Looking for programming time savers for beginners

[DavidM]

As someone just starting out with coding, I feel like everything takes me forever. What are the best programming time savers you wish you knew when you were a beginner? I'm talking about things that actually save real time, not just theoretical tips.

[Stephen31]

For programming time savers as a beginner, learn to use your debugger properly. So many beginners use print statements for everything, but a good debugger lets you step through code, inspect variables, and understand what's happening much faster. It feels slower at first but becomes a huge time saver once you're comfortable with it.

[Anthony.J]

Copy and paste judiciously. I know it sounds counterintuitive, but beginners waste so much time typing out boilerplate code. Have templates or snippets for common patterns. In VS Code you can set up user snippets that insert common code structures with tab stops for the parts you need to customize. This is one of the best programming time savers I wish I knew earlier.

[Joseph.J]

Learn to read error messages properly. Beginners often panic when they see an error and immediately search for the exact message online. Take 30 seconds to actually read and understand what the error is telling you. Most of the time, the solution is right there in the message if you know how to interpret it. This alone has saved me countless hours.

[Amelia73]

Use an AI assistant for boilerplate and documentation. I was skeptical at first, but tools like GitHub Copilot or even ChatGPT for generating repetitive code patterns can be huge time savers for beginners. Just don't rely on it for complex logic - use it for the boring stuff so you can focus on learning the important concepts.