I’m trying to do the freecodecamp but I am a bit confused. My friend who is a senior mobile app developer working in the field for more than 10 years told me I should skip all the web design, it is pointless and waste of time.
Instead of that I should learn Java and more complicated things.
Some more opinion on this would be appreciated. Thanks.
With all due respect, I think you’re friend is just being contrarian to sound like a big shot. There have been quite a few people who were able to land web development jobs before they finished the first certification, and the fact is that many of the skills you learn doing web development will translate to other platforms as well. As @P1xt said, if your goal is to be a mobile developer, there are far more direct paths you could take. That said, freeCodeCamp hardly focuses on web design at all and you will be spending the majority of your time programming. I would hardly consider that a waste of time.
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I don’t think it’s pointless even if your goal is to go into something like mobile development. This course teaches you the building blocks that can be used in any language you decide to learn in the future, including Java. The coding syntax will be different between different languages but the core logic (variables, loops, decisions, etc) transcends any programming language. I’ve been a developer for a few years and started programming many years ago when I was a kid. I’ve done a variety of things such as desktop applications, website design and development, as well as mobile development. I enjoy doing all of it and, as you can see, I’m here to continue to learn new things.
The question is, what do you want to do? What brought you to this site?
There are many great people on this site willing to help out and because there are so many different ways to do things, I learn so much from viewing other people’s projects and discussing them.
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Thank you for the replies. This is why I posted this question. I mean he is my friend and he knows way more than me, it just got me thinking that even learning html/css code is teaching me the basic principles, best practises.
At the beginning I just want to learn coding in general, little bit of this, little bit of that to try out what I want to do, what I like to do. I’m more inclined to work as a back-end developer though.
I think this article sort of applies. The take away is try everything and see what sticks.
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It doesn’t take long to learn the web stuff, so I don’t now why you would want to skip it. It’s always going to come up, maybe you don’t have to master it, but at least know your way around.
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Thank you, this article is really helpful.
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I don’t want to skip it but when somebody with 10 years experience says to a complete beginner that it’s not really needed., hmm, well, it is wise to listen. Although it is wise to ask more people too.
I have left well paied jobs in the .NET and JAVA world to switch to Adobe Flash/Flex/AIR and from there into opensource Rich Web/Mobile Apps. This has been a well thought transition I would not have made, when there would not be money to be made and future would not be spreading ahead of us.
Enterprise applications are ugly and not userfriendly and therefore will never face the customer. This is going to change, and there is a big need, that it is changed.
My personal goal is to replace all those interfaces with design driven frontends people got used to from the web and games. This is something the old world cannot do. Especially not, when it comes to cross-platform/mobile.
OK, Microsoft is trying hard, but has failed. IBM is trying hard and has failed.Same with Intel. They all have SOMETHING, but they do not beat open source.
So, from my point of view: Open Source Web/Mobile JS World has a future, and when it comes to embedded Systems (Internet of things) it IS the future.
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Oh man, if there was something like fCC for Linux development, in particular a roadmap towards competency. I’d love it if more people would get involved with free software, and I’ve got a bunch of ideas myself, but just learning what to learn is exhausting. This comes around full circle to why I like fCC, and why it’s certainly not a waste of time. So much of the high level work of figuring out what to learn for success has been done. Just being able to build web apps from scratch gave me the confidence to branch out. Now I’m building a project in Ruby on Rails, I feel capable of building an iOS app in Objective-C or Swift, and I’d be willing to bet I’d pick up Java pretty quickly.
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anyway…how do I float an image left!!! 
no answer required (just incase!!!) 
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M$ is trying even harder than before. I like the direction they’re going. Makes me feel not so bad being full-stack .NET now…