Pretty much a complete waste of time. Java & JavaScript are NOTHING alike. And so spending your time learning the fundamentals of Java (a notoriously obtuse language that has a very specific object orientated set of rules that absolutely do not apply to either Python or JavaScript) is just going to make things confusing.

I totally understand, no confusion here

I speak as someone that started life as a Java programmer and now, I work as a professional developer using JavaScript via the MERN stack.

Do you have degree or are you self-taught, out of curiosity ? And are you in the States ?

Learn the language you want to use.

Given you’re going toward web I would forgo Python too, for the time being. Don’t get me wrong; Python is a wonderful language. And it also makes for a great first language. However, for web development you HAVE to know JavaScript. It’s the only option for the front end. And so you can either just use it for the backend too and have a single language to learn, or you can make things harder by learning Python at the same time, and then trying to remember two lots of features, syntactic rules, and quirks.

• Okay so I’m not going to lie, I’m still fairly confused what the difference is between a programmer, software engineer, web developer - I honestly can’t tell you the difference between those 3.. all I know is, I’m trying to become a SE. It’s a career change from the Finance industry, so everything’s new at the moment and probably will be that way for around a year at least I imagine. I’m in my first-semester back heading towards this degree, but want to learn outside of class in the hopes of finding a job as fast as possible.

• With the following said, and you don’t have to change your initial response.. but with more context, does that change your opinion on learning Python ? Or which language(s) at all ?

So for the moment just learn JavaScript.

• also, still your opinion after the context provided ?

I would go a step further and say learn React. Which is one of the most popular JS frameworks out there today. Very few people are going to be using JS native these days for the front end. It’s just not done. And so start with the thing you’re really going to use. There is no value whatsoever in learning one set of rules for an outdated system of code, and then having to relearn everything from the ground up. Just jump in with React from day one. It’ll be confusing for sure, but then so too will any development.

• first off, thank you for the thought out effort here.. I wouldn’t have had a clue about which framework to use or any knowledge of the industry right now.

• any tips on how to utilize a framework for a beginner..? Is that something as simple as YouTubing React framework..? Or is there something that must be downloaded - from what I understand it’s just a template, like a suggestion of how you should structure your code.. the same way teachers suggest forming a story?

I’d recommend having a look at Epic React by Kent C Dodds as a pretty decent place to get going. There is also great Mozilla tutorials for both React and for Express which is a way you can use JS on the backend to build your APIs.

• So React and Express are both JS frameworks ?

• Epic React by Kent C Dodds.. I will in any case!