6 ms·

YouTube Channels to Level Up Your Programming Skills

267 points by spiderjako22 6y ago

KaiIrwin 6y ago
As a self tought software engineer, I have tried learning to code from YouTube videos but I really don't recommend it
- colesantiago 6y ago
  why?
  - mumblemumble 6y ago
    My main complaint with learning to code from videos is that it's really difficult to match the pace at which information is entering your head to the pace at which your head wants to absorb information. I believe (but cannot prove) that that mismatch is a major impediment to knowledge retention. With written material, by contrast, it happens so naturally that you don't even realize you're doing it. You unconsciously slow down or even re-read difficult bits, and skim over the stuff you already know. I'm also a big proponent of active reading techniques for learning new material efficiently. It's nigh impossible to scribble notes on a YouTube video. With written material, virtually anything can be converted to PDF and read on a tablet with a stylus in hand. That isn't to say that videos are useless. Lectures are great for learning things at a high level. And there are some YouTubers like 3blue1brown that make excellent use of the medium. But, unless you really just can't even with reading, even the best of them are probably still best used as supplementary rather than primary materials. I'm an avid consumer of recorded conference talks and the like, too, but I recognize that as being a form of entertainment as much as anything else.
    - libertine 6y ago
      >My main complaint with learning to code from videos is that it's really difficult to match the pace at which information is entering your head to the pace at which your head wants to absorb information. My way around this is by placing my fingers on the J, K and L keys, in case I need to go few seconds back to listen again, or pause to search more information/take notes, or resume where I was. Sometimes a 15 minutes video can be easily stretched to 40 mins/1 hour. I use this for learning code/design/guitar, and I think it works really well!
- omk 6y ago
  I think everyone has their own preference to learn but I second this recommendation. Videos work well to have a friendly face explain how things work and get interest generated, but if you intend to level up your programming skill you are better off reading code documentation and googling your way through every concept that needs explaination. Videos don't allow you to navigate away from the original learning path. I personally keep finding myself in situations where I am reading something up and want to fork out to get a good grasp on a concept being discussed. Text is your friend.
- sixQuarks 6y ago
  I’m in the same boat, I like watching videos to learn, but YouTube videos are not really comprehensive. Codingtrain youtube has some decent series, but I like buying courses on Udemy. They’re usually like $10 since there are always promotions.
- jasode 6y ago
  >, I have tried learning to code from YouTube videos but I really don't recommend it Videos can work better for learning visual UI tasks of programming. E.g. learning how to navigate visual IDEs such as Jetbrains, MS Visual Studio, Apple Xcode, Qt Creator, Amazon AWS dashboard, etc. If the above were all reduced to text-based materials, you'd end up with a bunch of static screen shots which misses the movement of the mouse and the button clicks that showed how the IDE changed from one state to the next. On the other hand... if you're primarily learning the syntax of a language or studying the Big-O properties of an algorithm, you don't need a talking head on a video to explain it. It's more efficient to just read the text.
- crispyambulance 6y ago
  I've found one YouTube-based technique that helps me sometimes. Basically, search youtube for some specific topic (eg "MediatR" b/c I'm working in .NET) Using the relevant results, create a playlist and order it with the shortest videos first, or in numerical order if some are part of a series. Then, start watching the video's. You'll get some garbage, some useful insights, and some really solid advice. Stop when you've had enough and you're at least in a better place to get on with your own work in that particular topic. Good youtube videos give you the benefit of some context and opinion around the topic. You can't get that with documentation because it typically takes too much of a "reference" approach that isn't helpful if you're just starting but need to get something done. Stackoverflow works if you got a specific question and can navigate past the smug a-holes, but it also eschews context and advice though in a different way than reference documentation. Of course, the best thing you can do is to have a kind mentor that will patiently answer your questions, or better, ask YOU questions to guide your learning. Sadly, that's not always possible.
- thebeefytaco 6y ago
  I think it depends on the task/what you're trying to learn specifically and what type of learner you are.
dudus 6y ago
Similar thread from not so long ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24374979 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24374979
geerlingguy 6y ago
In this article: 5000 words about "what is programming". Then, waaay down at the bottom, the actual list of YouTube channels. Seriously, this is worse than those recipes where you have to get through three anecdotes about cooking with grandma.
- chucky 6y ago
  Yeah, this article oozes of "we need to create content that gets eyeballs and backlinks to market our website/product", which unfortunately is all too common these days. Next time someone tries to find youtube channels for programming, they will end up on this list, rather than finding some real recommendations by real persons. The "author" of this article is even "Team Codegiant", it's a red flag when no real person wants to put their name on content. Which is especially funny since throughout the article the author refers to themselves in first person. Edit: and check out the submitter's post history. 15 submissions - all for codegiant.io: https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=spiderjako22 https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=spiderjako22
  - logicOnly 6y ago
    Team is used when the company takes credit for the work of the individual. But yeah seems like an SEO grab. Would love if Google changed their algorithm just to screw all these companies who have the resources to dedicate to SEO perfection.
- santiagobasulto 6y ago
  I came to point out the same thing. Is it just to make it look long? Or is to appeal Google/Medium algorithms?
- colmvp 6y ago
  I was just watching an old YouTube video of a couple guys throwing a giant rock off a bridge into a river in a remote part of the U.S with no one around. It was 20 seconds long. If it were produced in 2020, you'd have 10 minutes of useless preamble including discussion about how hyped they are to throw a rock, how difficult it is to carry a rock, fake drama about being followed by non-existent security, a drone shot of the environment, how awesome it was to throw a rock, and random memes. Use my promo code ROCKMAN to post your first job free on ZipRecruiter and hire your own rock thrower, and don't forget to Like this video to smash that Subscribe button!
