That is how I started with Java. I mean I started 5 years ago but I quickly learned other ways by simply running into intractable problems when you try to work

That is how I started with Java. I mean I started 5 years ago but I quickly learned other ways by simply running into intractable problems when you try to work that way. Modern programs end up so complicated that having hundreds of lines of crap in a single function is impossible to reason about and causes you to write bugs into everything. I think it was working with others and pulling apart code and shrinking it down until it does one thing and one thing alone was the most important learning experience. Dijkstra might be one of the smartest computer scientists ever but I don't think that his assessment of learning that way was correct.