Jiggling is much easier. I could probably jiggle code in any reasonable programming language within a week or two, without knowing it beforehand. Less if it res

Jiggling is much easier. I could probably jiggle code in any reasonable programming language within a week or two, without knowing it beforehand. Less if it resembles any mainstream language I know. Building a project from scratch requires much more deep experience and understanding. And yes, I learn most effectively by copying too. Showing me a couple of working project and letting me implement a bunch of simple tasks by jiggling existing ones usually works for me way faster than throwing manuals and tutorials at me. Manuals have its place - when I know enough to know what to look up - and so do tutorials, but "learn by copying" is the most optimal way of getting bootstrapped for many people, including me. There's nothing wrong with that, if you don't stop at that stage but continue learning.