yuanshan 6y ago
“The only way to learn a new programming language is by writing programs in it”. -- <K & R>
- VikingCoder 6y ago
  I know a guy who apparently has photographic memory. When a new programming language comes out, he buys the book, and reads it, and then he's fluent in that language. It's terrifying to watch. And the guy had no idea that's not how people do it. He saw me fiddling with a new language, and was baffled with what I was doing.
  - WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago
    To be honest, it's weird after learning 5-6 programming languages how quickly you can pick up a new language. Grab your variable declarations, inheritance support, static typign, flow control, loop forms, your variable casting, your i/o for files and the standard output for strings and you can learn any language pretty easily. Edit: String concatination if it's not Java-like (because . concatination is a thing)
    - mumblemumble 6y ago
      I'm in a similar boat; I've spent time working with such a wide range of languages that they all feel familiar to me. However, getting comfortable with a new standard library still takes me a year or two.
    - cnity 6y ago
      It sounds a little like you're just learning similar languages.
      - logicOnly 6y ago
        It really depends on the language, react native is definitely different because lots of the functions are run in-line. Programming is easy, learning the fancy tricks is the hard part.
McDev 6y ago
.
- dimgl 6y ago
  Why?
  - teddyh 6y ago
    They probably haven’t yet discovered the “favorite” link at the top of the page.
chrisgd 6y ago
I enjoy learning from videos and have paid in the past for some courses. My library has a free subscription to LinkedIn Learning (the old Lynda platform) and highly recommend it.
krapp 6y ago
My own suggestions: Game Design and Design Criticism: Design Doc https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNOVwMpD-5A1xzcQGbIHNeA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNOVwMpD-5A1xzcQGbIHNeA TB Skyen https://www.youtube.com/user/TBSkyen https://www.youtube.com/user/TBSkyen Game Development HeartBeast https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrHQNOyU1q6BFEfkNq2CYMA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrHQNOyU1q6BFEfkNq2CYMA Brackeys https://www.youtube.com/user/Brackeys https://www.youtube.com/user/Brackeys Sebastian Lague https://www.youtube.com/user/Cercopithecan https://www.youtube.com/user/Cercopithecan GDQuest https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxboW7x0jZqFdvMdCFKTMsQ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxboW7x0jZqFdvMdCFKTMsQ Javidx9 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-yuWVUplUJZvieEligKBkA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-yuWVUplUJZvieEligKBkA
jordache 6y ago
Stupid article.. complete with the stereotypical "programmer" depicted in a hoody..
Insanity 6y ago
Learning from videos never really worked for me. Plus on top of that, youtube probably has more distractions than a platform dedicated to educational videos. In my case, I just pick up a book and start coding along with it.
KIFulgore 6y ago
For those interesting in game programming, One Lone Coder is a great channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/javidx9/ https://www.youtube.com/c/javidx9/
rathereasy 6y ago
For those of you interested in programming related content, I created a series of videos that teaches the relationship between JavaScript code, stackframes and the heap: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBDAMasrPN7fPs4dfKDUh1gKbbVS7U2Qh https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBDAMasrPN7fPs4dfKDUh...
andreygrehov 6y ago
shameless plug (I'm the authour): Dynamic Programming for Beginners: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVrpF4r7WIhTT1hJqZmjP10nxsmrbRvlf https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVrpF4r7WIhTT1hJqZmjP...
asicsp 6y ago
See also: https://dev.tube/ https://dev.tube/ (DevTube is a free and open-source tech video hub as per their https://github.com/watch-devtube/contrib https://github.com/watch-devtube/contrib repo)
ethanwillis 6y ago
One thing that I think these types of channels and content don't do well is show all of the pitfalls and failures along the way. The missteps are vitally important to learning. This is also a potentially harmful side effect of newly remote teachers moving to pre-recorded lectures. When you watch a 15-30 minute video(or even an hour long video) and it's highly polished. You do learn how to go through the exact same problem they're working on. What you lose is the methodology of how they retraced their steps when they got stuck. What did they read and reason through to be able to provide their carefully worded tutorial? How did they reason through the misinformation they had in their mind or that they read online? When starting my undergraduate education I came into the program with a woefully inadequate grounding in mathematics. The calculus professor I had did at least two things right with his teaching that took me from failing algebra courses to completing really in depth 30-40 page projects several times per semester. 1. He had high expectations of those learning from him. 2. He showed his failures by working out problems he didn't work out before the class started. And critically he attached real emotion to those failures. Focusing on #2: There was nothing quite like seeing this professor get on the white board and work through a problem from first principles, explain his reasoning at each step... and then SHRIEK. He would let out a high pitched scream that I can still hear today when he'd notice an error. Then he would carefully show us him backtracking through his entire process until he found the source of error. When he'd finally find it he would circle it and let out an "aha". Then he would continue on back through the problem fixing the errors along the way. Seeing this process did several things for me as a student: It showed me that I am going to run into problems even if I have a PhD. Basic problems even. But more importantly it showcased the thought processes you need to be able to solve not just the problems you're given, but ALSO the problems you create yourself that come along with a human's fallible reasoning. So he'd give us these insane Calculus projects to work through and inevitably I'd make some mistake that would ripple through the entire project. But knowing at least he would find the source of the error, check for errors, and being given some of his intuition first hand on where the errors were sourced was infinitely valuable. Without that knowledge I surely would've gotten frustrated and just given up. Humans need both positive and negative cases in my opinion to learn effectively. Right now we're optimizing for positive cases only. Those are important, but the negative cases are also extremely important.
Swizec 6y ago
