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46 Comments

Learn to code?

Hello Community, I am a non-technical single founder intending to learn to code. Can someone point me to some good starting resources? Any help is appreciated. Thank you

  1. 3

    Hi Niloy, @bozkan gave me a heads up on your post and suggested I share my story here. I set myself a challenge to learn to code 10 months ago (before was also a non-technical founder) and I just released my first product as a solo maker a few days ago.

    My biggest tip is figuring out what learning method works best for you, and then finding good starting resources within that. For me, I'm terrible at reading books, so I went on Udemy and did an online video course to get some structure and foundation, and then watched a lot of youtube videos.

    Happy to share some resources around video learning if video suits you! let me know.

    My product Llama is currently on Product Hunt at the moment and you can read more of my journey/story over there. If you like the product please feel free to Recommend it or join the discussion 😊

    https://www.producthunt.com/posts/llama-task-manager

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      also depends what you're trying to learn bit if it's web development... my path was starting with html & css, then vanilla javascript, then React.

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        This was really inspiring! Im embarking on a similar journey. 2 years on would you say the same things to start with (html & css, then vanilla javascript, then React) is a good route?

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      Extremely sorry for my late reply. Would be awesome if you could share the resources around video. For someone who has learnt to code in the last 10 months , Llama looks fabulous! Congratulations and all the best

  2. 3

    freecodecamp.org is your friend. After that you can take Harvard Intro to CS50 course from David Malan(The best professor you can learn from) :) Good luck.

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      thank you so much . I really appreciate your help

  3. 2

    Youtube(free), udemy(paid), pick a language and build a small project .

    It could be a static website, later make it dynamic add login/register system.CRUD/
    understand database.

    Leave your dream projects for later.

    By focusing on small projects you are building your confidence.

    Ask questions , find answers. Best of luck.

    You can do it.

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      Extremely encouraging. Thanks a ton

      1. 1

        My pleasure,Looking forward to your progress.

  4. 2

    I've created an online course starting with the fundamentals of web development (HTML, CSS, JS) for beginners, learning to build websites from scratch.

    There is over 7 hours of voice-over video tutorials with presentation style and live coding throughout.

    Check it out here: https://beginnerwebdevelopment.com

    1. 1

      Thank you very much. Will check it out

  5. 1

    I have a weird take on this: Start with SQL.

    No, it's not a programming language.

    If you're learning a programming language, expect at least a year before you can build some pretty basic apps.

    SQL will help teach you about data. I think ~80% of the code we write as developers is built to interact with data.

    Understanding data tells you how developers structure apps, how it's linked together, how it's searched, updated, etc.

    If you learn SQL, you'll understand how an address book, a blog, an e-commerce store, and a social media network all have a lot in common. You'll learn that web apps are basically interacting with a bunch of "spreadsheets" to find info, piece it together, display it, and let people interact with it.

    And once you learn SQL, you've got a pretty solid core to move onto programming languages (if that's really what you want). You've also got a solid core if you decide to move onto no-code.

  6. 1

    If you're interested in finding coding YouTube channels, look no further ;) https://topicplay.com/t/dev-tutorial--channels

  7. 1

    You should start with Python. The easiest and powerful computer language for beginners. Other option is learning HTML/CSS/JS but those are not programming languages.

    1. 1

      JS isn't a programming language?

      Is it just a little jab at it, or do you really believe that? haha

      It's not my first choice, but when people ask me what language they should learn, I usually say: Just learn JS. You can get started with what you have on your computer already, it's more universally useful (because it's the only language supported in browsers), and it's easy-ish to learn.

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        JS is one of the most popular and widely written "programming" languages. Design wise its nowhere compared to the elegant python, and I will never recommend it to a beginner.
        HTML/CSS are too simple to be called programming languages.

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          Hah I don't particularly love JS, but jeez! :-D

          A C or Go programmer might say Python is barely a "programming" language in the same way. Maybe it looks pretty, but it's horrible and inefficient! It's for writing scripts.

          And I'm not saying that because I agree. My language of choice is Ruby.

          What you recommend is totally up to you, but it kinda sucks to degrade something you dislike, esp when it can affect people who are just starting and may only know it.

          And more so on IndieHackers. I had to learn to stop mocking PHP, and really, the jokes on me. I can tell Pieter Levels PHP sucks, and he can cry on the piles of cash he's made building apps with it :-P

  8. 1

    I'm in the same position. Non technical solo founder. I'm using Codecademy Pro account for learning dev. It covers HTML, CSS, & Javascript.

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      Hey thats great to know we are birds of the same feather! Would be happy to be connected. I am available at [email protected]

    1. 1

      Awesome. Thanks . Will do

  9. 1

    Currently I recommend the Harvard's "CS 50 - Introduction to Computer Science" recordings.
    The course is aimed at students that have never programmed and starts with the very basics (how is data represented at the hardware level?) and then continuous with the "C" programming language.

    Compared to a pure "How to make a website" course, it takes longer until you get "cool" results but it lays a better foundation.
    There just aren't any resources out there that have a script that is so well tested and have such a high production level as Harvard.

