Having a hard time finding a way to follow a path - html

I've been working on doing things like Codeacademy, trying to do minor projects on my own like designing a website, and also searching around the web for simple projects to work on to gain more experience. The issue has been that I'm having a hard time finding a good curriculum to follow in terms of learning what I need to learn in order to perform well when working in the development of websites or apps. Do any of you have any tips on any websites I could follow a set guide or anything of that nature to help me better my work? Most of them teach you the start of it and after that they say you have to pay or you have to sign up for a course to continue.

I understand what you're going through as I was in your shoes an year back. I would suggest you to follow the tutorial series of Python and then Django by Corey Schafer on YouTube. They are completely free and highly informative. You may start with Python beginners tutorial if you're completely unfamiliar with Python. After this, you can follow the Django series in which you'll learn to build a blogging website. As you said that you've been doing minor projects on your own so there won't be much difficulty in understanding the HTML and CSS used for the front end.
Here's the link to the YouTube channel I mentioned-
https://www.youtube.com/user/schafer5
I hope that this gives you an edge in your learning process.
Good luck mate!

I highly recommend you Udemy, which is a perfect collection for learning all sorts of technical studies. I learned Android programming, .NET, and Unity 3D from Udemy, and really it is helpful.
You may need to purchase the courses, maybe $10-15. But it is worth a shot.

Related

Django HTML quality and tutorials

Hey I recently heard about Django, and will hopefully be moving on to learn an HTML type platform. I am currently learning python 3 and wanted to know if Django, especially recent editions, are the "best" ( sorry about the arbitrariness of that).
Plus I was hoping to know any good books / tutorials for django or any other that you believe is more vesitile, easy, etc. Most books don't seem to be up to date on Django as there have apparently been big changes from 1.0 to 1.1 and another leap on 1.3, from what I've read.
Thanks a lot!
As Peter said, Django doesn't support python 3 (which isn't really a big deal and you shouldn't worry about it)
Check out the starter Django Tutorial - see if you understand what's going on (Do all of it!)
If you want to just "make a website" I would recommend learning to build raw HTML/CSS websites before jumping into django which is a web framework.
Python is a joy to learn - it sounds like you are jumping into that world. I would work with the basic tutorial - Read through Model View Controller architecture - and see if it clicks with you.
I can share my experience with you as I have recently learned Django.
Instead of following any book you should try to use the Django documentation and also dont be afraid to look at the source code, it will help you to understand how things are working behind the scene.

Suggested web development language and frameworks for a newbie with iOS experience

I'm a newbie to web development (although I have built basic sites long ago using HTML, CSS, hacked various CMS's etc) and was wondering what language and associated framework is best to go with for a data driven web service with a dynamic UI (i.e. AJAX-ey effects) which I hope will scale at some stage in the future. I am fairly proficient in iOS development so am comfortable with Object Orientated development and the Model View Controller paradigm. Any advice and/or thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Don't learn a language by learning a framework. Do basic non-framework programming in your language of choice first. THEN jump into the framework. Otherwise you're laboring under the double burden of unfamiliar language AND unfamiliar environment.
Basically, learn to drive first, THEN pimp out your ride.
If you're familiar with the Cocoa libraries, you might consider using Sproutcore which has a design that is highly informed by Cocoa. It also has the added bonus of being rather forward looking (aka: the new hotness) and is at the point of becoming a serious tool (ie: Apple uses it for mobile.me ) but still new enough that it is under active development by excited, passionate and skilled developers.
Also, as an aside to everyone advocating learning the basics. For many of us, the best way to learn something well is to have a real project and learn by building. Sproutcore seems like a good option for someone familiar with iOS development.
The easiest framework in my opinion is CodeIgniter and the docs are fantastic but this is really a subjective question.
I agree with #Marc B, first master your language, then you could start using a framework.
as a language the two obvious choices are either asp.net, or php, both have their advantages and disadvantages... you have some reading to do, a simple google search will provide you with plenty of info. there is no one size fits all in this department. look at some code examples, see what you feel comfortable about.

