Learning HTML

Since I graduated from college a year ago I have found I get restless with the extra time I have gained. I have finished the projects and stack of books that I had accumulated while I was in school pretty quickly and since then have tried to find new ways to structure my time so that I still feel productive.

I recently read an article on KSL that got me thinking about coding. I currently work for a software company and am surrounded by tech nerds so coding is always around me but not something I knew a lot about. When I first was hired there were a few hard days where I wondered why they hired me and how on earth did they think I could do this job?! The role of my job at that time was much more support than it was customer service. And since customer service was my strength and supporting software was not I really had to challenge myself to learn what I needed to be successful in this role.

In meetings I would take notes on the jargon and even at times language the other guys would use and then later go back to my desk and teach myself what it was they were talking about. I really had to fake it some days but I quickly caught up to the others and learned our complicated system and gained confidence in my abilities.

I quickly learned that I was capable of more than I knew and continued to push myself. So when I read this article and watched the video and saw that some of the biggest people in the technology world were once just like me I was quickly motivated to learn. They had a link to a program called code academy, an online set of classes that teaches you in an interactive way how to code. I started with the html lesson since that is the most basic and a stepping stone to the other code languages. I loved it! Finally I could begin to read the language that appears behind the scenes of every software and website.

Then I started thinking of all the simple things I could start doing with it. So recently I updated my blog template, edited a few widgets, added in code so that I could link to my social media pages, as well as added a "pin it" line of code so that all my pictures could easily be pinned by readers.

I am sure I could have done much of this before this class, but I now have more confidence in doing it and understand where and how to make edits to the code I can find already existing online so that it better meets my needs.

I use to think this sort of thing was really nerdy but with the world becoming so dependent on technology and jobs moving in that direction I think this is something more people need to learn. I hope that schools start to teach this so that children at young ages can learn these skills as well. I think continued learning is so important. I hope once Brian is done with school and when life allows for it that I can go back to school, (a year ago I never would have thought I would have said that) there is still so much more I want to learn!