Chapter 25. Final exam: tackling an administrative task from scratch
Congratulations! You’ve completed all of the main chapters in this book, and you’re ready to put your new knowledge to use. I find that having a practical task in front of you is a great way to cement newly acquired skills, and this chapter’s sole purpose is to give you that task.
Before you get started, however, I want to offer a few tips.
- You probably will get stuck. I almost always do. Don’t be afraid to ask for help! You can use the community forums at www.PoshComm.org, or you can log into my own forums at http://connect.ConcentratedTech.com (if you’re asked where you took a class with me, just answer “Lunches book” and you’ll be allowed in). Manning (www.manning-sandbox.com/forum.jspa?forumID=723) also has a forum dedicated to this book where you can post questions, and I try to monitor those a couple of times a week.
- Spend some time breaking the task down to its main components. Figure out which parts of the task involve the real functionality, and focus on writing commands that create the desired output.
- Once you have completed the necessary commands, you can worry about writing functions and other structures around those commands.