As an online coding educator, here’s my beef with online coding education: Most videos, courses, and articles you find don’t teach you much. They’re a recipe for you to follow. Do this then that then this. If you’re building exactly what the author is building, great! You’ve built it. Then comes a new problem. Or an interview question. It’s actually the same thing you just built, but you don’t have the understanding to realize that. So you look for a completely new tutorial to follow. This is a losing proposition. You’re learning a lot of recipes by rote and not understanding much. With months or years of pain, you’ll start to pick up patterns by induction. Not a great way to learn. It’s like learning to cook an italian risotto and then being flumoxxed by veggie rice. Even though they’re the same thing. Now here’s where it gets worse: It seems the market (or at least google searches) wants these rote recipes. It’s what gets you the most traffic. I don’t know that there’s a solution. It’s probably the same problem as crash diets and everyone asking for the best font to use on a VC pitch deck.
- tsumnia 6y ago
  > You’re learning a lot of recipes by rote and not understanding much. I partially disagree because that is how many technical skills are formed - cooking, music, dance, martial arts, etc. Soloway describes programming as a set of "recurring basic plans", where problem solving is break things down into actionable items [1]. Those recipes help establish your foundation of recognizing problems that allow you to pull a particular "recipe" out of your rolodex (my word for it) and apply it. I wrote a paper on simple typing exercises as an additional practice and students performed better in the course and made less mistakes in coding [2]. > With months or years of pain, you’ll start to pick up patterns by induction. This is where I agree and see the divide. After 6 months of training, I don't recognize someone as mastering the skill. You can be competent at it, but when I think about 6 months in martial art terms, those students are still very uncoordinated. I would say the issue with CS is the Problem Solving skill. THIS is what people want, but we (the educators) are not appropriately teaching it. And that doesn't mean teach it earlier persay, but that we aren't teaching it the correct way. I don't assume my approach solves the issue, but rather focus on building up students' rolodexes with a large set of recipes they can pull from. This in turn helps build a more abstract mental model [3] for students to work from. [1] https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/32/5010265/05010283.pdf https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/32/5010265/05010283.pdf [2] https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3373165.3373177 https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3373165.3373177 [3] https://telearn.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/19/73/76/PDF/Gerjets-Peter-2006.pdf https://telearn.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/19/73/76/PDF/Ge...
whalesalad 6y ago
> 19 minute read Yikes.
varshithr 6y ago
I love Gaurav Sen's approach towards teaching system design. Have been thinking about taking his paid course. Any experience HNers?
jklepatch 6y ago
I run EatTheBlocks, a youtube channel on Blockchain Development. Covers: - DeFi (Decentralized Finance) Development - Ethereum - Web3 - Truffle - Solidity smart contracts https://www.youtube.com/c/eattheblocks https://www.youtube.com/c/eattheblocks
- jcrubino 6y ago
  Great channel Julien. Great information without too much of the standardized youtube fisheye upsell and "smash that like button"
gen220 6y ago
For those of you that are seasoned, whether you're deeply-familiar with C or not, I'd recommend Antirez's walk-throughs of Redis. Episode 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBrnmciV9fM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBrnmciV9fM Watching highly-effective programmers navigate, explain, and modify code can be a career-changing experience. If you're not working in a place where these kinds of programmers accrue, you might never get the experience. Thank goodness for youtube and screen-recorders! If you're reading this, antirez: thank you for making these, they're really special!
- MiroF 6y ago
  This is great! Can we replace the original article with this, it's much higher quality than most of the ones listed and fills a gap in Youtube content I'd never been able to find (though I haven't tried recently) - that is: legitimately intermediate/advanced content.
  - gen220 6y ago
    I submitted it [1], if you'd like to discuss it there :) [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=24590896 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=24590896
  - notdang 6y ago
    The intention was to promote the blog, replacing it with a link to youtube will void the original intention.
- diehunde 6y ago
  I also recommend "Hacking with Andrew and Brad: tip.golang.org" [1]. They are part of the Go team. It's just something to watch the pros doing live coding. By the way, what's with antirez's colorscheme? I wonder if he really uses that blue background or is it just for the video. [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rZ-JorHJEY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rZ-JorHJEY
  - justin66 6y ago
DataCrayon 6y ago
If you wake up one day and decide, "I want to learn Evolutionary Algorithms with Python", then you're in luck... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee1-idlHUzg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee1-idlHUzg
semicolonandson 6y ago
Given that many readers of HackerNews have an entrepreneurial side and are therefore interested not just in software — but in the business of and marketing of software —, you might get value out of my channel. Basically my story is that is that I solo-bootstrapped a web-app and have lived from it independently for over a decade. Because of these circumstances I face no red tape in showing the code, the analytics, or the online advertising campaigns I use on screen, and this makes for a more concrete, example-filled treatment of the full gamut of what goes into running a web-based software business. So if you're an indie-hacker or software founder that does (or at least _should_ be doing) online marketing, I think you'll get something out of my story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOE_sQTyQOo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOE_sQTyQOo
- dstick 6y ago
  The link in the description of your video leads to: "The page you were looking for doesn't exist (404)."
vulcan01 6y ago
This is missing Ben Eater's channel, for learning about the lower-level parts of programming: https://www.youtube.com/user/eaterbc https://www.youtube.com/user/eaterbc
kratom_sandwich 6y ago
Currently there is a top post on /r/learnprogramming which (links to a Github which) contains a more dense list: https://old.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/iz064h/list_of_youtubers_that_teach_coding_you_may_find/ https://old.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/iz064h/li...
hswolff 6y ago
I'll humbly add myself to this list https://youtube.com/hswolff https://youtube.com/hswolff
