My path to coding, and what I would have done differently

How it began

During university, one of my closest friends was studying statistics with an emphasis in data science. As a liberal arts kid, I never took a coding class or had any real interest in computer science. At the time, my only exposure to coding was from hearing my friend complain about his data structures and algorithms class. It wasn’t until the heat of the COVID-19 pandemic that I took an interest in learning how to code. Once everything hit the fan, I moved back with my parents and continued school online. Along with a lot of other people, I suddenly had way more time than expected. That’s when I decided to give coding a go. It’s now been just over two years since then. While I’ve learned a ton in that time, I am by no means an expert. However, when I first started, I couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed about where to start with programming. There seemed to be an endless amount of information and an endless number of technologies to learn. Looking back now, I can’t help but think that if I had a clearer guide on where to start, I would’ve learned much faster.

That being said, I decided to write this article to help others along their journeys of learning how to code. While on my own path, I went through a lot of good and bad tutorials. Hopefully this article will help others know where to focus their time.

My Journey

First, I’ll briefly share all the courses and tutorials I remember using — in chronological order.

1. Python Tutorial — Python Full Course for Beginners — Programming with Mosh on YouTube.

If you haven’t checked out any of Mosh’s videos, I can’t recommend them enough. He is an awesome teacher and explains things very simply for beginners.

2. DataCamp Data Scientist Track Using Python

For a moment, I was incredibly interested in data science. This is what prompted me to look into DataCamp’s subscription-based platform. While it costs quite a bit of money, it’s a great platform for those interested in learning about analytics and data science through Python, R, and SQL.

3. freeCodeCamp Responsive Web Design

freeCodeCamp is definitely one of the best resources out there for learning how to code. This course definitely helped me learn best practices for HTML and CSS.

4. JavaScript and jQuery: Interactive Front-End Web Development

jQuery is a bit outdated when it comes to modern standards, but this book was definitely useful in understanding lots of JavaScript principles that I wasn’t able to learn in other ways.

5. Build Realtime Twitter and Fiverr with Node.js + Stripe — Udemy Course

For a while I got really ambitious and decided I was going to make a marketplace web app. So, I bought this course on Udemy. It wasn’t the greatest but it definitely helped me learn some valuable things when it comes to backend development.

6. APIs for Beginners —freeCodeCamp on YouTube

This video was a good introduction to working with REST APIs using Postman. It’s a great introduction into APIs for absolute beginners.

7. Ruby Programming Language Full Course — freeCodeCamp on YouTube

For a hot second, I was convinced I was going to learn the Ruby programming language. I have a close family member that is a Ruby prodigy and is extremely well known in the open source Ruby community. I figured I could get help with coding stuff easily if I started learning. Needless to say, this was the only Ruby course I did.

8. Learn JavaScript for Free — Scrimba

I was in love when I came across Scrimba and their free tutorials. This JavaScript one is definitely a must. It’s fun and challenging.

9. ES6 Essentials — Scrimba

Once I got on the Scrimba train, I couldn’t get off. I took this short free course to brush up on ES6 standards. It was a great course that refreshed me on some things I had known as well as taught me some valuable concepts.

10. Learn React for Free — Scrimba

Yet another Scrimba course. To be completely honest, I didn’t finish this course all the way through. I realized pretty quick that I really didn’t enjoy React that much.

11. TailwindCSS Crash Course — Traversy Media on YouTube

This was a short and sweet course on TailwindCSS that I would recommend to anyone. I’ve found Traversy Media to be a great source for coding tutorials and content.

12. Build an App with SvelteKit and Tailwind CSS — James Q Quick on YouTube

I took this course because I had watched a video from fireship.io about this newer web framework called Svelte. After following James’ tutorial on building an app with Svelte, I fell in love with the framework. I also started to really like James’ content. I recommend checking out his channel.

13. SvelteKit Crash Course — SSR, API Routes, Stores, Tailwind CSS — James Q Quick on YouTube

I wanted to dive a bit deeper into Svelte, and this tutorial definitely helped me do that. It made me love Svelte even more.

What I learned

As you can see, I definitely jumped around a lot between different tutorials and languages. In fact, I’m sure I didn’t even include all the courses I took. I can guarantee there are dozens of others that I can’t remember. For one, I remember learning SQL, but I can’t remember how I learned it.

Overall, what did I learn from all this? I learned that it really doesn’t matter what language you start with. When it comes down to it, all coding languages are built upon the same concepts. If you learn one, you can transfer that knowledge to easily learn another one. I also learned that coding is easier than everyone makes it out to be. If I could learn to code, then I guarantee everyone else can too. Lastly, I learned that projects are the best way to learn. Watching other people code can only take you so far. To truly learn something, you have to try it yourself. This means running into countless errors that make you want to throw your computer against the wall. It means reading through hundreds of Stack Overflow threads and joining Discords to ask questions. Once you can apply the principles to something you want to do, you’ll be a better coder.

How I would do it over again…

If I were to start over, I would 100% do it differently. This is the roadmap that I would suggest someone use to learn how to code — starting from the basic fundamentals.

1. Go through freeCodeCamp’s responsive web development course — Web programming is the center of the programming universe in my opinion. Anyone learning how to code needs to understand fundamental web principles.
2. Use Scrimba’s Learn JavaScript for Free Tutorial — This course will give you practical application for the JavaScript it will teach you. You will also have the opportunity to build something cool using things you learned in the freeCodeCamp course.
3. Scrimba’s ES6 Course — This course definitely fills in some holes of concepts that are crucial to web development, but that are not discussed in the other Scrimba course.
4. Learn Simple Backend Development — I don’t have any specific course in mind for this, but I would probably recommend freeCodeCamp’s Node.js & Express course. Express is an awesome framework for creating APIs and servers.
5. Start learning a frontend framework — To really build a scalable and fully functional web app, you’ll most likely need to use a web framework. This come in all shapes and sizes, but I definitely recommend trying Svelte. While I’m definitely biased, Svelte is a great framework for beginners to try. Plus, their website has a great interactive tutorial on how to get started.
6. Learn databases — Along with a framework, you’re probably going to need a database to build a scalable online application. Naturally, learning about databases is the next step. SQL and NoSQL databases rule the game in this space. To be honest, it doesn’t really matter which you learn. Both are heavily used and are actually more similar than everyone thinks. freeCodeCamp has great resources for learning and using databases.
7. Make stuff — This is the final and most important part of my roadmap. In the end, you just gotta start making stuff. This will help you learn more than anything else. Start making. Get frustrated. Google stuff. Try again. Break stuff. Cry. Google more stuff. Succeed. Start over. You got this.

Conclusion

If you’re reading this now, thanks for tuning in! This article is long and I know I’ve been pretty preachy. I just want to say, I am not an expert. I’m still learning how to code and continue to hit roadblocks every day. In fact, the reason why I started writing this article is because I got sick of running into an error in my code. I had to switch it up a bit. Needless to say, we all run into difficulties when learning how to code. However, there’s high rewards for it at the end of the tunnel. The best advice I can give is just keep going. And, you don’t have to learn all at once. Everyone’s pace is different!

Keep coding. Keep learning. Keep trying. You got this.