Connector pinouts orientations

[McMonster]

One thing is bothering me ever since I started playing with electronics and microcontrollers, figuring out how to read cable pinouts. For example I have a connector in some device and want to design a matching one on a PCB to connect them with a ribbon cable, but I always have trouble figuring out which pin is which and from which side to look not to make a mirrored connector. Pinout descriptions sometimes include a note what way to look at the connector so you will see the same pin order as it's drawn in documentation, but not always. This is specifically a problem with two row connectors like IDC and they're everywhere.

Any good advice on how to deal with this in a simple way? I'm really tired of wasting time figuring this out every time I draw a schematic or try to connect something to a breakout board or a breadboard using jumper wires.