jungletime 6y ago
I'll recommend 3 channels, from people that attack a problem until they figuring out how to solve it. The spirit of programming. Tech with Tim (Beginner) https://www.youtube.com/c/TechWithTim/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/TechWithTim/videos George Hotz (Advanced) https://www.youtube.com/c/commaaiarchive/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/commaaiarchive/videos BNT (Life Risking) https://www.youtube.com/c/BNTfullHDvideo/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/BNTfullHDvideo/videos
procd 6y ago
Just grab a book and read it, most of these channels are just a waste of time; they just keep going over the basics over and over again with long videos that could just have been a 1 minute read
iainctduncan 6y ago
Total clickbait title. I now never want to read anything from that author again.
dfxm12 6y ago
Am I the only one who thinks watching videos is an inefficient way to learn new programming techniques? There's no way to copy and it's hard to remember where a specific concept was so that you can reference it again. Sometimes, the video or audio quality is bad enough that you can't even really tell what's going on.
- disown 6y ago
  > Am I the only one who thinks watching videos is an inefficient way to learn new programming techniques? Just watching wouldn't be of help. Watching and doing will probably get you far. As for how efficient they are, it probably depends on the quality of the video and the student. > There's no way to copy and it's hard to remember where a specific concept was so that you can reference it again. That's true for books, audio, class lectures, etc. But at least with a video, you can always go back to the part your didn't understand - unlike say a class lecture. > Sometimes, the video or audio quality is bad enough that you can't even really tell what's going on. So watch better quality videos?
- appletrotter 6y ago
  The miss efficient way to learn is to use all medias available appropriately. You can integrate video lessons into habits that wouldn’t be practical in other forms.
  - andybak 6y ago
    I can't find a gap in my life that fits video. Audio maybe as I can listen while walking/driving. But video stops me multitasking, I can't skim at my own pace, the speed of information delivery is order of magnitude slower than reading and skipping back and forth is much harder than with text+images. I just honestly can't find a role for video where it's not significantly worse than reading+images (+ allowing for small, embedded video snippets for things that need to move to be understood like complex UI interactions or animations)
- mrtksn 6y ago
  Videos are great when the narrator reflects his/her thought process and adds relevant history(of how things come to that) when doing things. Articles can do it even better but can get very lengthy and people looking to quickly learn how to do something will seek short, to the point articles and missing out on significant depth. Of course just watching a video won't make you learn something but I think the situation is the same with articles. Remember school times, the articles were not that lengthy(I mean STEM of course) but to truly grasp something you would have to go over it again and again and try to solve problems by yourselves. I think the article have the advantage of extremely fast skimmability, you can even condense everything into a single page and use it as a reference because you can skim to the point in a single glance.
x87678r 6y ago
In general its tough to learn from videos, BUT its really enlightening to see demos of people's workflows, how often they test, how long it takes to compile run. Demos where people have problems, make mistakes, can't figure out why obvious things are going wrong, skippping a bunch of unit testing, hard code credentials etc. Hearing other people gave up on XYZ is reaffirming.
probotect0r 6y ago
I would find a list of good talks much more useful. For example, 'The Soul of Erlang and Elixir' talk by Sasa Juric [1] really sold me on Elixir. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvBT4XBdoUE&t=1s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvBT4XBdoUE&t=1s
- itsAWindowsSys 6y ago
  +1 for using YouTube for conference talks more than "watch me program" type videos. I love browsing through all of the Pycon [1] talks for example. It's annoying that each year is a different channel though. Oh well. There are also a lot of other great videos in the channel [2] where the talk you mentioned came from. [1] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMjMBMGt0WJQLeluw6qNJuA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMjMBMGt0WJQLeluw6qNJuA [2] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs_tLP3AiwYKwdUHpltJPuA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs_tLP3AiwYKwdUHpltJPuA
ghostDancer 6y ago
Today found another post on reddit pointing to this other list https://github.com/JoseDeFreitas/awesome-youtubers https://github.com/JoseDeFreitas/awesome-youtubers
asadawadia 6y ago
The biggest thing about learning programming from Youtube channels is that they just get something up and running. There is no talk about modularisation or testing. Everything gets dumped right into main and right into the http router handler function. Look up any video on how to build an http server in nodejs - and it is like that.
yeswecatan 6y ago
Can anyone recommend any good resources to learn DDD? I'm a visual learner, so videos or codebases with a detailed architecture plan help me the most. I have yet to come across anything other than small-ish examples.
almog 6y ago
The article is not available unless you submit to subscribing to Medium. Yes, it's free (free as in paying by feeding them with your data), but thanks, no thanks.
almog 6y ago
For anyone looking to get better in CP/algorithms, I'd highly recommend watching Algorithms Live: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBLr7ISa_YDy5qeATupf26w https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBLr7ISa_YDy5qeATupf26w
thrownaway954 6y ago
_the_ best youtube programming channel i have found is webdev simplified: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFbNIlppjAuEX4znoulh0Cw https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFbNIlppjAuEX4znoulh0Cw the dude knows his stuff and explains everything like your 5 years old which is _exactly_ what i want when viewing a tutorial site. as an example... his flexbox video is awesome https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYq5PXgSsbE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYq5PXgSsbE
drej 6y ago
If you write Python, look up Anthony Sotille (youtube, twitch, github, twitter). He does multi-hour streams as well as 10-minute explainers. Great stuff.
ransom1538 6y ago
I don't even use python. But this python expert video was absolutely amazing done by a true pro. James Powell https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKPlPJyQrt4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKPlPJyQrt4
gambler 6y ago
VPRI archives: https://www.youtube.com/user/yoshikiohshima https://www.youtube.com/user/yoshikiohshima

