Before I started
I had just finished high school in 2014, when I decided to go to a tech school to learn web design and CISCO. I didn't have a personal laptop then, but I had a desktop in our living room to play with.
When I saw other teenagers designing sites and doing great things with their phones, I wanted to be a "techie" as well. I remember, when I saw a friend using his symbian phone to design a Wapka site. I wanted that life. I wanted to be called "brainy" and a "techie." So, I told my dad I wanted to learn how to do these things as well and he reluctantly agreed.
I wasn't supposed to get a laptop until I had entered the university (family tradition), but I did get one before even gaining admission into the university just because I wanted to learn how to code. It was a HP 250 G5 Laptop then.
The Beginning
One morning, he told a friend to accompany me to the tutorial center to pay for the class and get me started on the journey. I started the class by learning how to use html opening and closing tags such as <p>, </p (for paragraphs), <body>, </body>, which defines the documents body and many more.
I was taught to always start with:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Page Title</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>This is a Heading</h1>
<p>This is a paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
And then save the document as index.html. As at 2014, I only knew how to use notepad to run the index.html page. That's actually what I was taught to use. So, I downloaded Notepad++ to run html codes on my laptop. It was a beautiful experience to be able to write several lines of working codes. I continued writing html, submitting assignments and doing a good job. I finished HTML and started CSS for styling the website that I had created.
I was taught that CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheets and it describes how HTML elements are to be described on screen and in other media. I was also taught that it controls the layout of multiple webpages at once. W3schools.com was one website that was highly recommended for learning HTML and CSS because I got to practice immediately what I had learned. My first CSS code was:
body {
background-color: lightblue;
}
h1 {
color: white;
text-align: center;
}
p {
font-family: verdana;
font-size: 20px;
}
After writing these line of codes, I was asked to save it as a separate document with the name style.css. Before this, I was taught inline styling which allowed me to see how my website was styled without creating a separate css file. An example is:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<style>
body {
background-color: linen;
}
h1 {
color: maroon;
margin-left: 40px;
}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1>This is a heading</h1>
<p>This is a paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
Later on, I was taught different commands such as classes, CSS colors and more. It was becoming so interesting that I was enjoying sleepless nights just because I wanted to beautify my newly created website. After completing the css3 course, I started learning about Adobe Dreamweaver and I was to use this software to design my final website project.
I learnt to use this software for designing my website and I got an A-grade in my final website design. I didn't get to start the CISCO course because it was time for me to enter the university.
The Confused State
After gaining admission into the university, I didn't continue with JavaScript or even WordPress, I decided to start-off with Python because of its simple Syntax. I was excited to Print("Hello World") in 2017. I picked interest in web harvesting and I made some bucks off Fiverr offering the service. I got stuck in Object Oriented Programming (OOP) and I quit programming in 2019.
As at then, I didn't have a mentor. OOP was like a nightmare, so I decided not to ever touch anything programming again. I moved into a non-tech niche and made some more money. Although, I wasn't satisfied. I just did it because I wanted to make money online. Later on, I took courses and read several books on goal setting, self-discipline and just any book that would help me develop myself.
Self Discovery
One evening, in May, I said to myself, > man, you just have to go back to your first love. I gave myself some pep talk and even told my friend about it. I wanted to get back to programming after graduation, but I had to tell myself again, that I was deceiving myself by waiting for the perfect time. The next day, I dust my laptop, downloaded VsCode and started programming again. This time around, I had to get some accountability partners to help track my progress.
Final Notes
So far, I've been making progress in my journey. I love Web3 and that's where I'm putting all my basket. In two months, I've completed HTML, CSS, Flexbox, Bootstrap, SASS and Tailwind. I've built a tribute page and some other projects by following Freecodecamp learning curve and some other Youtube resources. Here's some lines of code I can write now using TailwindCSS:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge">
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
<link rel="stylesheet" href="/css/output.css">
<title>Landing Page</title>
</head>
<body>
<!-- Navbar -->
<nav class="relative container mx-auto p-6">
<!-- Flex Container -->
<div class="flex items-center justify-between">
<!-- Logo -->
<div class="pt-2">
<img src="/img/logo.svg" alt="">
</div>
<!-- Menu Items -->
<div class="hidden space-x-4 md:flex">
<a href="#" class="hover:text-darkGrayishBlue">Pricing</a>
<a href="#" class="hover:text-darkGrayishBlue">Product</a>
<a href="#" class="hover:text-darkGrayishBlue">About Us</a>
<a href="#" class="hover:text-darkGrayishBlue">Careers</a>
<a href="#" class="hover:text-darkGrayishBlue">Community</a>
</div>
<a href="#" class=" hidden p-3 px-6 pt-2 text-white bg-brightred rounded-full baseline hover:bg-brightredLight md:block">
Get Started
</a>
</div>
</nav>
</body>
</html>
Cheers to a new life😎😎😎