Ask HN: Do you learn more from Tutorials?
Most tutorials tend to provide a step by step solution. But I feel like I would learn more if I had to figure things out on my own. Does anyone else feel the same way?
Also about figuring things on your own, the point of any good tutorial is to give you directions. You still have to figure things out on your own. You always do. But a good tutorial can at least tell you where to look to figure a specific thing out.
However, I learn more things faster from tutorials because they(assuming they're any good) give a high level overview and show how the pieces fit together to actually get something done. That is something a lot of official docs do poorly or not at all. And if it is a topic I'm actually interested in and use regularly, I'll eventually spend plenty of time with the official docs & learn it in detail.
The more detailed the better and if it explains pit-falls as well it's nice.
But if you considering SO a "tutorial" or something like fixing small problems - then no I don't learn much it's mostly quick fixes and I'm off.
It comes down to the details and how much time an author puts into a post - Quality comes secondary (ie: authors primary spoken language)
My own tutorials often focus on underlying principles rather than srep-by-step solutions. If the solution doesnt apply bevause the problem is different, say because a new release changed the UI of the software that the tutorial discusses, understanding the principles may enabke you to work out your own solution.