20 best alternatives to The New Boston video series as of 2018 - Slant

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Hackr.io

Top Pro

Community trust

Instead of getting a recommendation from a single dev, you get recommendation from the entire programming community. See More

Top Pro

Recommendation for every programming language/framework/library

You can find Python as well as Jenkins. See More

Top Pro

Nice filters

Free, Video, Book, Beginner, Advanced, etc. See More

18 0

Treehouse

Top Pro

Great instructors

The course formats are flexible enough that instructors are able to employ their own styles so long as exercises are offered in consistent intervals and student progress is measurable. The instructors communicate very clearly and are very approachable. See More

Top Con

Credit card required to sign up for the free trial

Treehouse offers a free 14-day trial, but requires a credit card to sign up. See More

Top Pro

Great material presentation, instruction, and visualization

Their animations and screenshares supplement the instruction, giving a really good all-around learning experience. See More

Top Con

The quality is inconsistent among courses

Treehouse has multiple teachers in order to provide such a variety of content. However there is a lack of consistency with teaching styles - Some courses provide content that is well explained and goes at a reasonable pace. Other courses can be quite hard to follow. The challenges are also inconsistent - Some are too easy and don't reinforce much of the material learned. See More

Top Pro

Learning tracks

Trying to figure out what language or tool to learn can be frustrating. TreeHouse groups their courses into learning tracks so you have more guidance, based on what type of development you want to do. Some of the tracks they offer: Web Design, Front-end Development, Full-Stack Javascript, and PHP Development (see the list here). See More

Top Con

Regular participation is essential

This is not a good place to skip ahead and work backwards from a specific need. In fact, even skipping sections you have mastery in can be risky since the condensed material relies heavily on past examples. See More

Top Pro

Best beginner's option

Materials are very well made and it'll get you started with the technology as fast as possible. Haven't found tutorials that well made and understandable. Nothing is skipped or assumed without reference to courses within that were recommended to you earlier. This makes the site an efficient review resource if you ever forget a basic concept. See More

Top Con

Way too expensive compared with other options

Most advanced materials are locked away as "Pro/Bonus." See More

Top Pro

Project-based learning

Soup to Bits videos show you how to build an app step by step in real time. Each is short and digestible yet illustrates many relevant new concepts. See More

Top Con

Charges your credit card before the free trial expires

The Treehouse offers a free trial period, which is nice on the one hand. On the other hand you still need to register a payment method to be able to use it. And what's even worse, if you cancel the paid subscription before the FREE trial ends, you loose any access to free trial! So you will then have to pay a subscription fee to renew the access to the free course even though you SHOULD have some trial period left. That is absolutely unacceptable these days and smells as quite a shady business practice. See More

Top Pro

New material added freqently

TreeHouse releases multiple new courses every month on various different topics. They do an excellent job of keeping pace with a changing industry. For example, they released courses on Swift not long after Swift was released. See More

Top Con

Has become very buggy/unreliable

The number of bugs has gradually been increasing to the point where the platform may be more frustrating than beneficial for some users (as of October 2016). The engineers seem to be doing their best to stay on top of things, but bugs appear to be occurring faster than they can fix them. Some bugs require you to refresh the page (often multiple times) before getting the information correctly displayed. UI elements jump around, some features on the site are broken. See More

Top Pro

Build projects as you learn

Most TreeHouse courses allow you to build interesting real-world projects that make for a fun way to learn how to apply what you've learned (such as apps, websites, UI elements and more). See More

Top Con

The forum lacks conversation/engagement

TreeHouse provides a a forum for students to have discussions. However almost all posts are students looking for answers to the quizzes and challenges. Any attempts at general discussions about business, learning, programming, job seeking etc. tend to go without replies. See More

Top Pro

Forum

If you're stuck with an task you can easily get help on their forum. Most topics are visited by hundreds of students per day and responses are often returned within minutes if not seconds. In case your question cannot be answered by the imminent community, they can be pushed to recommended members or staff experts for prompt responses. See More

Top Con

Not an in-depth resource

Most Treehouse courses are geared towards beginners, making it necessary to use other resources in order to gain a deeper understanding of the language you're learning. See More

Top Pro

iOS and Android app

Treeehouse provides an app for both iOS and Android that is easy to use. See More

Top Pro

Portfolio

You can share courses that you successfully completed when you're applying for a job. Probably after completing course you have a solid understanding in given technology. See More