Recommendation for where to learn web development in a classroom setting

I've been doing server-side development for several years, and have not had much (read - practically no) web development experience. My current employer is flush with ca$h at the moment and is offering to pay for training, so I thought it would be a great opportunity to learn. I seem to learn best in a classroom setting with practice at home, so I was wondering if anyone had suggestions as to where would be a good place to learn this stuff. There are some national firms that offer all kinds of training courses (e.g., LearningTree), but I have no idea how good they are. Local college classes are an option too, as long as I don't have to go through a whole degree curriculum (I'm based in NYC/NJ).
Stuff I'd like to learn includes Servlets/JSPs (starting at a very basic level but quickly moving through advanced), Tomcat, MVC, and integration with frameworks such as Spring. I realize not all of that may come bundled together in one neat little package, but if got 70% of the way there that would be a win too.
Thanks in advance for any and all suggestions.
I have friends who teach for Learning Tree, and they generally seem to know their stuff, but they spend most of their time teaching and working on small projects instead of large/enterprise application development. Since they need at least one week a month of time to teach a course... they can't always get hands-on experience in the bigger projects.
That said, if my company were flush on cash:
I'd try a single course at the most-convenient location near me. Probably Learning Tree, as I respect the two instructors I know who work there.
But mainly, I'd simply ask for time off my primary projects to learn the technologies on my own. If you install Tomcat and get a Hello World servlet built, then try to build an online cookbook site using Spring MVC on Tomcat, you'll have a really good knowledge of things in 40-80 hours.
You'll also have built the skills to continue learning on your own without paying someone else $3k a week to walk you through tutorials you can already find online.

how to get started with the game developement on PC

I would like to get started with game development on PC. I heard there are some commercial game engine to facilitate this process. I am wondering anyone can shed some lights on PCgame development. Thanks.
There is a good list of engines at the GPWiki (including many which aren't commercial, and so probably easier to get started with), which I'm sure also has a lot of other information.
http://gpwiki.org/index.php/Game_Engines
I suppose this is also required linking: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_game_engines
I'm not sure what your background is, but your best bet will be to learn a programming language and go from there. I started off with QBasic and slowly taught myself the language by building simple games.
You can also learn quite a bit from a site like this: http://www.xnadevelopment.com/tutorials.shtml
Maybe a bit of a stretch, but some games come with map editors that are quite powerful and can be used to make their own games. For instance, StarCraft II ships with a very powerful editor that can be used to learn about game development and you won't have to worry about writing an engine.

GAIA Framework, a blessing or a handicap?

As a new developer, is GAIA Framework something that I want to look into. Is this going to stifle my learning and keep me dependent upon such.
What are the limitations of this framework. Is there another framework out there that you can suggest for rapid site development with deep-linking and the other bells and whistles?
Thanks!
As a new developer, there's a good chance that you'll write better code if forced to by a structured framework like Gaia. Building Flash websites can be a tricky ordeal unless you're well versed in Flash and Actionscript.
I'd say give it a try and see if you like it. Gaia should save you some time once you understand it. Whenever I try a new framework, I try to build a sample project or two just to get the hang of it before I actually use it on a real project.
If you're new to Flash, Gaia could also be a good tool to learn a decent workflow between your design and code and just in general when it comes to Flash.
If you dig into the code and try to figure out how things are done and why they're done that way, I don't really see Gaia impeding your learning.
It all depends on how you use Gaia. If you use Gaia to make a website then pick apart the created code and figure out how it did the things it did then it will help you learn immensely.
On the flip side if you just publish websites using it and don't bother to pick it apart to learn the internals then it will simply be a crutch allowing you to never learn how to do it yourself. An ability to create something that you could not have otherwise created, and if you cannot use it again in the future, you will not have any clue of how to do it.
Use it as a learning tool, not just a building tool.
EDIT: That was all general comment on building tools in general. Specifically relating to Gaia I'd like to add that personally I think most top end devs make their websites MUCH MUCH better than the Gaia framework does. As a matter of personal opinion I'd only recommend using it as a base learning tool, then building your own framework that you can constantly improve on as you get better.
I have used it in several projects. My experience is that some things are really easy to do with GAIA, and some things are hard because you need to stick to the structure.
It also depends on what type of project you are creating. I think it is worth a try, because you can learn a lot from the structure and methods that the GAIA team created.