Learning to Program: How Should I Start on This Project?

As much as I despise PHP, I think it's a valid language for taking your first steps in.

From your post it's not easy to tell what you're exactly having trouble with, but I suspect it's a general feeling of being lost.

Be aware that for your project you probably need to read up a bit/learn a little of the following:

- Programming basics: Variables, types, expressions and statements, control flow (loops, if/else)

- Web development basics: HTML and CSS to build your pages, a little knowledge about HTTP can't hurt either (GET vs. POST for you form, maybe Basic-Authentication). PHP will take care of the gritty details here

- Not sure if you want to store your forms in a database. If you do, you'll have to look for a php/mysql tutorial. There should be plenty around the web.

- Finally you need to set up some kind of development environment. WAMPserver comes with everything you need. On Mac there's MAMP, which is easier in the beginning than setting it up on your own.

Don't expect this to go fast. There's a lot of reading and playing around involved. If you start enjoying this and feel comfortable in PHP, you should look for a different language though. While PHP is comfortable to learn and good for first steps, I think it's actually counterproductive to try to build anything bigger with it.

The PHP ecosystem is poised with mediocrity and bad code. While it's actually possible to write good code in PHP, it's hard to find examples of good programming and the languages horrible design makes it actually difficult (though not impossible) to express yourself well and write good code.

You might want to read this article first: http://www.shubharamani.com/wordpress/?p=31

It summarizes some of the challenges you will face as you go about building your vision into an actual product.

The hardest part is getting started, and it's great that you have already crossed that bridge. I know a lot of people on HN here will disagree with me - but if you want to just dip your feet and start hacking around - PHP will be a very nice option for you. PHP is rather simple and will allow you to start building things and getting basic stuff like how the web works (HTTP requests, responses, page loads etc.).

As mentioned in the article, you also need to know a decent amount of HTML and CSS for basic formatting of your page. Or, you can find a template (plenty online) which you can modify.

Finally - if you want to do something like emailing people etc. - it involves learning a bit about how web hosting works. This is another place where PHP might be helpful as most web hosts support PHP by default.

There is no one true way to go about learning stuff. Be prepared to be patient and learn by exploring rather than trying to read tutorials and trying to get a hang of everything at once.

You should absolutely learn how to program! As someone who was in your position three years ago, I can categorically tell you that learning to program is one of the best decisions I have ever made. My suggestion is the following - try and find a friend who is willing to be your tutor. It will help you immensely to have someone there who presumably knows the ropes and can walk you through the process and answer questions in real-time. Programming, especially when you are learning, can be intensely aggravating and you can lose interest very quickly if you have hit a seemingly insurmountable roadblock and have no one to fall back on.

Thanks so much for your feedback. To start, I'm going to follow @poisonpie´s advice and use GAE since I have some basic familiarity with Python. And will be sure to read up on how web hosting works -- hadnt even thought about that piece of the puzzle yet. And @swalkergibson will def be providing plenty of beer+pizza for a couple coder friends who've offered to help if I get stuck. Will let you know how it goes! Thanks again.

read the book "Java Head First" from OReilly http://www.amazon.de/Head-First-Java-Bert-Bates/dp/059600920... absolutely brilliant and funny at the same time!

why java? because you have to learn the basics. So better learn the pain-in-the-ass-way as your program basics, then you will understand why ruby is better ;) because if you learn ruby first, you dont know why it is better than other program languages.

Just a short note: I think that its just awesome that you want to learn how to program. (I assume that you are a girl). We need way more female builders!

Assuming you want to save the data you need to look into databases. MySQL is tried and true, but NoSQL database (MongoDB, for example) are hot right now.

You should start with Ruby, Rails, SASS for css, HAML for html, you should write your code in Aptana Studio, and deploy with Engine Yard or Heroku, Aptana has deployment wizards for both. Oh, and GIT for version control.