Top Pro

Motivates Students

The community is very supportive and the company convincingly more interested in your positive referral than in your subscription, though both is obviously preferred. Besides recognition and gamification, your timely progress is actively encouraged. There are even employer monitored sections with suggestions of how to meet career goals with related skills. See More

Top Pro

Workspaces

You don't have to install anything to your computer and can learn from anywhere using their Workspaces. The effectiveness of this tool cannot be overstated. Even though instructors often preface courses with installation guides to setup popular environments the Workspaces allow you to jump right in, mimic the examples, work on your project, experiment with tangent thoughts, or even complete parallel courses simultaneously, within separate Workspace instances. Execution is very fast and space is ample. See More

Top Pro

Very Effective Resource

Criticizing the lack of advanced material seems unjustified considering how consistent the paths are with the costs and transparent intentions. Advanced resources are usually politely introduced then passed over. See More

Top Pro

Student discount

You can get a student discount easily using their email support. See More

Specs

Languages:HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Ruby, Python, PHP, Objective-C, Java, Swift

Features:Projects, quizes, video tutorials, editor, progress saver, forum

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48 14

Lynda

Top Pro

Quality and quantity

Top Con

Lacks a community

With no user forum, there is very little opportunity to engage with other students and discuss the learning material. See More

Top Pro

Video tutorials with commentaries

Top Con

iOS and Android apps are somewhat poor

Compared to the experience available on the web, the mobile apps are severely lagging behind. See More

Top Pro

Extensive

There are a lot of different languages to choose from thanks to their large offering of courses (almost 4000 total that cover various subjects). See More

Top Con

More ways to help retain the information would be helpful

More quizzes, tests and assignments to help practice and retain the presented information would be helpful. See More

Top Pro

Build as you learn

Many courses offered on Lynda take a hands-on approach, encouraging you to apply what you learn by building projects. See More

Top Pro

It's possible to get transcripts of videos

Top Pro

Videos can be watched at 2x speed

If you feel yourself getting bored with the lecture, it's possible to speed it up to get through it quicker. See More

Specs

Languages:Java, JavaScript, C++, PHP, Ruby, HTML, CSS,MySQL, Go

Features:Video tutorials, progress saver, tutorials

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41 3

exercism.io

Top Pro

Human review and feedback

Rather than merely test for code correctness, Exercism uses peer review to improve general programming techniques. Users are encouraged to comment on others' solutions, and refine their own based on feedback. See More

Top Con

Custom commandline client

Exercism requires using a CLI utility to fetch and submit exercises. This is inconvenient compared to web-only alternatives, and poses an additional barrier to entry for some users. See More

Top Pro

Practice with production tools

Unlike many code practice websites, Exercism requires the user to develop and test entirely offline, submitting only the finished code. This promotes familiarity with essential tools and workflow, not just the bare language. See More

Specs

Languages:Clojure, CoffeeScript, C++, C#, Crystal, Elixir, Java, Elm, Erlang, F#, Go, Haskell, Java, JavaScript, Kotlin, Common Lisp, Lua, Objective-C, Ocaml, Perl 5, PHP, PL/SQL, PureScript, Python, R, Racket, Ruby, Rust, Scala, Scheme, Swift, TypeScript

Features:Exercises

63 5

Code School

Top Pro

Practice the code after each video

After each video, there are a series of challenges that give you a chance to apply what you just learned. The great thing about these challenges are that they force you to think through a problem, and use the new skills to solve it. It's not just regurgitating facts; it requires some effort. See More

Top Con

Requires paying to complete courses

Although the beginning of each course is free and you can see if you are interested in pursuing it, to complete the course you must pay. See More

Top Pro

Paths for learning different skills

While you can jump into any video you like, there is also the option to follow a path for what you are wanting to learn. These give a nice direction if you are wanting to improve on a particular area and guide you into what to do next. They currently offer Ruby, Javascript, HTML/CSS, and iOS. See More

Top Con

Videos are of a tone that some people cannot stand

Top Pro

Fun and engaging teaching style

The instructors often use humour throughout the videos while letting their passion for the topic show. See More

Top Con

A bit too basic

There is not a lot of advanced content. See More

Top Pro

In-depth courses

Code School is not just for beginners to programming, but provides plenty of intermediate and advanced courses for students as their skills grow. See More

Top Pro

Videos show how to build an app in real time

Soup to Bits is a series of videos that shows a developer creating an app from scratch in real time. It's easy to pause a video and follow along with the developer. See More

