Actually someone invented a device that can measure cognitive load, which theoretically helps push people down learning paths that work better for them, not moving to new exercises before they're ready or not staying on previously mastered material too long, that sort of thing.

What I mean is... I once saw a post on HN about someone's cofounder being a total autodidact. His process was waking up at 4 and studying until 6. He used flash-cards, took notes, read books, etc.

This would not work for me. For starters, I'm totally not a morning person. The only useful flash card at that time of the morning would list my name, phone number, and home address. I also generally eschew using flash cards; I don't have the memory capabilities to make them useful, but that doesn't mean they don't work for other people.

I also think codecademy is terrible, but it doesn't mean that it is bad per se. It serves a certain purpose and I'll let it at that.

Opinions are what they are and at the end of the day, you have to find resources that are valuable to you, not to everyone else. If it isn't working out, move on to the next thing. You shouldn't fall into to the trap of "this is how Person Y does it, therefore all people Z could benefit." It simply doesn't work that way.

This book is really good. Exercises are top notch too.

I'm a programming noob too and have been reading this and doing the codecademy course. I'm not sure codecademy on its own is enough - There is a fair amount of hand holding and with the structure of the website you can't really go back and reread sections easily.

However codecademy does give you some fun things to write which you obviously then mess around with and improve complexity of.

I'm by no mean a 4 am rising autodidact but I worked full time and have completed about 1/2 of a CS degree in the last 3 years. Being that busy means I have to pick up things extremely quickly. Me, i learn and am most productive in the morning about 1-3 hours after i wake up so i try to do cognitively intensive tasks in those times. You really just gotta know yourself and what works for you. Everyone learns differently. I remember that early feeling of being completely overwhelmed and ambitious and knowing nothing, it's healthy.

You'll eventually find that programming kinda disappears the higher you go. I believe anyone can program.. Kinda like how most people can do arithmetic, but it doesn't mean they understand Ring theory and stuff like that. The mechanics of programming mostly become second nature. Yea there's style and convention and good practice kind of stuff but you pick that up as you go, so i wouldn't stress too much on language or anything. I find programming puzzles useful, codingbat is my favorite because I can do them on my phone.

For putting 15 minutes of downtime to use I would recommend having a look at some questions on stack overflow in your target language.

A lot of this input has been very helpful. I've been able to do enough learning on my own to allow me to finish all the coursework with about a month to go. My class was pretty basic, though, and as it progresses things have really slowed down, which is kind of disappointing. Now that I've finished my class work and the Python interactive e book we used, I think I'm going to focus on Learn Python the Hard Way while I also toy around with whatever random program ideas I come up with. It really is a lot of fun to learn a new concept that immediately makes you think, "Well, that fixes that problem," or "Using this would make this other program so much better."

Also, specifically, thanks for the codingbat recommendation, jmakin.