How to quickly but effectively become technically conversant For a non-technical entrepreneur wanting to up her technical capabilities what would you recommend? Not looking to be a programmer, but ideally learn enough to better lead and work with engineers and/or build a crappy prototype. |
If I may, there are three courses you could look into. I've only taken the last one, which is fantastic for people that don't have a CS background. You'll learn about data structures.
The other two I just came across them today.
Now, the intent of this is only to give you a general idea of the amount of information these people deal with. If you happen to be a P.M. and deal with clients, this will help you avoid making promises for x feature to be ready x day due to lacking an understanding of what must be done to get it working. And so forth... Once again, I'm just starting, so take my advice with a grain of salt.
https://class.stanford.edu/courses/Engineering/CS101/Summer2... https://www.coursera.org/learn/insidetheinternet https://www.coursera.org/course/pythonlearn
So go and find (small) problem, work out how to solve it and implement it. Then if you really want to learn: promote and sell the damn thing.
Hope this helps.
I'm far from an expert but I've been through this. I was in a very similar position to you less than a year ago and have since then gone from absolute zero technical knowledge to becoming a shitty-but-enthusiastic self-taught hacker. I'm happy to chat more specifically if you want to message me directly (first name: Linda; last name: last 4 letters in my HN username; email: firstlast@gmail).
If you already have some experience (as you mentioned in another comment) in whatever language it is, stick to that language. Find a good introductory book / tutorial that explains data structures. Whichever introductory book you find (I'm biased towards books - but each person learns a different way, whatever works for you, go with that) will teach you enough to UNDERSTAND what you are coding.
You'll learn how each line relates to the other. You'll learn how to manipulate that which you are building. How one thing relates to the other within the constraints of certain laws which were created to be able to communicate with the machine.
As you progress, you'll see how other people have already done certain things so that they won't need to repeat themselves later on. These functions, whenever available, can be used by anyone.
When you learn data structures, you can grab these functions to ease your own coding. But to be able to use them, you'll need to know how to manipulate the instructions that are contained within them.
I digress. As I mentioned earlier, I'm new at this. If I'm wrong I am wrong. If I explained stuff you already know, oh well. But it does help myself get a firmer grasp of what I may or may not know.