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Discussion on: The 7 Myths of Learning to Code

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stephsmithio profile image
Steph Smith

Thanks for the feedback Mihail. I have to disagree with you on a few points, but this is just my experience.

I launched my personal site with only HTML and CSS and it did everything I needed to begin with. Obviously if you're creating full applications, yes you need more.

jQuery is perfectly fine and can do almost everything that other frameworks can. Is it "as good"? Maybe not, but it's great for beginners and can accomplish a lot.

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qm3ster profile image
Mihail Malo • Edited

Maybe I misunderstood and we are talking about different things.
When I said HTML & CSS aren't enough, I assumed the app is a core part of the product. If it's an informational/commerce site for your offline business, you will probably have more of an advantage using something like Squarespace/Shopify/a WordPress theme. The amount you have to learn to make something for scratch for those purposes, as well as the effort of upkeep without a static site generator or CMS is very unlikely to be worth it today.

But about jQuery, I simply cannot agree. Native APIs have eaten it, and learning them (aka the fundamentals aka the platform) will not only be as easy initially, with abundant documentation and examples, but also remain useful regardless of what they use later. So yeah, beginners are precisely the people who should stay well well away of it, lest they forever be confused by the subtle differences such as some jQuery methods being properties in the native APIs.

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kristynagel profile image
Kristy Whalen

You're being part of the problem (one of the myths that was covered). Rather than say that jQuery will just create confusion or that it's a waste of time, present some clear, SIMPLE alternatives.

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qm3ster profile image
Mihail Malo

For total newcomers:
developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web
developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/L... (guided tour)

For those that already use jQuery and want to get rid of it:
youmightnotneedjquery.com/
vanilla-js.com/

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kristynagel profile image
Kristy Whalen

A repository of technologies available to webs goes against the grain of this article, and again echoes one of the myths. If you're going to suggest that jQuery is a waste of time, then offer a specific alternative to jQuery (with reasons), otherwise you are just adding to the clutter.

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qm3ster profile image
Mihail Malo

I'm sorry, I don't understand what you're asking of me.