Mutiny said:

Hello and Welcome!

Do you know what type of coding you want to do? Do you want to be a web developer, mobile developer, game programmer, Windows or Mac programmer, etc? Knowing what you're interested will let others give you a better idea of where you should start.

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Mutiny said:

That's a tough question, but I think that web dev is probably the fastest path to employment.

Web dev is very all encompassing though. There are two parts to web dev and you can learn one or both. They are:

Front End - What the user sees and what occurs in the browser
Back End - What the user doesn't see and what happens on the server

If you want to become employable quick a good path may be to learn the following:

Front End:

HTML - The very basic building blocks of web dev
CSS - Works with HTML to shape the look and feel of a website
Javascript - Adds interactivity to websites and allows for doing things when a user clicks, loading content in response to a user's action, etc

Back End:

PHP - One of the easiest programming languages to learn (in my opinion), allows you to add interactivity to websites
Wordpress Theme and Plugin Development - Wordpress powers over 40% of all the websites on the internet, so knowing it ensures there's a market for you
MySQL - A very common database language for storing user data / creating user accounts, etc.

Further Study:

Laravel Blade + Sage 9 for Wordpress - A framework for more modern development on Wordpress, which helps alleviate a lot of the issues with Wordpress development and a lot of the bad practices.

There are other paths for web dev as well, such as focusing on the Javascript route and getting a job coding in Node JS or one of the many Javascript frameworks such as Vue or React. You have to determine what you like and what your local job market is demanding.

I will say though knowing back end + front end will make you more valuable than someone who just knows one or the other. If you want to learn both, I recommend starting with front end to learn the building blocks, then back end to enhance your skills.

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Mutiny said:

Where to go depends on how you learn best. When learning a new coding skill, I prefer by watching Youtube videos and coding along with the videos, but everyone learns differently. There are plenty of good resources online. One is the Mozilla MDN site, where they even have a free course for absolute beginners.

However you learn, I highly suggest having a project to put your efforts towards. Having a goal of a finished project will keep you motivated and helps put things into more perspective than if you are just coding in the abstract. When I first started coding (a long time ago) I did it because I had a goal for myself of a project I wanted to accomplish. This can be a portfolio website, a web service, a Wordpress plugin, anything really. But set a goal of something final to code, it will help what you learn stick so much better than completing random tutorials that teach you concepts in the abstract.

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Mutiny said:

I like Web Dev Simplified as well as Traversy Media.

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Chrisjames105 said:

I am in desperate need of a career change and have always been interested in learning how to code. Would appreciate any advice and guidance. I am turning 35 later this year and still don’t have a home or decent car. Help me turn my life around so I can start a family! 😃

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