    Here is the 2019 playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhQjrBD2T381L3iZyDTxRwOBuUt6m1FnW

    Just note, that as a non-developer, you will need a lot of
    other knowledge besides pure programming. You will have to know how to version-control your code, how to use the command line of your computer and so on. The "Missing semester" handles some of the topics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z56Jmr9Z34Q&list=PLyzOVJj3bHQuloKGG59rS43e29ro7I57J

    1. 1

      This is fantastic. Thank you very much

  10. 1

    What do you want to build?

    1. 1

      Hi would like to attempt to build an attendee registration platform like ti.to but something more intelligent & customizable. I would also like to learn how to do API integrations. I am aiming to launch something by this year end.

      1. 1

        This course is just great. It helped me a lot. You'll learn about APIs as well. https://www.udemy.com/course/the-complete-web-development-bootcamp/

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        Pick a web language that has a big community. One that you can Google specific problems and get the answer right away.

        From my experience PHP, JavaScript/Node, and even Python

        They're all good. Just pick one. Ignore what everyone else says.

        In my opinion. Go with the JavaScript ecosystem. You can use this learning course: https://rb.gy/pcssza to get started

  11. 1

    I had a great experience with Udemy courses. There is no information you can't find for free on youtube or in blog posts but the curation and the structure of knowledge helped me a ton, especially at the beginning when you don't know what you don't know

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      Ha ha .. I love the "you dont know what you dont know part." Awesome. Thanks

  12. 1

    Hello, here are my thoughts on learning to code, specifically how to go about teaching yourself for not much money.

    The only thing I'd say is - do you have time right now? If you're a solo non-technical founder, you're likely busy with many other priorities. I'd strongly recommend looking at all the no-code solutions out there, as explained in @dru's trends newsletter number 6.

    Alternatively there is the challenging prospect of convincing someone technical to join you - the secret to which is showing that you have legimitate marketing/sales talent (presales, email list, audience, existing revenue).

    1. 1

      Thank you so much

  13. 1

    Hey Niloy,

    It's really cool that you're learning to code!

    I think you'd like Scrimba, it has an interactive code editor built-in, so you don't need to mess around with configuring tools and you can focus on learning the languages.

    I'd suggest starting here for the fundamentals of HTML/CSS, Kevin Powell is a great teacher.

    Beyond that, you can't go wrong learning JavaScript, Wes Bos has a great beginners course. It's paid, but honestly, I'd say it's worth it, even as someone that already "knew" JavaScript I got a lot of value out of it, it's always important to keep revisiting and strengthening the fundamentals.

    Without knowing your goals it's hard to say what else you should learn, maybe frontend is all you need and you can easily combine that with systems like Firebase or even a CMS like WordPress that can do the heavy lifting for you on the backend.

    A FEW KEY LESSONS I CAN SHARE:
    1. Don't try to remember everything! Focus on understanding and taking good notes you can reference later.

    2. Start building projects BEFORE you feel ready, this will force you to discover what you don't know, you don't know.

    3. The first code you write will be terrible and that's completely fine, learning to code is hard. All that matters is that you are improving.

    4. Quality over quantity: it's better to spend an hour coding every day so that you are constantly exposed to it than it is to spend seven hours in one day and then burn out.

    5. If you want to make your life easier in the long term, focus on fundamentals over frameworks. This means that you should build projects out in plain HTML/CSS and understand it before you reach for a framework like Bootstrap or Bulma. In JavaScript, it means you should learn the fundamentals of vanilla JS before diving into React or Vue.

    I hope that helps.

    1. 1

      Thanks a ton. This is very helpful

  14. 1

    Could you give more details about what you're planning to build? That could be easier for us to share more precise resources.

    1. 1

      Hi would like to attempt to build an attendee registration platform like ti.to but something more intelligent & customizable. I would also like to learn how to do API integrations. I am aiming to launch something by this year end.

      1. 1

        I would go with a full-stack framework like Meteor or Django as it would be easier for you to learn as a beginner. To learn, platforms like udemy or Coursera would be an affordable choice.

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    What do you want to code? Web pages? Web apps? Mobile apps?

    1. 1

      Hi would like to attempt to build an attendee registration platform like ti.to but something more intelligent & customizable. I would also like to learn how to do API integrations. I am aiming to launch something by this year end.

      1. 1

        Ooh heck! You might want to readjust your expectations there.

        If you are learning to code now, to build a platform like that by the end of the year (3 months), in such a way that is "production ready", which means, well usable for real, and it is better than ti.to then I am simply going to say that is almost impossible without a miracle.

        I hope you prove me wrong. If you do, apply to do a TED talk!

        Source: Full time software engineer for 19 years, focus on web development.

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          Thanks for inspiring me to set the bar higher :)

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            Go for it! The question is, am I wrong (am I the Taxi to your Uber)? You can decide.

  16. 1

    I really like Brad Traversy's YouTube channel.

    Alternatively, you can try the no-code way of development.

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