Top Pro

Video tutorials

Videos give an overview of the course/lesson plan before a single line of code is written. This gives context and a general understanding of what is possible and how teaching will be approached. See More

Specs

Languages:HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Ruby, SQL, Objective-C

Features:Editor, video tutorials, progress saver, forum

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48 7

Google's Python Class

Top Pro

Good mix of theoretical and practical material

The class includes written materials, lecture videos, and lots of code exercises to practice Python coding. These materials are used within Google to introduce Python to people who have just a little programming experience. See More

Top Con

Some programming experience is required

While the courses cover the very basics of Python, basic understanding of programming is needed to start learning from Google's Python class. See More

Top Pro

Great for people with little programming experience

This is a free class for people with a little bit of programming experience who want to learn Python. See More

13 0

SoloLearn

Top Pro

Completely free

Top Con

Only the most commonly used languages are covered.

C++, Java, JavaScript, C#, Python, SQL, PHP, Swift, Ruby, JQuery, HTML, CSS. You won't find anything less common like Haskell, Erlang, Elixir, Common Lisp, Scheme, Clojure, Rust, etc. See More

Top Pro

Offline learning mode for mobile apps

Allows learning while disconnected from the net. See More

Top Con

Limited usefulness for intermediate or experienced programmers

No advanced coding challenges. Look for those on other sites like hackerrank. See More

Top Pro

Easy for beginners

Anyone can get started with this. See More

Top Pro

Share and modify others' projects

Top Pro

Browser-based code playgrounds

No software installation needed, just a modern web browser. On mobile devices though the mobile apps are highly recommended. See More

Top Pro

Excellent mobile apps available

Top Pro

Gamification

XP, levels, badges, certificates, etc. See More

Specs

Languages:C++, Java, JavaScript, C#, Python, SQL, PHP, Swift, Ruby, JQuery, HTML, CSS.

Questions throughout the course:Yes

Offline operation:Yes

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10 0

Think Python

Top Pro

Free versions available

The book is available for free in PDF and HTML formats. A hardcover version can be bought from Amazon. See More

Top Con

Some missing instructions for absolute beginners

Some exercises sometimes require taking steps that aren't explained. Some functions and commands are used without explaining their purpose. See More

Top Pro

Beginner-friendly

Think Python is a free book designed for those with no background in programming. It starts with basic concepts of programming, and is carefully designed to define all terms when they are first used and to develop each new concept in a logical progression. Larger pieces, like recursion and object-oriented programming are divided into a sequence of smaller steps and introduced over the course of several chapters. See More

4 0

Why's (Poignant) Guide to Ruby

Top Pro

Free

Available online for free. See More

Top Con

Entertainment can be distracting

Being entertained while learning is not for everyone. See More

Top Pro

Entertaining

The book includes drawings and jokes that can make the learning process more enjoyable. See More

4 0

Udacity

Top Pro

All courses are self-paced

Courses are always made available which means there is no waiting for the specific course you want to run. You can work through the courses as fast or as slow as you want. See More

Top Con

Nanodegrees are expensive

Udacity is quite expensive at $200/month if you want to do a nanodegree. See More

Top Pro

Courses taught by industry professionals

Top Pro

Offers Nanodegrees

Udacity offers a few different Nanodegrees which provide access to various different courses, project reviews and coaching support for $200/month. Current options include Front End Web Developer, Data Analyst and Android Developer. See the full list here. See More

Top Pro

Courses are easy to understand

Top Pro

Actual feedback on coding projects

You get actual feedback from developers on your code, which is useful. Yes having your sites/apps do what it is supposed to do is important, but you need feedback to learn industry standards/best practices and other gotchas that are much harder to learn on your own. See More

Specs

Languages:HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Java, Python, Swift, SQL, R

Features:Editor, progress saver, forum, video tutorials

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65 4

Code Avengers

Top Pro

Reinforces concepts through fun interactions

Code Avengers makes their material engaging and interactive, which aids with understanding and retention of the material. See More

Top Con

A little slow

It may be slow, but that's only because it's thorough. See More

Top Pro

Full of context

Explains what everything is before you must use it, unlike Codecademy, which just kind of tells you to do stuff. To figure out what everything is exactly, you must either look at the glossary or google it. See More

Top Con

Limited selection of courses

Compared to many other paid learning resources, Code avengers currently has a limited number of courses to choose from. See More

Top Pro

Wide selection of courses

Not only do they offer Python, CSS and HTML, and all the works, they offer them in context packages, where you can work on a project that utilizes one or the other. Also, there are different recommended tracks for different purposes - web designer, etc. See More