267 points by spiderjako22 6y ago

KaiIrwin 6y ago

As a self tought software engineer, I have tried learning to code from YouTube videos but I really don't recommend it

colesantiago 6y ago
why?
- mumblemumble 6y ago
  My main complaint with learning to code from videos is that it's really difficult to match the pace at which information is entering your head to the pace at which your head wants to absorb information. I believe (but cannot prove) that that mismatch is a major impediment to knowledge retention. With written material, by contrast, it happens so naturally that you don't even realize you're doing it. You unconsciously slow down or even re-read difficult bits, and skim over the stuff you already know. I'm also a big proponent of active reading techniques for learning new material efficiently. It's nigh impossible to scribble notes on a YouTube video. With written material, virtually anything can be converted to PDF and read on a tablet with a stylus in hand. That isn't to say that videos are useless. Lectures are great for learning things at a high level. And there are some YouTubers like 3blue1brown that make excellent use of the medium. But, unless you really just can't even with reading, even the best of them are probably still best used as supplementary rather than primary materials. I'm an avid consumer of recorded conference talks and the like, too, but I recognize that as being a form of entertainment as much as anything else.
  - libertine 6y ago
    >My main complaint with learning to code from videos is that it's really difficult to match the pace at which information is entering your head to the pace at which your head wants to absorb information. My way around this is by placing my fingers on the J, K and L keys, in case I need to go few seconds back to listen again, or pause to search more information/take notes, or resume where I was. Sometimes a 15 minutes video can be easily stretched to 40 mins/1 hour. I use this for learning code/design/guitar, and I think it works really well!
omk 6y ago
I think everyone has their own preference to learn but I second this recommendation. Videos work well to have a friendly face explain how things work and get interest generated, but if you intend to level up your programming skill you are better off reading code documentation and googling your way through every concept that needs explaination. Videos don't allow you to navigate away from the original learning path. I personally keep finding myself in situations where I am reading something up and want to fork out to get a good grasp on a concept being discussed. Text is your friend.
sixQuarks 6y ago
I’m in the same boat, I like watching videos to learn, but YouTube videos are not really comprehensive. Codingtrain youtube has some decent series, but I like buying courses on Udemy. They’re usually like $10 since there are always promotions.
jasode 6y ago
>, I have tried learning to code from YouTube videos but I really don't recommend it Videos can work better for learning visual UI tasks of programming. E.g. learning how to navigate visual IDEs such as Jetbrains, MS Visual Studio, Apple Xcode, Qt Creator, Amazon AWS dashboard, etc. If the above were all reduced to text-based materials, you'd end up with a bunch of static screen shots which misses the movement of the mouse and the button clicks that showed how the IDE changed from one state to the next. On the other hand... if you're primarily learning the syntax of a language or studying the Big-O properties of an algorithm, you don't need a talking head on a video to explain it. It's more efficient to just read the text.
crispyambulance 6y ago
I've found one YouTube-based technique that helps me sometimes. Basically, search youtube for some specific topic (eg "MediatR" b/c I'm working in .NET) Using the relevant results, create a playlist and order it with the shortest videos first, or in numerical order if some are part of a series. Then, start watching the video's. You'll get some garbage, some useful insights, and some really solid advice. Stop when you've had enough and you're at least in a better place to get on with your own work in that particular topic. Good youtube videos give you the benefit of some context and opinion around the topic. You can't get that with documentation because it typically takes too much of a "reference" approach that isn't helpful if you're just starting but need to get something done. Stackoverflow works if you got a specific question and can navigate past the smug a-holes, but it also eschews context and advice though in a different way than reference documentation. Of course, the best thing you can do is to have a kind mentor that will patiently answer your questions, or better, ask YOU questions to guide your learning. Sadly, that's not always possible.
thebeefytaco 6y ago
I think it depends on the task/what you're trying to learn specifically and what type of learner you are.

dudus 6y ago

Similar thread from not so long ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24374979 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24374979

geerlingguy 6y ago

In this article: 5000 words about "what is programming". Then, waaay down at the bottom, the actual list of YouTube channels. Seriously, this is worse than those recipes where you have to get through three anecdotes about cooking with grandma.

chucky 6y ago
Yeah, this article oozes of "we need to create content that gets eyeballs and backlinks to market our website/product", which unfortunately is all too common these days. Next time someone tries to find youtube channels for programming, they will end up on this list, rather than finding some real recommendations by real persons. The "author" of this article is even "Team Codegiant", it's a red flag when no real person wants to put their name on content. Which is especially funny since throughout the article the author refers to themselves in first person. Edit: and check out the submitter's post history. 15 submissions - all for codegiant.io: https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=spiderjako22 https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=spiderjako22
- logicOnly 6y ago
  Team is used when the company takes credit for the work of the individual. But yeah seems like an SEO grab. Would love if Google changed their algorithm just to screw all these companies who have the resources to dedicate to SEO perfection.
santiagobasulto 6y ago
I came to point out the same thing. Is it just to make it look long? Or is to appeal Google/Medium algorithms?
colmvp 6y ago
I was just watching an old YouTube video of a couple guys throwing a giant rock off a bridge into a river in a remote part of the U.S with no one around. It was 20 seconds long. If it were produced in 2020, you'd have 10 minutes of useless preamble including discussion about how hyped they are to throw a rock, how difficult it is to carry a rock, fake drama about being followed by non-existent security, a drone shot of the environment, how awesome it was to throw a rock, and random memes. Use my promo code ROCKMAN to post your first job free on ZipRecruiter and hire your own rock thrower, and don't forget to Like this video to smash that Subscribe button!

