as good as the best programmers in the world, but I can now say I know how to use the hammer to build something—like a working script that does the job I want it to. Now, I finally tasted what it feels like to automate a task.
P.S.
I’d be forever grateful that my colleague and friend, Jayson, has been generous with his time to remind me of some basics, such as python –version and pip list, and for teaching me new stuff like venv. I’m glad he really pursued becoming a computer engineer, too. Who knew I would need his generous help ten years into the future?
Correction (May 9, 2023):
My mother messaged me today, telling me that the lego set we had wasn’t a gift from her employer. Instead, she had it bought (and her employer bought one too) through someone who was traveling to USA. Well, it’s nice to have my perceived history corrected. Thanks mama Belen for reading my blog posts! You are my top fan. ❤️🏆
jessa 