Think he means boom assisted repositioning of the tracks there serious work.. Implement on the ground, raise toes, one pedal hard forward, one hard back, while slewing where you wanna go.
Seat time has been my teacher, bought my own, taught myself like you have, SMLWinds. You're probably the type who enjoys that kind of learn as you go stuff. You're quite right to identify that newness to task is a safety issue. I personally looked for books but found none that had what I needed to know. So I asked a few obvious maestros and they just said, " get in, start slow, get every move right, smooth is fast, experience is the best training so get experienced." Which is pretty much what you have started doing.
Safety wise on slopes one of the things you need to watch is slewing with the implement out too far. If you're quick you'll live to know what I mean. Keep it in low and close and move slow.Steeper you are, slower you go. Listen to your butt cheeks when lifting stuff that might lift your butt off the ground. The slower you do it the safer it will be. You'll learn how much lift is safe, or how much you are comfortable with.
Some people shun seat belts but the fact is if you f something up, seat belts keep you in the control position so you can recover. You should develop a system where you stay belted in until you lock out the hydraulics. Make that a habit. If you're on uneven or stumpy hill country and get in a fix, getting out and having a proper look at what can be done is always a big help in the beginning. ROPS is a must on hills. I've been advised to drop the boom when you go mobile on hills, by that I mean when you start to slide. Sometimes that's a good idea but if its really slushy and you're facing downhill, sometimes the machine ( 20 tonners anyway) like to pivot off the implement if you put it down too hard. Main thing is to keep calm and hope you're brainy enough to survive, and brainy enough to stay off the steep when its slushy next time. I've been on ground so wet that when you are sitting still with implement slightly raised, you go to draw it in towards the cab and instead the whole machine slides towards the implement. Like grease.
Traction wise some hills are better approached at half revs or less to stop your tracks spinning. And if you're still having issues getting up, poke the stick right out and pretty much on the ground, that will keep your toes down and maximise your tractive area. And if it decides to go mobile backwards then its more likely to respond kindly to dropping the implement as an anchor, so to speak. Tracks up and down is a mantra you hear a bit. Later on you learn that on some ground if you soften it up ahead of you then diagonal climbing is safer as the machine can sit down in the soil and hold more sideways than straight up and down. To a point. Learning those limits just comes from pottering about with a safety first attitude. One time early on in my learning I walked away from a machine after hooking the bucket around a tree and chaining it there. Was busy tracking and didn't notice big rain clouds coming in. Within a minute the dirt was slush and the machine wanted to go mobile. No shame in it, that was the safest thing to do and when it dried out I went and finished the track and retrieved it, and learned that hill tracks need to be tilted into the hill and have a buffer zone of extra width.
