How I Started to Learn Computer Coding

I secretly worry that I won’t understand what’s happening when computers – or our evil robot overlords – eventually take over the world because I don’t really understand how computers work. But maybe I should be more seriously worried today because the actual mechanics of computers and the Internet, for the most part, puzzle me.

The argument that you cannot understand how pervasive computer surveillance is in our daily lives unless you understand how computers work has persuaded me to start learning how to code. I had anecdotally gathered that coding is well suited to self-directed learners, and since I have more time on my hands than usual this week owing to the reading week break at the college where I teach, I decided to dive in.

I just lied to you:  I know a little bit about computers

Before this week, I knew just a little bit about the inner workings of computers.  For example, I’ve completed a brief online tutorial about HTML basics through Codecademy in order to teach this material to my paralegal students. I’ve been using personal computers since the early 90s, so I know a couple of hot troubleshooting tips like “check that the cables are connected” and “restart the machine”. Still, other than understanding that computer code is essentially instructions that computers follow to do things, I was mostly clueless, and I mistakenly thought that I’d have to borrow telephone-book-thick volumes from the library to get started.

My official starting place

Fortunately LinkedIn informed my by email that it has acquired the online-education site Lynda.com along with an offer for a free trial. I quickly found the excellent course “Foundations of Programming:  Fundamentals” by Simon Allardice, which runs for 4 hours and 47 minutes. Although it’s presented using many examples of a computer language called JavaScript, this course provided well-structured context that addressed many of my questions about computer coding. Throughout Allardice emphasizes that the purpose of this course is to introduce concepts that are relevant to coding in general rather than any specific computer language; however, I quickly became comfortable with the basics of JavaScript. After completing this course, I returned to Codecademy to work on its JavaScript tutorial, and I found that I could fly through the earlier lessons. Some of my previous hang-ups, like where to place “{“ symbols were cleared up quickly by Allardice, so I was able to focus on practicing through Codecademy’s interface. I haven’t finished the Codecademy tutorial yet, but I’m eager to move on to Allardice’s JavaScript essential training before my free trial at Lynda.com expires.

Please leave any advice you have for me in the comments section below!

Photo by Karl-Ludwig Poggemann (CC BY)