{the jump}

For the love of tech...

In the beginning

  • Tech itself began 1000s of years ago, with abacuses, etc.
  • By the time we reach modern times we'd moved to trying to automate this process with more modern materials and methods (See Douglas Crockford's AMAZING talk!)
  • In the last century, with the harnessing of electricity and its efficient distribution we moved to the creation of the first computers as we know them:
    • They were the size of a room!
    • They were not cheap!
    • Media was very physical (Tape reels, etc.)
  • At this stage tech was for science and business purposes

In the beginning

  • In 1975 the first personal computers were sold
  • At this stage all the programs were held on the machine (as you have with Microsoft Word, etc.)
  • Given modern computer's derivation from telephony it wasn't long before people began to have the idea of linking them. 
  • Tim Berners-Lee & the internet
  • API culture (REST) - allowing people to talk to your machines. (e.g. Can I get my machine to ask twitter's machines to do something for me, like search for a tweet?)
  • The arrival of mobile (WAP to mass popularity and the iPhone)
  • Cloud infrastructure (Using other people's systems)

In the beginning

  • Programming itself was difficult. At it's best it might look like this (short code for the UNIVAC1):
X3 =  (  X1 +  Y1 )  /  X1 * Y1   substitute variables
X3 03 09 X1 07 Y1 02 04 X1   Y1   substitute operators and parentheses. 
                                       Note multiplication is represented by juxtaposition.

07Y10204X1Y1                      group into 12-byte words.
0000X30309X1

Assembler (x86)

Grace Hopper

  • A brilliant woman who would not take no for an answer!
  • ​She advocated the idea of writing programs in a human language and having them transformed into something for the computer to use.  
    • ​"[She] was told very quickly that [she] couldn't do this because computers didn't understand English." Still she persisted'
    • She was a badass! (speaking as a programmer and ex-navy guy!)

Modern languages

#include <stdio.h>

int main(void)
{
    printf("hello, world\n");
}

(An example in C)

  • It's more in line with Grace's idea
  • It's still a bit intimidating though

Web languages

HTML, CSS & JavaScript

Brief History of the Internet

What we teach and why?

  • Web Timetable
  • We're in the middle of creating a python/data science/ML & AI course
  • For the future
    • Gaming
    • Dev Ops
    • Web Security

HTML

  • Markup Language
  • Tag language
  • Lets us control CONTENT 
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <title>Homepage</title>
  </head>
  <body>
    <!-- Text -->
    <h1>Hello World!!</h1>
    <p>This is mah new page!!</p>

    <!--images -->
    <img src="happy.jpg" alt="I was happy">

    <!-- links to other documents -->
    <a href="see_more.html">See More</a>

  </body>
</html>

CSS Example

  • Stands for 'Cascading Style Sheets'
  • Allows us to control Presentation 
h1 {
 color: red;
}
<!-- html fragment: for exercise only -->
<h1>My Red Heading</h1>

Let's try some!

codepen

Javascript

  • A scripting language
    • Controls BEHAVIOUR (adds intelligence to your page.)
    • Built into your browser
    • Visible with Dev tools console
    • Can be used to:
      • Manipulate parts of the page
      • Call server for data (AJAX)
    • How big an ecosystem?
//Create your own pop-up

// In your console (right-click, 
// select `console` tab)type:

alert("I RAWK!!!");


//now try
document.body.innerHTML="<h1>My Heading</h1>";

We can be JEDIs!!

  • First 3 letters of your first name
  • First 2 letters of your surname
  • First 2 letters of your mum's name
  • First 3 letters of your place of birth

Copy that text and lets go to codepen

Fork this pen...

And add that code!

How far can you take code?

JS Back-End vs. Front-End Careers

  • Back-End (Server): Programming for the machine that gives you the document. May include:
    • Sending you back a document
    • Getting, processing & returning data from a database
    • Calling someone else's servers to get information
    • Keeping 'state' for your application (think: logged in/out)
  • Front-End (Client/Browser): Programming for what happens to the document when it is with the user and the user interacts with it. May include:
    • Document manipulation (show/hide)
    • Responding to clicks, hovers, etc.
    • Calling server for more information
    • Manage local resources (e.g. localStorage, etc.)
    • Local programming (Maths operations, etc.)

There's never been a better time

  • Tech is future-proof
  • It is exciting and ever changing
  • There are a variety of jobs in there, so you'll never be bored
  • Learning one language gives you the basis for the others.
    • Once you know how to program it's just syntax...

Thank You

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By James Sherry

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