Treehouse is ridiculous

Look Luqman Shah, you've been posting for the last week about how Treehouse isn't giving you a step by step guide to build specifically what you want. Nobody is going to do that unless you hire a developer and a designer to work for you and teach you as they build your specific idea.

You need to stop trying to go straight to Z and start at A. Learn HTML and CSS. PHP isn't there to teach you layout and styling, it's there to interact with servers and add functionality to your site like security and getting dates, as examples.

Go back to the very beginning, learn HTML, then CSS, then Javascript and jQuery, then MySQL, then PHP, then WordPress. Each language build upon the previous language you've learnt and the first one you need to learn is HTML.

Then look at Ruby and Android and iOS apps once you've actually learnt how to build things.

If Treehouse was so ridiculous and didn't teach anything, then how after 3 months of learning on here, have I landed a job in which I need to know HTML, CSS, jQuery, MySQL, PHP and WordPress? Because I learnt everything in the right order and built upon what I learnt with self-study.

As for saying the points thing isn't a big deal, it's a massive deal. You can't just watch the odd video and think you'll know something. You need to start at the start and complete all the challenges and quizzes so you actually learn something.

Seriously, you didn't even watch the whole video. Otherwise you would have answered the quiz, which you didn't. You still have 32 points and you're still complaining after more than a week. Why don't you watch the 4 videos in a lecture, do the 4 or 5 quizzes they have you do, and if you still don't like it, you can give a more rational (or educated) critique on what Treehouse is offering. You're seriously slacking dude. You don't even know basic HTML, which it tells you to start off with before you continue the videos, or did you skip that one? All you're doing is wasting your parents money by funding this amazing site. Get your head in the game kid.

The Simple PHP Application isent for creating a website, but to learn how to use PHP in your design. Try to look at the "Become a webdesigner" Learning adventure. They will teach you how to create designs yourself.

Luqman, based on the interactions I've seen from you on these fourms over just the last THREE days I've been viewing them, I think you'd feel more at home right here than on Treehouse. They'll do exactly what you say. This and this (business plan) are also solid choices. You seem more interested in the end product than you do in learning how to create your own end product so that you can do it again anytime you need to. If I were you, I'd take a look at those links I provided and start on the business classes that Treehouse offers. I think you'd be better off on focusing on the selling aspect of your website than the creating.

P.S. If you get pissy and temperamental every time you get frustrated, development (of any kind) isn't for you. It's not uncommon to spend several hours looking for an error that is causing your code to break. Whether it's mobile apps, web sites or desktop programs, debugging is a fact of life. I've worked with them all and it does require patience. Just my $.02.

Starting with PHP is definitely a mistake and will only lead to confusion and frustration. PHP is code to add function to your HTML and CSS that they themselves cannot do. Function is the key word here.

I am currently learning HTML and CSS (using books) simultaneously and have started to add PHP (through Treehouse) after being half-way through my HTML studies. I am building a webstore of my own at the same time as following the examples being taught. It is double the work, but it is double the experience and it is valuable. If something goes wrong with my website instead of relying on someone else to interpret and fix the code, I can do it. Every time you need a change to your website, you have to pay your programmer to do it. Having control over these issues is a huge reason to slow down and learn from the beginning what it takes to build a website. HTML is easy and you can get through it quickly!

I am also encouraging my teenage son to follow the same pattern of learning because in reality HTML and CSS go hand-in-hand and in my opinion really should be learned side-by-side. But, I am starting to see the limitations of HTML/CSS as well and that is why I decided to get into PHP sooner rather than later. Might I have to take a break and do more HTML/CSS before I continue on with PHP? Maybe, but I prefer this style of learning so I can see how everything fits together as I go rather than have to unravel unnecessary work and redo some of it in PHP.

I don't think PHP is difficult to understand at my level (although I do have experience with BASIC from years ago), I will say that I think the material is "too fast" sometimes and I have to watch the video a couple of times or so.

Hang in there, don't give up but be more patient and you can do it. Try HTML with concomitant lessons in CSS and see if you feel better about what you are learning.

If you want to learn one particular language, Treehouse isn't exactly focused on that. Have you looked into Code School or Codeacademy? They will focus much more intensively on one language.

Some people act their age, and some don't was all i meant.

The whole idea behind the t-shirt website in the PHP project is to show you some aspects of programming in general and some basic (yet very important) ways the PHP works and how it integrates with HTML and CSS. The whole website, as it is programmed in the basic project is designed in a fairly impractical way, if this was a real-world website (if that was the case, you'd need many more features, program it in more "scalable-friendly way", use database instead of nested arrays etc). However, that was not the purpose. The website as a final product is secondary. Building that website is simply used as a teaching tool for the student to grasp important programming concepts and PHP techniques. So forget whether or not you already have a website. There is no need for starting from the scratch either (the knowledge of CSS and HTML is a prerequisite). The point is to take what you learn and be able to apply it to any PHP website project.

I hate to sound mean or be negative, but after the way you responded to one of my posts and then followed it up with this one, here it goes.

Points ARE important because it shows you watched videos and completed the challenges. That is how you learn something. It is no different than school Do the activities, complete the quiz.

You have to walk before you can run.

And another thing...when people give you advice, take it and thank them. If you don't want to hear what we say, don't make posts that come across as whining.

It's simple. If you don't like treehouse, don't pay for it (or tell mom and dad to stop paying for it).

Luqman,

I'm not sure what experience you have with web technologies but understand that when something does not go well the first time or you don't understand something it's easy to get frustrated.

Just like previous comments on this thread, take it step by step. Treehouse made it easy to follow a curriculum so that you don't have kill yourself trying to figure what steps to take. If you are interested in creating PHP sites, take the Web Design Adventure and then the PHP adventure.

As you keep going through the adventure you will start getting the "AHA" moments and actually start understanding what the heck is going on on each video.

Before you complain about Treehouse, you have to give it a chance and learn things day by day. If you're unsatisfied or feel Treehouse is going too fast for you. Check out www.codecademy.com , do the HTML/CSS/Javascript course and come back when you have a better understanding.

Listen @LuqmanShash, I've been here at Treehouse for only a while and I have learned a TON ! I've actually even have been making some website for some clients, and working on a project with a Marketing Company, and I didn't know absolutely nothing about building site, if you've got a passion you will learn, try taking the Web Designer learning adventure, also you learn a lot by just making mockups, but like I said you need to start from the begging HTML and CSS and for me Treehouse has given me Great tutorials and I couldn't be any happier.

Good luck