Probably a month or so ago I found one interesting idea. If a person wants to learn something new, they should look at different sources at the same time or one right after another. I began my Java language journey at Lynda.com but it went from simple to not so simple 🙂 really quick there. So I was looking for another source about Java that would clarify more details for me. And stumbled upon this book. So it’s kinda old school – a book. This means I had to compare my experiences from book vs from video. Mine is just like this one(see the image below). But hard copy. Loved the book and author’s approach to teaching. Was nice to learn some Java unrelated things too 🙂

So, my journey continues… This one was big and interesting and took a little while to complete. But it gave me a good boost in understanding OOP concepts. And overall Java applications structure. Definitely a good one. I can recommend this one to anybody.

Another step another cert 🙂 Way to go!

So, recently I decided to start learning Java! This sounds like a good thing to have an Automation testing skills nowadays. I do automation testing for Windows applications but this is a very specific thing. And for web automation the most common language would be Java. That’s why I chose that one.

There’s an amazing course available for Java learners at Lynda.com Here

Some completion certs earned on the way to Java Programmer!

This weekend, I discovered an e-mail from the Codeschool in my Promotions mail box, it said: Free weekend at the Codeschool. So, I decided to take this opportunity and refresh my SQL skills. I took two courses and passed them successfully.

Here are my completion badges:

Thanks to the Codeschool.com for this opportunity. I must say, those two courses were the best I’ve ever taken so far.

Direct links to those courses:

The TrySQL course and The Sequel to SQL course

I started to learn Python about a month ago, and today I asked my fellow student at BBST Foundations course if he could recommend any good books to learn Python. He’s an experienced Python programmer. So, he gave me a great list of books. I wish to keep that list for myself and share it with others:

– Effective Python (more advanced)

– Learning Python, 5th Edition – very comprehensive and deep going introduction

– Programming Python, 4th Edition

– Python Testing Cookbook (2011) – nice for testing

– Test-Driven Development with Python – also very interesting book but requires more knowledge of Python

– Testing Python – good for Unit tests, BDD and TDD programming approaches

– Learning Python the Hard Way -> http://learnpythonthehardway.org/ very fast way to get basic knowledge

– 100 Python Programming Exercises – good for practice https://github.com/zhiwehu/Python-programming-exercises/blob/master/100%2B%20Python%20challenging%20programming%20exercises.txt

– Project Euler – more practice more mathematical exercises – https://projecteuler.net/

Thanks, Patrick!