AppJet, the Y Combinator-funded startup that lets users build web applications from their browsers, has opened a new set of lessons that guide novice users through the basics of programming. The lessons focus on JavaScript, one of the world’s most popular programming languages, and have been written to be accessible to students who have never programmed before.
Co-Founder Aaron Iba says that the lessons will likely take a new programmer a few weeks to work through at a moderate pace, depending on how much time is spent on the interactive demos (each lesson provides a fully functional program that can be modified). There are currently 24 lessons available, with more on the way. After skimming through the first few lessons, I managed to put together a program slightly more complex than “Hello world!”, which you can find here.
This online school is significant because it offers a very low barrier to entry for novices who are looking to get their feet wet and start programming. Nearly every programming tutorial requires some kind of software prerequisite, be it a downloaded client or a server, which can be both expensive and difficult to set up for a new user. Conversely, AppJet requires no software, allowing users to edit, debug, and run code through a browser interface. Because of this low barrier, AppJet may well see an influx of new students who they can convert to regular members.
Besides the lessons launching today, AppJet offers web developers a way to create and host web applications free of charge. The site appeals primarily to users in the long tail, who may not want to spend money on a web server just to host a number of small applications that are only accessed once in a while. Iba says that since its launch in December, AppJet has seen over 1900 applications published, with another 4000 under development (though many of these will likely never be completed).
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This is an impressive resource for beginners. We have been doing JavaScript for years and would recommend this.
The layout and pace is well thought out.
Please, do more blog posts like this.
This is the old TechCrunch we all remember
Let me guess, you’re doing PR for these guys. The story’s up a minute and you already know that these tutorials are ‘great’ etc. And a PR guy would know JS well enough to ‘recommend it’.
Seriously, you suck at PR buddy. This is called astroturfing.
http://www.w3schools.com/
First useful y-combinator funded startup.
This would be a great resource for anyone wanting to learn JavaScript. I tried out a few lessons and it is very intuitive. Looks like they might have a winner here!
Javascript is not a programming language. It’s a client side scripting language used to create the user interface of an application.
Cool…Thanks for the Info.
Hope you like this,
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Nice service however, I tried using the service on Mozilla (2.0)and getting “error creating transient app:error”.
@KP: That happens when you have cookies disabled. I just updated the site to provide a better error message. In FireFox, you can enable cookies by checking “Accept cookies from sites” in the “Privacy” tab of the options dialog.
@webepags….i kinda lean your way but are we just getting into semantics? especially for a noobie-centered site?
@appjet, well done! not sure how much it’ll catch, but well done.
@Webepags: Are you talking about a distinction between the terms “scripting language” and “programming language”? Most dynamic, lightweight programming languages (Perl, Python, etc.) are also referred to as scripting languages.
Also, JavaScript is not at all limited to “user interface” scripting. It was actually originally conceived as a server-side language.
For more information:
http://www.crockford.com/javas.....cript.html
since i dropped out from valley
this may pave the way for my returned
not with spelling like that it won’t ….
you are an idiot
certified idiot at that
spelling not one word is spelled wrong idiot lmaoooooooooo
did you attend a community college?
I tried some simple stuff and it worked well. I am a beginner when it comes to Web programming and these sites are very useful. Reminds me of Heroku (for RoR).
w3schools.com is good also
Great, now every Tom, Dick, and Harry can call themselves programmers and churn out crappy buggy s/w, is this what we really want? Seriously, think about it, there are plenty of crappy buggy s/w out there even with CS degreed developers and now you want to teach average Joe how to code, you gotta be fucking kidding me.
@phil dalhauser - perhaps because (many) folks majoring in cs do it for a salary, and thus don’t care too terribly about quality. and perhaps, those people who have other professions, who have sought out programming and have the passion to learn it, will also have the passion to deliver quality experiences?
@robfitz, I highly doubt that a casual developer would be more quality focused than a salaried developer. More likely than not, a casual developer is going to be a lot more interested in delivering features and far less interested in ensuring quality s/w, just my $0.02. Often times, a basic level of quality assurance involves testing on multiple browsers and different versions of the same browser(s), and I doubt they teach that at AppJet.
Any metrics at all on Y startups?
I would think your hands start to smell pretty bad after throwing a ton of crap at the wall.
@Phil Dalhauser, By your logic, I shouldn’t change the oil in my own car just because I’m not a mechanic. The fallacy is that education is more important than talent and a good idea. After all, how many of the best ideas were conceived by nobodys and then tweaked by the professionals? Face it, the ones that don’t have the natural talent will give up early on, and those who have raw talent and a little training will be able to present a quality idea that us educated folk can then make better.
@Dave, give me a break, one can hardly compare changing oil to writing code. Writing code is more like asking an average Joe to design and put together a car, not change oil.
@Phil Dalhauser Writing code doesn’t have to be difficult for Average Joe. And tools like this and Axiom Stack’s Inspector and Debugger make is easy to learn. http://www.axiomstack.com
If you guys like the AppJet concept of rapidly developing hosted web apps. You should check out my site http://utilitymill.com too. It’s a similar concept but designed for simpler input/output type programs and it runs Python.
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