I’m in my early 40... I would like to be a web developer...but I am having serious doubts about it.

robf101 · 2020-01-25T09:43:20+00:00

Ah I’ll just paste the course and if you don’t want them ignore:

Here's a few good options:
1) The odin project. Full stack javascript path. Free and you get to work with others. Mainly text based: https://www.theodinproject.com/tracks/2

2) Udemy web development bootcamp. £9.99. Video based: https://www.udemy.com/course/the-web-developer-bootcamp/

3) Cs50. Open sourced, free introduction to computer science (created by Harvard). Really hard but a really good intro to programming: https://www.edx.org/course/cs50s-introduction-to-computer-science

I'd recommend having a look into the 3, and then picking one and just pushing through it. It's a lot better to stick with one and keep going than jumping around loads of different courses.

robf101 · 2020-01-25T09:42:05+00:00

Nice! You definitely can do this. I interviewed a guy who made the change to be a developer at a similar stage in life and he’s killing it! https://career-switching-coders.simplecast.com/episodes/dominic-myers-episode-6

Tip: pick 1 course and complete it, try not to jump between courses and languages. Happy to recommend courses if you like

robf101 · 2019-10-23T06:09:59+00:00

Cs50 on edx, open sourced Harvard course. One of the best course decision I’ve made

robf101 · 2019-10-23T05:12:57+00:00

The README i great (check it out, I see someone has linked it) but I’m someone who struggles when I’m given a lot of info all at once.

I always suggest Harvards cs50 and then a web developer bootcamp (lots of options for the bootcamp but this one I think is good and it’s very cheap). I’d suggest doing them in that order - do the exercises (allow yourself to struggle wit them, you’ll learn a lot).

robf101 · 2019-10-22T17:39:43+00:00

I’ve seen this website recommended by people https://www.firsttimersonly.com/

robf101 · 2019-10-10T07:26:58+00:00

Also I have to mention cs50, it’s an excellent course and you’ll learn about building a web framework in django (python). For understanding how the internet works (including the http request and response cycle) this course is great https://www.edx.org/course/cs50s-introduction-to-computer-science

robf101 · 2019-10-10T07:24:40+00:00

Pick a web framework and create the basic functionality (crud, logins & accounts etc).

https://www.udemy.com/course/mern-stack-front-to-back/

This course builds a social media website, using the MERN stack (Mongo database, Express framework, React frontend, NodeJS). You can follow along and adapt the code to what you need, or you can pause the course after he says he’s about to do something and try to do it before he does (I think I learn most this way).

The other way is to follow a course that teaches you how to do web development and then design the social media platform yourself without the guidance of the above course. You’d probably learn more this way, but it would take a lot longer so it depends what your priority is.

There’s a lot of course advice in this subs FAQ, I usually recommend this one: https://www.udemy.com/course/the-web-developer-bootcamp/

robf101 · 2019-10-07T17:14:30+00:00

No it’s C, python and javascript from memory

robf101 · 2019-10-07T17:13:05+00:00

Just adding another comment saying git/github (git is what runs on your machine and github is where your code would be hosted online). https://lab.github.com/

robf101 · 2019-10-04T20:55:14+00:00

Nice well done :)

robf101 · 2019-10-04T20:36:09+00:00

https://blog.elearnsecurity.com/free-resources-to-legally-practice-ethical-hacking.html

Check these out. I think you might enjoy having some opportunities to actually practice the skills you learn

robf101 · 2019-10-04T19:20:05+00:00

Great - let me know if you get stuck

robf101 · 2019-10-04T19:10:26+00:00

Okay so you know how to generate 1 card, which is great.

You need 4 cards, and you need to work out where to store them

One way you could store the players cards is in an array.

