How to: Apr 4, 2025
1. Learn how Large Language Models like GPT 4 work – one layer at a time. This freeCodeCamp course will walk you through the new DeepSeek-V3 technical report so you can learn about Multi-Head Latent Attention, Query-Key-Value mechanisms, Mixture of Experts Architecture, Rotary Positional Embeddings, and more. It will help you bridge the gap from understanding the theory to writing the Python code. (4 hour YouTube course): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/understand-and-code-deepseek-v3/

2. Laravel is the most popular PHP web development framework. And freeCodeCamp just published a crash course where you can code along at home and build your own Instagram clone using Laravel. This course is taught by Beau Carnes, one of freeCodeCamp's most popular instructors. You'll learn some PHP basics and how to harness the power of Laravel's Model-View-Controller architecture. You'll also learn how to configure your development environment, create your data models, set up routing, and test your app. (1 hour YouTube course): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/code-a-full-stack-instagram-clone-with-laravel-and-mongodb/

3. On this week's freeCodeCamp podcast, I interview Ryan Furrer about his journey from broke musician to software engineer. As you may know, not every guest on my podcast has a PhD from Stanford. Case in point, Ryan dropped out of college and worked as a violin instructor. He spent 5 years teaching himself how to program while working odd jobs and paying down his student debt. He ultimately ramped up with freelance gigs before landing developer jobs. He shares tons of practical insights for mid-career folks who want to break into tech. (90 minute listen in your favorite podcast app): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/from-broke-musician-to-working-dev-ryan-furrer-podcast-166/

4. The freeCodeCamp community is on a roll with another awesome handbook – this time on cryptography. You'll learn the history of the RSA cryptosystem and the math that underpins it. You'll also learn about various attacks on the encryption scheme such as Håstad’s Broadcast Attack, the Bleichenbacher Attack, the Malleability Exploit, and the many additions to RSA that have hardened it over the decades. Strong recommend. (full-length handbook): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/the-cryptography-handbook-rsa-algorithm/

5. Finally, did you know you could run your own home VPN off of a cheap Raspberry Pi computer? This freeCodeCamp tutorial will walk you through setting up a Tailscale open source mesh VPN for all your internet-connected devices, using the WireGuard protocol. (12 minute read): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/set-up-a-home-vpn-using-tailscale-on-a-raspberry-pi/

Quote of the Week: *“You don't have to push yourself if you're not comfortable. But there are rewards to be reaped should you figure out a way to put yourself slightly past the threshold of comfort.”* — Ryan Furrer, self-taught developer, on this week's freeCodeCamp podcast