Day 11

Hours worked/Total: 1/18

Day Recap

Got tired of just reading tutorials and decided to dive in and experiment directly with the code. Successfully managed to print filenames, but not without encountering some frustrating documentation issues along the way. Bing Copilot turned out to be a lifesaver here.

What I Did

• Decided to stop relying solely on tutorials and start building by experimenting hands-on.
• Learned Avalonia-specific coding practices, like the conventions for naming variables:
  • _variableName for private variables inside a class.
  • VariableName for public properties.
• Encountered issues with the Avalonia documentation:
  • Some properties were incorrectly named in the text but correct in the examples—very confusing.
  • Bing Copilot was actually the most helpful in navigating these problems; GitHub Copilot and Gemini didn’t offer much support with Avalonia specifics.
• After some trial and error, finally got filenames to print with just a few lines of code.
  • What took an hour here would’ve taken days in React Native, which was a big relief.

Remarks

• Switching from tutorials to hands-on coding was definitely the right choice. Avalonia’s documentation could use serious improvement, as misnamed properties are frustrating when you’re learning a new framework. Thankfully, tools like Bing Copilot helped fill in the gaps where other coding assistants fell short.

Next Goals

Continue building without relying so much on tutorials.