[drummermandan02]

Hi.
I am pretty new to the web design/development and as of yet found it interesting and eager to progress further learning new skills. I find it easier to be tought things so I am looking at going down the path of training courses. But am able to teach myself.
Basically this thread is asking all of you out there on your opinions on training courses. Anyone know of a good place to go, what to look out for etc.

There are some courses offered at computeach for example which provides you with some Microsfot qualifications, and others provide other qualifications such as CIW. You know which qualifications are looked upon as something to make you stand out?

I dont want to commit to spending the money to get these courses if the majority of people here think that its a total waste of time due to experience or just opion that tutorials such as on here would help more!? I would reconsider what to do!

Thanks for the adivce n help

[drummermandan02]

I'm suprised nobody has anything to say

[axel]

I don't really know what "qualifications" you need, since I am only 16, but I guess just look for different classes teaching the basics of HTML/CSS and stuff like that. It really all depends on what you want to do. I have basically taught myself all the programming that I know, with the help of my dad. I think it is better to learn it yourself. Just my opinion.


Hope that somewhat helps.

[Domeman165]

I have been programming in Microsoft Products for years. Mostly Visual Basic. I have been trying to learn web development. To learn any of it requires good understanding of HTML/XHTML/XML and then code to make it all work.

I am currently working on a project that was pieced together 4-5 years ago in HTML and VB.ASP. I have been struggling to understand this code. Because a number of people touched and left no comments has me bewildered.

I have been trying to learn the HTML syntax but with the visual designers most of the code generation is handle behind the scenes. I look at the code and have no clue. I don't know wether people even write webpages from the ground up anymore.

Let me know if you find out the correct direction to take.

Microsofts MSDN seems to have very valuable info but it maybe slanted torward their products.

[skyhawk133]

If you're wanting to actually do web development, you need to learn the basics and a certification class won't teach you that. It will teach you how to pass the certification.

Take HTML classes, and from there just start learning on your own. I've taken several "web programming" classes in college and they really didn't teach me much, but you may find some descent PHP or ASP.NET classes at a local community college that may be worth your time and money.

[Domeman165]

I just remember a site that I was going to sign up for. They have demonstration videos to check out. They cover most of Visual Studio. The videos I watch were very good and the cost very reasonable. A lot less than a college class.


http://www.learnvisualstudio.net/


Check this link out at Microsoft on Web learning

http://msdn2.microso...r/bb308786.aspx

This post has been edited by Domeman165: 18 December 2007 - 11:15 AM

[Nykc]

Hey there Domeman165 -

Im a programmer analyst for a bank and we work with about 5 million different programming languages. At my college I took a ton of programming classes mainly to learn 500 different ways to write Hello World! and add a few variables.

First off understand that Web Design and Development are two different things all together. I recommend learning Design first to get a good feel for HTML and CSS. start there, www.w3schools.com has loads of great tutorials, Troll forums such as this and see what problems people run into as well as solutions and then you can get a feel for hacking out bugs in your code. In design always make sure your code validates. Will save many headaches in future when trying to make a simple 3 column layout look decent in ie6 or 7. when it looks great in firefox.

Once you get a feel for HTML and CSS - its time to focus on some development languages. Grab a good scripting language like Javascript and try and understand it. You wont master it right away but with practice it gets easier.

Once you get a good feel for Javascript, you will need a good server side language. This is dependant heavily on the server you are using or web host provider. I use Dreamhost, therefore I developed a knack for php and mysql for my server side and database needs. But there is also ASP and .net for more commercial approach. If you have a server that supports ColdFusion thats another one.

In summary my advice is:

Learn:
HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP and MySql - you can do about anything with that setup!

Get a few development tools:
HTML Kit makes a great IDE and is user friendly.
Dreamweaver is used in alot of professional environments, im not a huge fan but its there.
DO NOT USE FRONTPAGE!!!!!!

Hope that helps