yuanshan 6y ago

“The only way to learn a new programming language is by writing programs in it”. -- <K & R>

VikingCoder 6y ago
I know a guy who apparently has photographic memory. When a new programming language comes out, he buys the book, and reads it, and then he's fluent in that language. It's terrifying to watch. And the guy had no idea that's not how people do it. He saw me fiddling with a new language, and was baffled with what I was doing.
- WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago
  To be honest, it's weird after learning 5-6 programming languages how quickly you can pick up a new language. Grab your variable declarations, inheritance support, static typign, flow control, loop forms, your variable casting, your i/o for files and the standard output for strings and you can learn any language pretty easily. Edit: String concatination if it's not Java-like (because . concatination is a thing)
  - mumblemumble 6y ago
    I'm in a similar boat; I've spent time working with such a wide range of languages that they all feel familiar to me. However, getting comfortable with a new standard library still takes me a year or two.
  - cnity 6y ago
    It sounds a little like you're just learning similar languages.
    - logicOnly 6y ago
      It really depends on the language, react native is definitely different because lots of the functions are run in-line. Programming is easy, learning the fancy tricks is the hard part.

McDev 6y ago

dimgl 6y ago
Why?
- teddyh 6y ago
  They probably haven’t yet discovered the “favorite” link at the top of the page.

chrisgd 6y ago

I enjoy learning from videos and have paid in the past for some courses. My library has a free subscription to LinkedIn Learning (the old Lynda platform) and highly recommend it.

krapp 6y ago

My own suggestions: Game Design and Design Criticism: Design Doc https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNOVwMpD-5A1xzcQGbIHNeA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNOVwMpD-5A1xzcQGbIHNeA TB Skyen https://www.youtube.com/user/TBSkyen https://www.youtube.com/user/TBSkyen Game Development HeartBeast https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrHQNOyU1q6BFEfkNq2CYMA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrHQNOyU1q6BFEfkNq2CYMA Brackeys https://www.youtube.com/user/Brackeys https://www.youtube.com/user/Brackeys Sebastian Lague https://www.youtube.com/user/Cercopithecan https://www.youtube.com/user/Cercopithecan GDQuest https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxboW7x0jZqFdvMdCFKTMsQ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxboW7x0jZqFdvMdCFKTMsQ Javidx9 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-yuWVUplUJZvieEligKBkA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-yuWVUplUJZvieEligKBkA

jordache 6y ago

Stupid article.. complete with the stereotypical "programmer" depicted in a hoody..

Insanity 6y ago

Learning from videos never really worked for me. Plus on top of that, youtube probably has more distractions than a platform dedicated to educational videos. In my case, I just pick up a book and start coding along with it.

KIFulgore 6y ago

For those interesting in game programming, One Lone Coder is a great channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/javidx9/ https://www.youtube.com/c/javidx9/

rathereasy 6y ago

For those of you interested in programming related content, I created a series of videos that teaches the relationship between JavaScript code, stackframes and the heap: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBDAMasrPN7fPs4dfKDUh1gKbbVS7U2Qh https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBDAMasrPN7fPs4dfKDUh...

andreygrehov 6y ago

shameless plug (I'm the authour): Dynamic Programming for Beginners: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVrpF4r7WIhTT1hJqZmjP10nxsmrbRvlf https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVrpF4r7WIhTT1hJqZmjP...

asicsp 6y ago

See also: https://dev.tube/ https://dev.tube/ (DevTube is a free and open-source tech video hub as per their https://github.com/watch-devtube/contrib https://github.com/watch-devtube/contrib repo)

ethanwillis 6y ago

One thing that I think these types of channels and content don't do well is show all of the pitfalls and failures along the way. The missteps are vitally important to learning. This is also a potentially harmful side effect of newly remote teachers moving to pre-recorded lectures. When you watch a 15-30 minute video(or even an hour long video) and it's highly polished. You do learn how to go through the exact same problem they're working on. What you lose is the methodology of how they retraced their steps when they got stuck. What did they read and reason through to be able to provide their carefully worded tutorial? How did they reason through the misinformation they had in their mind or that they read online? When starting my undergraduate education I came into the program with a woefully inadequate grounding in mathematics. The calculus professor I had did at least two things right with his teaching that took me from failing algebra courses to completing really in depth 30-40 page projects several times per semester. 1. He had high expectations of those learning from him. 2. He showed his failures by working out problems he didn't work out before the class started. And critically he attached real emotion to those failures. Focusing on #2: There was nothing quite like seeing this professor get on the white board and work through a problem from first principles, explain his reasoning at each step... and then SHRIEK. He would let out a high pitched scream that I can still hear today when he'd notice an error. Then he would carefully show us him backtracking through his entire process until he found the source of error. When he'd finally find it he would circle it and let out an "aha". Then he would continue on back through the problem fixing the errors along the way. Seeing this process did several things for me as a student: It showed me that I am going to run into problems even if I have a PhD. Basic problems even. But more importantly it showcased the thought processes you need to be able to solve not just the problems you're given, but ALSO the problems you create yourself that come along with a human's fallible reasoning. So he'd give us these insane Calculus projects to work through and inevitably I'd make some mistake that would ripple through the entire project. But knowing at least he would find the source of the error, check for errors, and being given some of his intuition first hand on where the errors were sourced was infinitely valuable. Without that knowledge I surely would've gotten frustrated and just given up. Humans need both positive and negative cases in my opinion to learn effectively. Right now we're optimizing for positive cases only. Those are important, but the negative cases are also extremely important.

