Drupal Training Experiences

I come from Drupal 6 and 7 and in the past I programmed (among other things) with POO languages like C++ and Java. I've been a student of Forcontu before.

I recommend the course without hesitation to all those who are going to start with Drupal 8, whether they know nothing about Drupal or come from Drupal 7. Whoever thinks that knowing PHP will be able to dedicate in a short time and on his own to work with Drupal 8, is certainly wrong, unless he is a student with a lot of free time and no obligations. 

Now, even betting on the course, you have to be aware that it devours your free time and even with 6 months you are very fair: there is no margin for misdirection. I believe that the dedicated sessions should be at least 2 hours to be able to advance, preferably 3 or 4. I recommend to the future students to make a calendar with all the exercises of the course and to revise it often if you want to be conscious of what you lack to finish.

As everything can always be improved, I think that the scoring system deserves a revision. I think that the mix of criteria when it comes to awarding points to each exercise is confusing and I personally found it frustrating: it does not give a real measure of the proportional progress made, nor of the effort invested. Keep this in mind for your next students so that you don't despair if you get stuck in an exercise "that was originally only 2 points" while one of 10 you finished in half the time ;)

As an idea for Forcontu, I would suggest that when sending each exercise you include a field to be filled in by the student of "minutes dedicated to solve it", together with the statistics already collected (number of answers given, minimum, maximum, median, average...). In this way the student could foresee the time needed for each one and organize himself/herself without getting frustrated.

While we are on the subject of the "Letter to the Kings" I would ask Forcontu to make the exercises independent or "modularized" for future courses, at least per lesson, so as not to overwrite the code.  For three reasons:

I'm sure that would make it easier for you to hand in and correct the exercises, by not "crushing" each other;
If we get stuck in one exercise or lesson, if they were independent we could continue with another one and thus take it up again later, fresher and more motivated;
Resolved exercises are possible "chops" of our own that can be used in the future. If I have already spent time solving a problem thanks to the course, and I come across something similar in "real life", it is not the same for me to have to unravel it in a code that is already a jumble of 4 overlapping exercises, and where the solution to the specific problem has already been overwritten and lost.
More than once I have come across a statement "take back the module you did in activity X and now you do this one"...it may have been weeks or even months since that activity and the module no longer exists. Perhaps it would be best if it were not necessary, or to have the code necessary to start it available for download from the new statement or in another folder/web on the server.

New students: document and keep for yourselves the solutions exercise by exercise. And zip and save the modules worked on and given for good activity by activity. Even if it takes time, your future self will thank you, maybe a week later during another activity, maybe at a work station.

And well, otherwise thank you very much for the help of the Forcontu team, whose titanic task both in preparing the course and in attending to the students is appreciated. Greetings and thanks also to the colleagues of the Forum.

I only have 2 exercises and 2 weekends left to reach 800 points (having time for a final project is Science Fiction) but as I must be going I ask you: when will the Drupal 9 course be finished? ;)
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