Part VII: Final Projects

The final part of the book is where you step up to more advanced projects and try to nail down your personal process. These projects are a mix of difficulties, but they should help you formalize your process and figure out what is working well for you. The most important thing is that you should be on the path to analyzing how you work and what is best for you. Maybe you didn't do everything I suggest in this book regarding personal development, but I hope you continue to pick this book apart and find ways to analyze yourself. Doing this will give you an effective way to grow and improve as a programmer.

We should review what you've learned so far since you'll be asked to apply as much of it as you can:

• Part II you learned how to get hacking and how to make your start as smooth as possible.

• Part III you learned about data structures and algorithms, but also learned how to focus on quality and write good tests.

• Part IV you applied your testing and quality skills to projects focusing on Test Driven Development and auditing.

• Part V you learned about parsing, but also about measuring your quality as you work and writing effective tests.

• Part VI you studied SQL databases and learned a new process for analyzing data and structuring it well.

Part VII you will apply everything to a set of projects, making sure to focus on the three areas of improvement:

• Process by attempting to define your process and sticking to it.

• Quality by focusing on automated testing, testing tools, and tracking your quality progress.

• Creativity by trying to solve that are not too well defined and starting off with some loose fun hacking.