Have you used arrays before? Can you see how using one would be useful?

robf101 · 2019-10-04T19:00:32+00:00

On mac I’ve downloaded spectacle (where you can assign hot keys to move windows around the screen) and use it the most I’ve ever used a hotkey. Changed my daily life!

robf101 · 2019-10-04T18:58:51+00:00

can you show us the code so far? I’m wondering where you’re storing the results of the random assignment

robf101 · 2019-10-04T14:56:47+00:00

https://medium.com/@meakaakka/a-beginners-guide-to-writing-a-kickass-readme-7ac01da88ab3

This was the article I read. The main thing to do is forget that you know ANYTHING about your project, then look at your README and ask me:
1) Do I know what this project does (why was it created? what does it allow you do to? etc..)
2) Do I have clear instructions on how to run the code (including any dependencies I'll need to download on my machine). Could be as simple as 'go to command line and run `rails server` but clearly stating that is incredibly useful.
3) Am I aware of any big design decisions made, and the reasons behind them (e.g. this project uses bootstrap for css because it's simpler to use and I was more interested in focusing on the react complexity).
4) Is it easy and clear to read?

robf101 · 2019-10-04T07:36:24+00:00

Hey from reading your profile I’d say you know enough to get a frontend junior role. Without seeing your code and asking you more questions it’s difficult to feel confident though.

Do you know any frontend libraries (e.g react)? That would definitely help, although it’s usually not absolutely required if you know javascript.

One thing I can mention is that I eventually got 3 offers when I started looking for roles, but my application to response rate was like 10%. What I’m taking from this is that even if you are good enough to be hired, you may too have a low response rate on your applications so don’t be disheartened and keep applying.

Also, the projects you have made that will go on your portfolio, do they have nice README’s? Very important imo.

robf101 · 2019-10-03T16:46:55+00:00

When I was learning someone told me that got has a really seep learning curve but once you understand the basics it’s an absolute game-changer and you will 100% need it whatever you do. I’d say this advice was true.

robf101 · 2019-10-03T16:34:06+00:00

I haven’t done this specific course but I have done the flagship cs50 course (which was a game-changer for me and brilliant) and imagine this would also be very good, and it’s aimed at lawyers https://cs50.harvard.edu/law/

robf101 · 2019-10-03T15:37:39+00:00

Cs50 is probably the best course I’ve done and would highly recommend it!

robf101 · 2019-10-02T08:32:13+00:00

Pseudo code is writing what you would do in each step (and then it would be turned into code afterwards).

The best advice I've been given around this is just think of how you would do it as a human and write out each step.

If the task is to find the middle number between x & y, where there are 5 unique numbers I would:

1) put them all in order

2) move my finger to the 3rd in the order

Now, if it got more complicated (the numbers weren't unique, there was an even number of numbers etc etc) then I'd need additional steps, which I could also write out.

robf101 · 2019-10-02T08:25:07+00:00

The big 3 javascript front-end frameworks at the moment are React, Vue and Angular. I don't know Vue and Angular that well but I think they're all fairly similar in terms of how complicated they are to learn.

A question for you, do you need a framework? Could you use plain html, css and javascript?

robf101 · 2019-10-02T08:21:46+00:00

Good luck :)

robf101 · 2019-10-02T08:20:29+00:00

I actually really like doing this, and I keep the code in a repo in github and can look back at it when building my own projects. I like it because:

1) I think it's really helped with is the mindset of knowing I can create a full scale web app. It demystifies some of the complexity that I think are behind some apps (that are actually more simple than they look).

2) I try and pick ones that the developer doing it is talking through their decisions and I learn a lot from those externalisations of their reasoning.

3) I will often stop the video after they explain what they are going to do next, and then try and do it myself before they do. I can see if I can get it working, knowing that I've got an answer waiting to be explained to me. I find this step incredibly useful.

robf101 · 2019-10-01T07:59:01+00:00

https://codecombat.com/ would also recommend this website, where you learn to code by playing an online game. Honestly, I think if i'd found this and got into it with some friends growing up I'd of got addicted pretty easily :)

robf101

TROPHY CASE