How to: Dec 21, 2024
1. freeCodeCamp just published a new course that will help you prepare for the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Professional exam, and pass it with confidence. Andrew Brown is a CTO who has passed dozens of similar cloud cert exams. He'll teach you all about Virtual Private Clouds, cloud databases, serverless functions, and tons of AWS-specific security and storage tools. (70 hour YouTube course): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/aws-solutions-architect-professional-sap-c02-certification-course

2. Each week somebody writes asking for me to share some more Java-focused courses. Well, I'm thrilled to say that freeCodeCamp just published a course on the Spring Boot web development framework that will walk you through integrating AI capabilities into your Java apps. You can code along at home and build several projects that incorporate AI APIs like an audio transcription tool, a recipe generator, and a question & answer chatbot. (4 hour YouTube course): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/build-smarter-spring-boot-applications-with-spring-ai

3. On this week's podcast, I interview software engineer James Q. Quick about how he approached his job search after a recent layoff. James grew up in Memphis and was an athlete who also played violin. He knew nothing about computer science, but chose it as his college major. Since then, he's not only worked as a dev at Microsoft, FedEx, and many tech startups. He's also given more than 100 talks at developer conferences. He talks about how his Harry Potter Trivia app helped launch his career. And he shares tons of advice for how to make a name for yourself through writing tutorials and giving conference talks. (90 minute watch or listen in your favorite podcast app): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/how-to-get-a-developer-job-even-in-this-economy-james-q-quick-podcast-153/

4. Learn game development fundamentals and code your own 2D platformer game. This course will teach you how to code your own JavaScript game that runs right in a browser, which will make your game extremely easy to share with your friends. You'll learn how to use the Kaplay JS library to load sprite art assets, handle collisions, react to controller inputs from players, and more. You'll even learn how to deploy your game to a publishing platform like itch. (4 hour YouTube course): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/learn-game-development-with-javascript-and-kaplay

5. You may have heard the term “User Stories.” These are a key concept in Agile software development. User Stories are essentially feature specifications, but they're written from the perspective of what your end users are actually trying to accomplish. This comprehensive tutorial will teach you how to create good user stories that can guide you and your team as you build features for your apps. This tutorial will also show you quite a few examples of well-designed user stories, and share some tips for how to structure them. You'll also learn about some common pitfalls developers encounter when crafting user stories, so that you can avoid them. (20 minute read): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/how-to-write-user-stories-for-beginners/