Swizec 6y ago

As an online coding educator, here’s my beef with online coding education: Most videos, courses, and articles you find don’t teach you much. They’re a recipe for you to follow. Do this then that then this. If you’re building exactly what the author is building, great! You’ve built it. Then comes a new problem. Or an interview question. It’s actually the same thing you just built, but you don’t have the understanding to realize that. So you look for a completely new tutorial to follow. This is a losing proposition. You’re learning a lot of recipes by rote and not understanding much. With months or years of pain, you’ll start to pick up patterns by induction. Not a great way to learn. It’s like learning to cook an italian risotto and then being flumoxxed by veggie rice. Even though they’re the same thing. Now here’s where it gets worse: It seems the market (or at least google searches) wants these rote recipes. It’s what gets you the most traffic. I don’t know that there’s a solution. It’s probably the same problem as crash diets and everyone asking for the best font to use on a VC pitch deck.

tsumnia 6y ago
> You’re learning a lot of recipes by rote and not understanding much. I partially disagree because that is how many technical skills are formed - cooking, music, dance, martial arts, etc. Soloway describes programming as a set of "recurring basic plans", where problem solving is break things down into actionable items [1]. Those recipes help establish your foundation of recognizing problems that allow you to pull a particular "recipe" out of your rolodex (my word for it) and apply it. I wrote a paper on simple typing exercises as an additional practice and students performed better in the course and made less mistakes in coding [2]. > With months or years of pain, you’ll start to pick up patterns by induction. This is where I agree and see the divide. After 6 months of training, I don't recognize someone as mastering the skill. You can be competent at it, but when I think about 6 months in martial art terms, those students are still very uncoordinated. I would say the issue with CS is the Problem Solving skill. THIS is what people want, but we (the educators) are not appropriately teaching it. And that doesn't mean teach it earlier persay, but that we aren't teaching it the correct way. I don't assume my approach solves the issue, but rather focus on building up students' rolodexes with a large set of recipes they can pull from. This in turn helps build a more abstract mental model [3] for students to work from. [1] https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/32/5010265/05010283.pdf https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/32/5010265/05010283.pdf [2] https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3373165.3373177 https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3373165.3373177 [3] https://telearn.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/19/73/76/PDF/Gerjets-Peter-2006.pdf https://telearn.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/19/73/76/PDF/Ge...

whalesalad 6y ago

> 19 minute read Yikes.

varshithr 6y ago

I love Gaurav Sen's approach towards teaching system design. Have been thinking about taking his paid course. Any experience HNers?

jklepatch 6y ago

I run EatTheBlocks, a youtube channel on Blockchain Development. Covers: - DeFi (Decentralized Finance) Development - Ethereum - Web3 - Truffle - Solidity smart contracts https://www.youtube.com/c/eattheblocks https://www.youtube.com/c/eattheblocks

jcrubino 6y ago
Great channel Julien. Great information without too much of the standardized youtube fisheye upsell and "smash that like button"

gen220 6y ago

For those of you that are seasoned, whether you're deeply-familiar with C or not, I'd recommend Antirez's walk-throughs of Redis. Episode 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBrnmciV9fM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBrnmciV9fM Watching highly-effective programmers navigate, explain, and modify code can be a career-changing experience. If you're not working in a place where these kinds of programmers accrue, you might never get the experience. Thank goodness for youtube and screen-recorders! If you're reading this, antirez: thank you for making these, they're really special!

MiroF 6y ago
This is great! Can we replace the original article with this, it's much higher quality than most of the ones listed and fills a gap in Youtube content I'd never been able to find (though I haven't tried recently) - that is: legitimately intermediate/advanced content.
- gen220 6y ago
  I submitted it [1], if you'd like to discuss it there :) [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=24590896 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=24590896
- notdang 6y ago
  The intention was to promote the blog, replacing it with a link to youtube will void the original intention.
diehunde 6y ago
I also recommend "Hacking with Andrew and Brad: tip.golang.org" [1]. They are part of the Go team. It's just something to watch the pros doing live coding. By the way, what's with antirez's colorscheme? I wonder if he really uses that blue background or is it just for the video. [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rZ-JorHJEY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rZ-JorHJEY
- justin66 6y ago

DataCrayon 6y ago

If you wake up one day and decide, "I want to learn Evolutionary Algorithms with Python", then you're in luck... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee1-idlHUzg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee1-idlHUzg

semicolonandson 6y ago

Given that many readers of HackerNews have an entrepreneurial side and are therefore interested not just in software — but in the business of and marketing of software —, you might get value out of my channel. Basically my story is that is that I solo-bootstrapped a web-app and have lived from it independently for over a decade. Because of these circumstances I face no red tape in showing the code, the analytics, or the online advertising campaigns I use on screen, and this makes for a more concrete, example-filled treatment of the full gamut of what goes into running a web-based software business. So if you're an indie-hacker or software founder that does (or at least _should_ be doing) online marketing, I think you'll get something out of my story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOE_sQTyQOo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOE_sQTyQOo

dstick 6y ago
The link in the description of your video leads to: "The page you were looking for doesn't exist (404)."

vulcan01 6y ago

This is missing Ben Eater's channel, for learning about the lower-level parts of programming: https://www.youtube.com/user/eaterbc https://www.youtube.com/user/eaterbc

kratom_sandwich 6y ago

Currently there is a top post on /r/learnprogramming which (links to a Github which) contains a more dense list: https://old.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/iz064h/list_of_youtubers_that_teach_coding_you_may_find/ https://old.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/iz064h/li...

