How do you learn programming, if you don’t know anything about programming at all? I’ve been very curious about this problem, especially in recent months, as I hear stories of the digital divide, and the growing gap between STEM graduates and jobs in the US. There is also the question of digital equity – if someone has already gone past school and college without exposure to the basics of programming, what are their options for catching up?
I spent about six years and change studying for two degrees in Computer Science. I learned how to program before I joined college. But a lot has changed since I went to college, and while it might have been expensive and difficult to introduce oneself to these concepts back then, today there are a host of services and tools that make it much easier and faster to come up to speed on how programming works.
This blog post is the first in a series that focus on these services and tools, to teach someone who isn’t a programmer, to learn how to teach themselves the skills. These posts will assume not that you are a programmer, but that you’re willing to follow the exercises, search for answers on the Internet, and be creative in attempting to find the answers.
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