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General Discussion

Posted by Suleiman Leadbitter
Suleiman Leadbitter
15,805 Points

Making First Web App - Starting Questions.

I'll lay this out exactly how it is. We set a challenge for the family (me, wife and three of my sons) to build our own app. It can be on any platform using any language. Best one wins a prize.

This is as new to me as them as I have always been designing front end with even a limited knowledge in javascript. The plan was to dive straight in and see what happens.

I'm going to build a simple money accumulator web app. Ideally responsive also. So I will need a simple as possible method of storing usernames (could use Twitter auth), location and basic calculations.

If anyone could recommend something that would be great. I've looked into Ruby on Rails but that seems a bit of a steep learning curve. Node.js seems a great idea as does Meteor.

This is totally new to me so I thought I would ask for any advise on the subject from the community. Many thanks.

  • Sul

3 Answers

marsha grasett
marsha grasett
9,995 Points
marsha grasett
marsha grasett
9,995 Points

@joshlong Builder of @cheddar & @simplecast. Co-host of @happymonday. Member of @greatdiscontent.

Just launched this: Looks pretty sweet. https://executeios.com/

~m~

James Barnett
James Barnett
39,199 Points
James Barnett
James Barnett
39,199 Points

PHP probably has the least steep learning curve.

So build ...

  • programming logic in PHP
  • store the data in a MySQL database
  • An interface in HTML/CSS/JS
Adam Fichman
Adam Fichman
9,502 Points
Adam Fichman
Adam Fichman
9,502 Points

If you're looking for a quick and easy way to set up user authentication I'd check out Parse or Userbin. As for a really easy to learn way to set up an interactive interface, aside from the usual HTML/CSS, i'd check out angularJS. However, those are just suggestions for if you're trying to get up and going quickly. But if you're learning and the main goal is to learn something new, I'd plus one on what James Barnett said. PHP is a pretty easy language to get started with and there's no better way to learn than to dive in and start building.