Finding the right materials to learn

Today we’re going to talk about finding the right materials to learn to code.

Google is usually good enough

One thing I realized over the years is that you can find almost anything you want in the first three pages of Google.

If you cannot find it, it can mean four different possibilities:

1. The answer is already there

The answer can be in the first three pages, but you’re not aware of it.

You need to go back and re-read the articles and books you found. Pay more attention as you read through them again.

Read slowly.

Maybe you need to try things to get a deeper understanding.

2. You don’t have enough knowledge to understand the answer yet

For example, if you want to learn React, but you don’t know any JavaScript, you’re not going to go very far.

You might not be able to catch the answer even if it shows up in front of you since you’re not ready for it.

Go and learn some fundamentals before trying again.

3. You don’t know what to search for

If you’re new to the industry, and you don’t know what to search for, you won’t be able to find what you want.

What you should do is grab a beginners book. Start reading it. Learn the keywords. Learn how to Google

4. The answer might not be on google

You might not be able to find answers you’re searching for new or unpopular things. What you can do then, is to figure things out yourself. Alternatively, you can ask someone you know personally.

No amount of Googling can help here.

Here are two tips

The first tip

Few people explain things well. When you find these people, follow them.

I follow these people:

1. Rachel Andrew and Jen Simmons for CSS Grid
2. Sarah Drasner for Vue
3. Heydon Pickering for accessibility
4. Seth Godin for marketing
5. Sean McCabe for business

The key is to build your own list of favorite people to follow.

Keep track of what they do. Watch them work their magic. Buy their books and courses.

The second tip

One useful tip is to narrow your search to the site you want to search from. To do this, you can write

site:sitename search-term

If you want to google for something on my site, you can use site:zellwk.com functions.