How to learn web development?

Quench24

Anyone here a web developer?

urstuffplz1

Not a web dev, but I have written websites as apart of my undergraduate degree I'm currently pursuing.

If you want to learn website development you'll need to know the front-end side of things (HTML5, CSS3 & Javascript/alternative) and learning either PHP or ASP.NET would be extremely beneficial learning the server-side. Most websites run server-side these days, but you need to know front-end code to link everything together. I don't have any server-side experience with websites, however.

You can learn for free, and the easiest way is to download Notepad++ and begin with building a website in just HTML5, then add in your styles with CSS3, and just progress it from there. Try to avoid Dreamweaver and other programs that automate elements for you until you know the at least the fundamentals of the code.

W3Schools Online Web Tutorials is one of the best resources to learn everything from.

tedjames

I learned way back in 1995 or so by tearing apart existing web sites and learning what the codes do. urstuffplz1 is right about learning for free. Learn to write code and avoid drag & drop systems like Wordpress. HTML code is very easy and logical. <open code>text</close code> Obviously, there's more to it than that.

I found a great book on HTML5 on eBay for about $3. There are a ton of free online resources as well.

Quench24

urstuffplz1 wrote: »

Not a web dev, but I have written websites as apart of my undergraduate degree I'm currently pursuing.

If you want to learn website development you'll need to know the front-end side of things (HTML5, CSS3 & Javascript/alternative) and learning either PHP or ASP.NET would be extremely beneficial learning the server-side. Most websites run server-side these days, but you need to know front-end code to link everything together. I don't have any server-side experience with websites, however.

You can learn for free, and the easiest way is to download Notepad++ and begin with building a website in just HTML5, then add in your styles with CSS3, and just progress it from there. Try to avoid Dreamweaver and other programs that automate elements for you until you know the at least the fundamentals of the code.

W3Schools Online Web Tutorials is one of the best resources to learn everything from.

Thanks for the reply. I already know how to create websites using HTML and CSS... whats next? Learning Javascript?

urstuffplz1

Quench24 wrote: »

Thanks for the reply. I already know how to create websites using HTML and CSS... whats next? Learning Javascript?

In that case I would suggest learning JavaScript/JQuery fundamentally, and then moving onto PHP/ASP to a high level, these languages gives you what JavaScript/JQuery does, and much more.

ally_uk

Why would you bother learning all of the above when you can create pretty decent looking websites with Wordpress

amanuelquicka

if you get new info about web development hitme back sir

amcnow

If you're going to invest time into learning JavaScript, then you should invest additional time into learning the Angular 2 framework.

https://angularjs.org/

https://angular.io/

Additionally, if you're serious about ASP.NET, then learning C# is almost a must.

marzillo

Learning web development is not unlike learning any other type of software development. Start small and iterate over time. To be effective, you must learn multiple technologies and languages. HTML and CSS is not web development but more markup and presentation. It focuses on what things look like and where they are on the interface rather than the full functionality of the application. You can provide some functionality but it's limited.

To round out the presentation you need Javascript. These however, are primarily client side technologies and therefor focuses on the User Interface / User Experience or UI/UX aspect of the application. This is half the picture. People who only know the HTML/CSS/Javascript side of things are said to be front-end web developers. Back-end web developers focus on the sever-side languages such as PHP, ASP.NET (C#), Java, etc. and typically write the middle-ware, business logic, API's, and database access layers. Developers that know both front-end and back-end are said to be "Full Stack" web developers.

Besides understanding those languages and technologies there is a whole different mindset behind developing for a web application verses a desktop application. The stateless nature of a web application along with the countless environments and browsers you app may need to function in change the game considerably. One of the hardest things to grasp for traditional desktop app developers is that you must think about transaction speed of a single page hit and ensure that you only do what is necessary to satisfy that specific page hit. Many new web developers will load all kinds of data in memory for all pages but only use it on a few. This typically goes unnoticed until you have millions of page hits and your site begins to crawl for everyone.

If you want to be a web developer, learn the languages and technologies of which there are many to choose from. Learn various concepts such as MVC or MVVM. Understand what 3-tier architecture is and why it's important. Learn about micro services, RESTful and SOAP services, and the concepts of loosely coupled distributed components. Most importantly, learn about security and the various threats that web applications face these days along with how to deal with them. If you are going to focus on front-end learn about concepts like progressive disclosure, user interface design, and how to support multiple browsers.

As with any complex system it takes years to become a true professional. Most of it being in the trenches rather than the class room. Pick a project to do at home and write a web app for it. Learn by doing and then continuously improve.

huntert

you can join free code camp and learn a lot about front end and back end development

Quench24

I am doing Udacity's Front End Developer Nanodegree.