Advice for Code Newbies.
The tech industry is really booming right now and many people would love to join, but a lot of people don’t really know how to go about it or get started. I would be giving advice on how you can get started in coding and how to possibly get a job and opportunities eventually.
- Choose your area of specialization
There are different fields in the tech industry, and it’s best for you to do a good amount of research on which one you think is suitable for you. Some areas you could decide to branch into include :
- Web development: you could choose to be backend, frontend, or full-stack.
- Mobile development: you could decide to go into iOS or Android development.
- Data science
- Machine learning/ Artificial intelligence
- DevOps
- Product Design
- Just start learning
Firstly, I recommend that you have a laptop available to start learning, it’s just better to learn that way. When it comes to coding, there’s no “right” time to start learning, just do it. Start by coding for at least an hour per day, also choose your preferred method of learning. Some people prefer to watch tutorial videos or read books, thank God for the internet because there are an endless amount of free resources available to learn how to code. Examples of such resources are:
- Youtube: literally everything you want to learn is on YouTube.
- The Odin Project: For HTML & CSS, ruby on rails, and javascript.
- Freecodecamp.org: web development, python courses
- Udemy: there are some free courses available on udemy
- b-ok.cc : This is a platform that has thousands of free books available for downloads
- codecademy.com
- teamtreehouse.com
I suggest starting of learning basic HTML and CSS first because you’d need it for web development. I also recommend participating in the 100 days of code, for consistency and accountability, the 100 days of code community on Twitter is really supportive. You could also practice your coding every day on codewars and codepen
- Join a community
It’s always good to join a group of people with who you share a common interest. It could keep you up to date with what’s happening and make new connections as well as gaining and sharing knowledge. You could get opportunities like attending conferences and job opportunities as well. A few communities you could join are:
- CodeNewbies: This is a supportive community for people who are just getting started coding. They have podcasts episodes teaching how to code, as well as interviews with other software engineers and how they got started.
- Women who code: Is a community for supporting women in the tech industry all around the world, they have conferences available and also job opportunities.
- Facebook open source: a community for empowering open source contributors.
- Dev Community: A community for developers all around the world.
- Vue vixens: A community for women into vue.js, a javascript framework,
- blackgirlcode: A community for helping black women code by providing resources, etc.
- SheCodeAfrica: A community for women in tech or interested in tech in Africa.
- Learn Git & Contribute to OpenSource.
It’s advisable to learn version control (git) for tracking adjustments in your code and also for contributing to open source. Contributing to opensource isn’t compulsory, but it’s advisable for helping accelerate your career in tech, so many opportunities can come out from contributing to open source. Firstly, it would look really good on your resume, you can also participate in the google season of docs program and get paid, lastly, you can give back to the community.
- Build projects
Building projects are always a good way to improve your learning as well as a bonus to add to your resume. It’s best to build projects you’re excited about and that can be of use to people. I recommend building 3 projects and hosting them on Heroku to build your portfolio. Ensure to write clean codes, future employers don’t want any spaghetti codes.
- Be Active on Social Media
I advise joining a social media platform and being active on there, especially Twitter and Facebook. My personal favorite is Twitter, tech Twitter is one of the most supportive communities on Twitter. I’ve seen many more opportunities on there, like conferences and job openings. It also keeps you up-to-date on the current trends in tech and also you hear about resources to help you create better code. Some topics I follow on Twitter are open source, machine learning, web development, and python. From following these topics on Twitter, I’ve found resources to help me expand my pre-existing knowledge. In general, the profiles to have are:
- GitHub
- StackOverflow
- Start Blogging
Again this isn’t compulsory, but advisable. Try writing articles on projects you built or articles on how you solved an issue you couldn't find existing solutions on in the past. Blogging helps you reach a wider audience, it helps you put yourself out there, you’re also giving back to the community and you could also monetize your blog posts and earn some money on the side. You could write blogs on your personal website or on platforms for free like:
Now that you’ve finished learning to code and have built projects, you can go ahead and create a LinkedIn profile and a resume to get you started on getting a job. You could create a resume using Canva, which has a lot of free resume templates available. You can find jobs on:
- StackOverflow jobs
- indeed.com
- gigster
- toptal
- tunga.io
- Upwork, etc.
At the end of the day, it is very possible to kickstart your career in tech, just be consistent, put yourself out there and you’ll succeed. It’ll obviously not be easy all through, but just keep going and put your best foot forward.
