Really 🆓?
Spending money is a painful habit and to learn that you can actually get quality things without spending any money at all has us thinking there’s a catch. Well rest assured there are no catches here, the only thing you need is a drive and passion for programming.
Although the method I am about to discuss has a paid “PRO” version. Do not feel tempted to buy it. The free version is great and I never got the PRO version and still learned multiple languages through the website and self-study.
👨💻Codecademy
On Codecademy, you can create a free account and start learning the programming language of your choice entirely for free! It’s an easy way for beginners to begin learning the magic of programming.
After signing up you can select any and all programming languages from an extensive list
Let’s select Python and check out how it works!
💡Hello World
Codecademy takes away setting up development environments. The environment is already set up and running. No need for installing Python and installing dependencies etcetera. It skips the unimportant bits for a beginner and focuses straight on the learning! This makes it extremely beginner-friendly.
Codecademy will teach you and give you instructions from the most left pane. This is the “Learn” pane.
In the middle pane, the website lets you type, alter and check your Python code. The most right pane will show you the result of your code.
As we can see there is already code here. Let’s hit run and see what happens!
Our code just printed exactly what was specified! Magnificent! We can now start learning from the Learn pane.
The Learn pane will also give us assignments increasing in difficulty as we go further with the course. Eventually, we will also have exams and even certificates we can earn.
There’s also a paid ‘PRO’ version of Codecademy. I have never used it since there was no need for it. The free version is complete and offers the whole course nonetheless.
As a beginner do not immediately go for PRO. Just start with the free courses they are better than most paid courses out there! Begin learning to code and have fun!
Programming is a beautiful art and enables you to do so many things with just your laptop.
💭My Experience
I have been coding since I was 10 years old. I started with Visual Basic and currently can code in multiple languages. One of the reasons why I can fluently code in multiple languages is Codecademy. I only used the free courses and it enabled me to quickly understand and learn the syntaxes of new languages.
It’s a beautiful tool that is easy to use and not enough people know about it. No need to spend hundreds or even thousands of dollars on online courses or colleges about programming!
After studying with the tool sometimes, try and challenge yourself! Try and set up the development space yourself, create your own portfolio website or create a simple app doing some basic things. I have learned the most by just doing things and learning new stuff on the fly as problems arose. It’s fun and challenging. Solving problems after encountering them by yourself and with some help from the internet is extremely satisfying.
Self-thought programmers are the best kind of programmers — Me