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Ask HN: Daily updated learning portal - would this work?
Rails was my first programming endeavor. With a non-cs background, learning it was an impossibly difficult task. Every resource I found either assumed the reader had some prior programming knowledge, was incomplete, or was outdated, which led to frustration. I tried to struggle through countless tutorials, videos and ebooks, but nothing made sense and I always gave up. Railscasts were helpful for specific concepts, but not so much for general ideas and clueless newbies. After months of spinning wheels, I found a decent ebook and I realized that programming was not all that difficult as long as it was properly explained and dissected.
Since then, I've thrown around the idea of starting dedicated a blog to teaching Ruby on Rails to non-programmers. I know for a fact that there are people out there that would find this valuable - constant email inquiries enforce this. The only problem is I'm terrible at blogging since there is nobody to hold me accountable if I slack off (it happens).
Lightbulb - if I launch a platform with strong intentions to update every single day (think Woot.com for learning), I may be inclined to do just that. This would solve a number of issues:
- first post would assume absolutely no previous programming experience
- each new post would build on the last (building increasingly complex sample applications, etc)
- with daily updates, content would never become stale or dated
- would not require a huge commitment (maybe an hour a day)
- at the end of every month, the previous 30 posts could be packaged into an ebook
But why stop with Rails? The same platform could host a number of programming languages, community driven or maintained by a number of select contributers. It could be like Wikipedia + Woot + Railscasts. And it doesn't just have to be for beginner programmers. Eventually it could turn into a daily dose of programming tidbits - little tips and tricks that even experienced programmers could find useful.
So who wants to collaborate?
- krianbalma13 15y agoI'd be interested in hearing more about this. hit me up!
- guynamedloren 15y agoGreat! Shoot me an e-mail - lorendburton at gmail. I'd love to chat :)
- tomfakes 15y agoOne thing I've not seen done often on the web is timed release of content to every user, based on their start time. For things that become complex over time, i.e. learning a programming language or a framework, having the content fed to me in a specific order, without overwhelming me with everything at once, has some value. This is the way classes are taught in the real world (although this is usually a group of people on the same schedule), but isn't the way the web works.
- guynamedloren 15y agoInteresting and valid concept! The only potential downside I see with this is the fact that everybody learns at different paces - specifically, some may be eager to move forward. Possible alternative: a user could subscribe and select a desired starting point, receiving an email corresponding to the next lesson each day.
- swanson 15y agoCheck out http://www.codeschool.com/ http://www.codeschool.com/ - later content "unlocks" when you finish the previous lessons.