hswolff 6y ago

I'll humbly add myself to this list https://youtube.com/hswolff https://youtube.com/hswolff

jungletime 6y ago

I'll recommend 3 channels, from people that attack a problem until they figuring out how to solve it. The spirit of programming. Tech with Tim (Beginner) https://www.youtube.com/c/TechWithTim/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/TechWithTim/videos George Hotz (Advanced) https://www.youtube.com/c/commaaiarchive/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/commaaiarchive/videos BNT (Life Risking) https://www.youtube.com/c/BNTfullHDvideo/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/BNTfullHDvideo/videos

procd 6y ago

Just grab a book and read it, most of these channels are just a waste of time; they just keep going over the basics over and over again with long videos that could just have been a 1 minute read

iainctduncan 6y ago

Total clickbait title. I now never want to read anything from that author again.

dfxm12 6y ago

Am I the only one who thinks watching videos is an inefficient way to learn new programming techniques? There's no way to copy and it's hard to remember where a specific concept was so that you can reference it again. Sometimes, the video or audio quality is bad enough that you can't even really tell what's going on.

disown 6y ago
> Am I the only one who thinks watching videos is an inefficient way to learn new programming techniques? Just watching wouldn't be of help. Watching and doing will probably get you far. As for how efficient they are, it probably depends on the quality of the video and the student. > There's no way to copy and it's hard to remember where a specific concept was so that you can reference it again. That's true for books, audio, class lectures, etc. But at least with a video, you can always go back to the part your didn't understand - unlike say a class lecture. > Sometimes, the video or audio quality is bad enough that you can't even really tell what's going on. So watch better quality videos?
appletrotter 6y ago
The miss efficient way to learn is to use all medias available appropriately. You can integrate video lessons into habits that wouldn’t be practical in other forms.
- andybak 6y ago
  I can't find a gap in my life that fits video. Audio maybe as I can listen while walking/driving. But video stops me multitasking, I can't skim at my own pace, the speed of information delivery is order of magnitude slower than reading and skipping back and forth is much harder than with text+images. I just honestly can't find a role for video where it's not significantly worse than reading+images (+ allowing for small, embedded video snippets for things that need to move to be understood like complex UI interactions or animations)
mrtksn 6y ago
Videos are great when the narrator reflects his/her thought process and adds relevant history(of how things come to that) when doing things. Articles can do it even better but can get very lengthy and people looking to quickly learn how to do something will seek short, to the point articles and missing out on significant depth. Of course just watching a video won't make you learn something but I think the situation is the same with articles. Remember school times, the articles were not that lengthy(I mean STEM of course) but to truly grasp something you would have to go over it again and again and try to solve problems by yourselves. I think the article have the advantage of extremely fast skimmability, you can even condense everything into a single page and use it as a reference because you can skim to the point in a single glance.

x87678r 6y ago

In general its tough to learn from videos, BUT its really enlightening to see demos of people's workflows, how often they test, how long it takes to compile run. Demos where people have problems, make mistakes, can't figure out why obvious things are going wrong, skippping a bunch of unit testing, hard code credentials etc. Hearing other people gave up on XYZ is reaffirming.

probotect0r 6y ago

I would find a list of good talks much more useful. For example, 'The Soul of Erlang and Elixir' talk by Sasa Juric [1] really sold me on Elixir. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvBT4XBdoUE&t=1s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvBT4XBdoUE&t=1s

itsAWindowsSys 6y ago
+1 for using YouTube for conference talks more than "watch me program" type videos. I love browsing through all of the Pycon [1] talks for example. It's annoying that each year is a different channel though. Oh well. There are also a lot of other great videos in the channel [2] where the talk you mentioned came from. [1] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMjMBMGt0WJQLeluw6qNJuA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMjMBMGt0WJQLeluw6qNJuA [2] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs_tLP3AiwYKwdUHpltJPuA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs_tLP3AiwYKwdUHpltJPuA

ghostDancer 6y ago

Today found another post on reddit pointing to this other list https://github.com/JoseDeFreitas/awesome-youtubers https://github.com/JoseDeFreitas/awesome-youtubers

asadawadia 6y ago

The biggest thing about learning programming from Youtube channels is that they just get something up and running. There is no talk about modularisation or testing. Everything gets dumped right into main and right into the http router handler function. Look up any video on how to build an http server in nodejs - and it is like that.

yeswecatan 6y ago

Can anyone recommend any good resources to learn DDD? I'm a visual learner, so videos or codebases with a detailed architecture plan help me the most. I have yet to come across anything other than small-ish examples.

almog 6y ago

The article is not available unless you submit to subscribing to Medium. Yes, it's free (free as in paying by feeding them with your data), but thanks, no thanks.

almog 6y ago

For anyone looking to get better in CP/algorithms, I'd highly recommend watching Algorithms Live: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBLr7ISa_YDy5qeATupf26w https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBLr7ISa_YDy5qeATupf26w

thrownaway954 6y ago

_the_ best youtube programming channel i have found is webdev simplified: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFbNIlppjAuEX4znoulh0Cw https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFbNIlppjAuEX4znoulh0Cw the dude knows his stuff and explains everything like your 5 years old which is _exactly_ what i want when viewing a tutorial site. as an example... his flexbox video is awesome https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYq5PXgSsbE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYq5PXgSsbE

drej 6y ago

If you write Python, look up Anthony Sotille (youtube, twitch, github, twitter). He does multi-hour streams as well as 10-minute explainers. Great stuff.

ransom1538 6y ago

I don't even use python. But this python expert video was absolutely amazing done by a true pro. James Powell https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKPlPJyQrt4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKPlPJyQrt4

gambler 6y ago

VPRI archives: https://www.youtube.com/user/yoshikiohshima https://www.youtube.com/user/yoshikiohshima