Specs

Languages:HTML / CSS / JavaScript / Python

Features:Editor / written tutorials / progress saver

13 1

The Pragmatic Studio

Top Pro

Will teach you to think like a programmer

The projects are designed in a way that allows you to visualize how OOP (object oriented programming) concepts fit together from the ground up. See More

Top Con

High cost

The course is quite expensive, with a regular price of $199 (current sale price is $149). See More

Top Pro

Awesome instructors

The instructors (Mike and Nicole Clark) have a very clear and concise teaching style. See More

3 0

CheckiO

Top Pro

Community backed solution reviews

Users can publish their solutions for different problems and other users can review the code and give their opinions on how they would have solved the problem. Sometimes, some of the most active users get their code reviewed by Guido Van Rossum (the creator of the Python language) himself. See More

Top Con

Not for absolute beginners

CheckiO does not teach syntax, instead it teaches how to solve problems using a particular programming language therefore some basic programming knowledge is required to start. See More

Top Pro

Available in multiple languages

CheckiO crowdsources translations for problems. Currently problems have been translated in 10 languages. So it's highly possible that eventually more languages will be supported. See More

Top Pro

Ability to create new challenges

New missions can be created and uploaded using GitHub. After that is done, it's suggested to CheckiO and if it fills all the requirements after being reviewed by a CheckiO team member, it's pulled into the game. See More

Top Pro

Challenges from GitHub, O'Reilly, Dropbox and Hubspot.

3 0

Coursera

Top Pro

High quality courses from well known universities

Many courses offered at Coursera are from well known universities (such as Stanford and Princeton) and instructed by their professors. Often the material taught in the Coursera courses is material from the actual university course. See More

Top Con

Courses are not always available

Courses are run on set dates, though some courses provide access to the material whether or not the course is running (however, there will be far less student activity in the forums when the course is not running). Some courses only make their material available when the course is running, so you may have to wait a long period (sometimes months) for your course to be offered. See More

Top Pro

You can audit courses for free

Top Con

You cannot take the full courses for free

While you used to be able to take courses for free and earn a statement of accomplishment, this is no longer the case. You can only audit the courses if you are not paying. Coursera makes it seem like you should also do the quizzes, but the submit button says "Upgrade to submit". See More

Top Pro

Wide selection of courses

Coursera offers over 1000 courses on a variety of different topics. Courses are offered on learning to code and specific languages, but there is also a large selection of courses that would be beneficial to someone wanting to learn more about computer science as well (algorithms, data science, computer security) and plenty others. See More

Top Pro

Courses offered in a variety of languages (with transcriptions available)

Coursera offers courses from all around the world, resulting in courses taught in English, French, Spanish, Chinese, Russian, Turkish and a long list of others. Transcriptions for a large number of languages are offered for each course. See More

Top Pro

Some courses offer a verified certificate for a fee

There is an option to earn a verified certificate as proof you completed the course (for use on LinkedIn, resumes etc.). The cost varies between courses, but is generally around $49-$60. See More

Specs

Languages:Spanish, Chinese, Korean

Features:Video tutorials, tests, forum

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37 4

Codecademy Ruby course

Top Pro

You'll come away knowing the Ruby language itself

This course teaches Ruby as a language, so you'll not be tied to a specific library or framework. See More

Top Con

Doesn't teach computer science

Maybe this is a pro for some people, but there is really no computer science taught in this course aside from the basic structure of a programming language. See More

Top Pro

Good for people completely new to programming

If you've never programmed before, you can come away from this with a better understanding of programming and the Ruby language. See More

Top Con

Teaches Ruby and nothing more

You'll come away from this course with a general knowledge on how to program in Ruby, but it won't really teach you how to create a real-world project or how such things work. See More

2 0

Styling Android

Top Pro

Actively updated

The blog is updated with a new post once a week. See More

Top Con

Not a good starting place for beginners

The blog assumes some knowledge of Android development. See More

Top Pro

Free

Available online for free. See More

2 0

The Busy Coder's Guide to Android Development

Top Pro

Covers a lot of different subjects

This is an extremely large book at around 3500 pages. The table of contents is extensive, with topics ranging from the process model to power drain and memory leaks. See More

Top Con

PDF only

The updated versions are no longer available in print, and are only available for purchase from the site in PDF. See More

Top Pro

Updated frequently

"The Busy Coder's Guide to Android Development" is frequently updated (every couple of months) to insure all information is relevant. See More

2 0

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