Build a Personal Portfolio Webpage question

Hi guys,

I’m starting the next challenge: Build a Personal Portfolio Webpage, however I have a question:

What does this mean?
2. Fulfill the below user stories. Use whichever libraries you need.

I’m not sure what a user story is and what Library and API means?

Can someone elaborate?

Also, are there any resources within FreeCodeCamp that I can use, or should I just google help?

Thanks,
Ulla

A user story can be thought of as a deSignal goal. Yeah I’d never heard of it either. The user stories are listed on the left side of the page.

Libraries are just code that you import to make your life easier. I think you’ve been introduced to bootstrap at this point. That is a library.

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@ksjazzguitar Ok thanks so much Kevin!

Do you know if there are any resources I can use to do this challenge?

Ulla

Hi,

Many people get stumped on a project here and there. And if your new to coding, the first few can be very confusing. The FCC program is a good framework for learning, but there are a lot of gaps. You are expected to supplement it by doing research on your own. With regards to this first progress, I often give this advice:

I think one of the great lessons from the movie The Martian is that when you are confronted with a problem to large to comprehend, break it into smaller pieces and work those problems. Don’t think that you need to visualize the entire problem all at once – that’s for the pros. Just take on one little problem at a time. Keep breaking things up into smaller problems until you get down to a problem small enough to handle.

Let’s look through the user stories.

  1. User Story: I can view a tribute page with an image and text.

OK, can you create a web page in codepen? Do you know how to add text? Don’t move on until you can. Can you add an image? Don’t move on until you can. Do you know how to manipulate and format these? Don’t move on until you can. Seriously, don’t move on until you can do any of these steps.

  1. I can click on a link that will take me to an external website with further information on the topic.

Do you know how to put a link into a web page?

My advice is to break things into small problems and test them. Don’t get too complicated too fast. Don’t make 10 changes at once until you’re a good enough coder to do that. Make one change and test. Make another change and test. Etc. And don’t get too complicated if you don’t need to.

Research those small problems and test them. Read-search-ask - it’s a great motto. If you get to the point where you are stumped, then ask the forum, but be specific. Don’t say “I’m stumped on this build.” Say, “I can’t figure out how to put a link into a page.” Ask for small, specific problems and you’ll get better results. (And you could probably google that first and get 1000 results.)

Lastly, see what others have done. Yes, you can look at other people’s pages. Obviously try for yourself first, but if you’re stuck, see how someone else did it. As long as you understand what they did, you’re still learning.

Just keep it simple. You can go back and spruce it up later. This is what I did. I fully intend to go back and clean it up and improve it later, but its good enough for now.

Relax. Go back to basics. Ask specific questions.

And if you get stuck, and can’t find the answer on google, then ask the forum. Really, this is a knowledgeable and very supportive group. Don’t worry, there is no question you can ask that another dozen people aren’t wondering about but are too chicken to ask. We’ve all been there, just ask.

Just be specific in your question. What is confusing you? What did you write? (A link to a codepen is awesome but if you don’t have that, just cut and paste the code) What did you expect it to do? What were you wanting it to do? The more specific the question, the better the quantity and quality of answers.

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