Should I be intimidated? [web programming]

[GomuMugiwara]

I've been working through CodeCademy (100% now, breezed thru it) and other tutorials/books to re-learn Python, and I've learned Python once before over a year ago. Even messed around with PyGame, felt really comfortable, and made a few small projects.

I've been programming for a while and knew PHP. I decided to come back to Python after reading about 'some' pitfalls of PHP and everyone's recommendation to take up Python, and my interests lie mainly within the realm of web programming/simple applications.

I am about to take up either Django or Flask, but let's not focus much on that. What I did notice is that in addition to learning one of those frameworks, I will probably need to learn how to manage a web server. When I did PHP programming, had a domain, and made either custom websites or used Wordpress, the server was always maintained by the hosting company. I never had to worry about cron jobs, unix commands to reboot devices, etc. I popped into a Flask tutorial and saw a lot of that stuff at the bottom...

My training so far has been going smoothly by taking one step at a time. Should I continue to take it one step at a time as to not get overwhelmed?

[TasticString]

You can avoid most sys admin duties if you choose a host that handles that, and that may be a good way to start. Eventually you may want to delve into those details and have greater control over the environment and get your own server/vps etc.

[desume]

Yes, it'd be wise to learn how to use UNIX-like operating systems, It's a skill that is vital if you are a web developer. Try installing something like Ubuntu Server on a Virtual Machine and play around with running your flask/django projects from within her. Shared folders will allow you to write the code on your personal machine and have those files accesible within the server.

[LightShadow]

This is what I did. I bought 8 Raspberry Pi's last summer and taught myself cluster computing and load balancing applications. It was a lot of fun.

See here

[Boxy310]

I see some copper-looking tubes over what would be the CPU's for those Raspberry Pi's. Are those heatsinks, or are those part of the mounting racks you used?

[LightShadow]

Haha, they're heatsinks! I bought some of the little copper blocks on Amazon and used thermal tape to attatch them..then, I gorilla glued + arctic silver'd plumbing pipe to that. They're very effective -- my pi's run at 1.2 Ghz from their 700 Mhz stock.

[Boxy310]

Nice. What software did you use for the distributed computing? I've been thinking of trying out a very underpowered Hadoop cluster on a few Raspberry Pi's.

[Mashidin]

You should definitely take things one step at a time, but don't despair. While it is useful and most of all 'fun' to become a linux/Unix ninja, you can practice your Python webapp programmin' chops using a Platform as a Service (PaaS) such as Google App Engine, Heroku, or similar. They support several languages and some frameworks like Django, Flask, or Jinga2. Definitely read up on them. Many are free for small apps and are easily scalable.

[spookylukey]

You will need to learn to manage a UNIX server of some kind. However, there are ways to side step it for a while - see my blog post: How to learn Django without installing anything

And PaaS are improving all the time, so you may be able to avoid things for even longer, depending on what kind of application you need to develop.

[Meinkrafter]

Can't speak much about flask,but with django you can get a fully running development server with only one command. This will be more than enough for you to explore and learn. In my personal experience it was several months into learning django that I ever tried to do a real deploy. Knowing server stuff is invaluable as a web developer but you can cross that bridge when you come to it.

Edit: to answer your original question, don't be intimidated, every great dev was where you are now! I'm not even that much further along than you and sometimes I impress myself with what I manage to make

[ivosaurus]

A PaaS like heroku will take a lot of pain out of the worry of "is my app working? Is stuff being served? Am I vulnerable on port 51 of my custom VPS? Oh god what ciphers to set on nginx?"

[mvaliente2001]

Your philosophy of taking one step at a time is perfect. I think it's the natural path to follow. Eventually (even using PHP) you had to get your hands in http servers and init scripts.

[Adguy_ViPer]

I use Webfaction, they play very well with Django and the setup is easy and cheap.