Coding for beginners

fasttalkerchat

I stayed away from a degree/career in computers because I never gave coding a real go. I thought that I'll never be as good as the experts so didn't bother going much further than basic HTML.

I recently started learning Javascript on Codecademy.com and would recommend it to anyone looking a place to start.

Are there any other resources aimed at beginners?
What other language should I try and pick up?

conor.hogan.2

Udacity.com and Coursera.com and edx.com all have beginner level proper University level courses. All much better than codeacademy imo, as they actually teach you and don't ask you to mostly blindly change method calls etc to see what happens.

Try one (or taste all and pick one) and see where you go from there.

fasttalkerchat

conor.hogan.2 wrote: »

Udacity.com and Coursera.com and edx.com all have beginner level proper University level courses. All much better than codeacademy imo, as they actually teach you and don't ask you to mostly blindly change method calls etc to see what happens.

Try one (or taste all and pick one) and see where you go from there.

Thanks for that. I'm thinking to go for C++ next.
What about Cisco? I've heard their hardware qualifications are good.

agricamera

fasttalkerchat wrote: »

I stayed away from a degree/career in computers because I never gave coding a real go. I thought that I'll never be as good as the experts so didn't bother going much further than basic HTML.

I recently started learning Javascript on Codecademy.com and would recommend it to anyone looking a place to start.

Are there any other resources aimed at beginners?
What other language should I try and pick up?

I would start off by learning PHP

You will be able to build a simple web application (register, log in, access controls to pages etc) in a matter of hours and you will very quickly be able to 'code' things.

You'll learn much faster if you are actually trying to build something, rather than just following a course. Once you have figured out the basics, start building a web application, Google till your heart is content and register ac account on Stack Overflow for when you get really stuck

ChRoMe

fasttalkerchat wrote: »

Thanks for that. I'm thinking to go for C++ next.
What about Cisco? I've heard their hardware qualifications are good.

I'd strongly advise not going to C++ next, perhaps have a look at Java or C#.

C++ is incredibly complex and unforgiving, its not for the faint of heart.

fasttalkerchat

Thanks for the advice everyone.

Just out of interest, I saw some jobs are asking for knowledge in Java, C++ or C#. Its not necessary for the job but would be an advantage.
What level would I need to be at before it would be worth mentioning.

ChRoMe

fasttalkerchat wrote: »

Thanks for the advice everyone.

Just out of interest, I saw some jobs are asking for knowledge in Java, C++ or C#. Its not necessary for the job but would be an advantage.
What level would I need to be at before it would be worth mentioning.

When you can show some sort of a personal project, doesn't really matter what it does. Just so that you can demonstrate taking a requirement, build a solution and deploy it.

jgh_

Why is everybody scared of C++?

agricamera

jgh_ wrote: »

Why is everybody scared of C++?

Because it is like trying to learn to run before you can walk and would put most people off coding for life if they tried to learn it as a first language with no prior experience :cool:

jimmycrackcorm

jgh_ wrote: »

Why is everybody scared of C++?

Various reasons but the biggest issue is having to manage memory to ensure you deallocate everything you use.

jgh_

Oh come on, we all learn to clean up after ourselves as children

I agree it's probably not a great starting point these days (though for whatever reason it was my 1st choice as a teenager), but it's not nearly as terrifying as people like to suggest.

ChRoMe

jgh_ wrote: »

Oh come on, we all learn to clean up after ourselves as children

I agree it's probably not a great starting point these days (though for whatever reason it was my 1st choice as a teenager), but it's not nearly as terrifying as people like to suggest.

Its not terrifying but its a bad choice for a lot of common development domains these days. Squeezing performance with pointers is only applicable in some very specific cases, and those cases are reducing everyday.

Even just nonsense compiler errors and separate header files are enough to make me not want to develop in it tbh.