What's best suited for low-tech
What's best suited for low-tech
Hi everyone,
TL;DR Completely new to coding and programming, but I want to learn enough to be able to run a home server, my own website and tinker a bit with Arduino. Is there any programming language or path that you could recommend?
I don't know if those things are related or not. I've been looking at books a bout Arduino, but it's just following instructions to do xyz, but not explanation of the basics.
About the server and website, I've wanted to try it out since I stumbled upon the Low tech magazine. Many of the projects there and the philosophy behind it speak to me, so I would like to be more knowledgeable about it and be able to do some stuff myself.
EDIT. You guys are awesome! Thank you so much for the replies. It’s so cool to see Lemmy populated with cool people willing to chat and put knowledge in common :) I might be updating this post when I get to do something about… well all the resources you gave me!
The most pragmatic answer is to learn Python.
The most pragmatic approach to that is Automate The Boring Stuff with Python which is free to read online. But it might be a little dated and you said you want to learn some basics which I take to understand as underling fundamental theory of programming which it doesn't provide.
Think Python, 3rd edition, which is also free to read online and was just updated to use Jupyter Notebooks, is a great introduction to the fundamentals of programming theory, but it is lengthier and will take more time to get to practical projects.
If you really want to get into an introduction to Computer Science theory, it would be hard to find a better introduction than A Data-Centric Introduction to Computing which is used at Brown University as well as others in their introductory Computer Science courses. It's can also be read online for free.
For website things, the MDN Web Docs hosted by Mozilla is the best resource out there.
For Linux server stuff, Linux Upskill Challenge is a wonderful resource.
Have fun!
Automate the boring stuff with Python sounds like something I would enjoy reading, even if it's a bit outdated. Mozilla's website seems a good approach for me too, since it starts from complete beginners.
I don't think I have the time to learn much about computer science theory if it's not something mandatory. Linux, on the other hand, is something I'm somewhat familiar too (I've used it a lot for uni and such as a “distraction free” OS haha) and it looks like any server that I could run on a Raspberry or similar is going to be running Linux.
Thanks for the information!
The good news is that the author has a third edition coming out with updated material. But it won't be ready until August 2024. I'm assuming you won't want to wait for that, so I suggest using the current edition to get used to the language and then going through the list of updates and differences in the blog post and "figuring out" how to do some of them on your own.
Also, the author has a book for people who finished Automate the Boring Stuff and want more guidance on good, effective practices with less focus on people with no prior knowledge of programming, Beyond the Basic Stuff with Python, is also available to read for free online.
I should mention that if you have the means, I encourage you to pay for the eBook version of these books on the publisher's website since this allows the author to continue creating updated and high quality content that's free for those who feel that $35 is a strain on their budget. If not, no worries, that's why I paid for his first edition a while back. Al is pretty active online and in the fediverse (@AlSweigart@mastodon.social) and seems like a good dude. He deserves some love, so please give him a thank you at a minimum.
This was a weirdly long reply, but I hope other people subscribed to the Learn Programming community on Programming.dev see it and find some value in it too.
Nice picks for hobbies. I'd just like to say that all of that are rabbit holes with quite some span and things to learn... Tinkering with electronics, learning how to program and webservers and sysadmin stuff like networking and services deployment.
Considering the self-hosting I'd recommend to start out with an out-of-the-box solution. Like yunohost.org or DietPI or a few others. It gets you some results and is usable in the real world without studying textbooks and larning Docker and Linux for a few weeks full-time.
With programming Arduinos and microcontrollers: Have a look at projects like MicroPython and CircuitPython. You can also install the Arduino IDE and see if you like it but programming in C is a steep learning curve. Maybe less suited as a first programming language. I can recommend the ESP32 microcontrollers. They're awesome and have wifi and you can do lots of home automation projects in addition to everything an Arduino can do.
I think neither of that is low-tech. The chips and software itself are state-of-the-art technology. From my perspective you'd need to add the "low"-aspect with some context. Make them solar-powered or host a blog on those services.
It is true that I thought it would be easier to know what learning is essential to me and not. I find myself now saving stuff for later and with loads of new stuff that I didn't even know that existed before haha So far it's fun though! I'll probably stick to python and learn a bit of HTML and CSS for now.
I think neither of that is low-tech. The chips and software itself are state-of-the-art technology. From my perspective you’d need to add the “low”-aspect with some context. Make them solar-powered or host a blog on those services.
This is something I plan on doing. Going solar is something I definitely want to do for my website and, to be honest, I want to learn more about electronics for that same reason. It would be a sin not to since I live in Spain lol
Spain? Nice. The low tech magazine is operated from Barcelona. I'm occasionally envious about the amount of sun and the temperatures in late autumn while it's cloudy and rainy here in Germany...
Yeah. I'd pick something to start with. Depending on how much you want to delve down, it's quite some amount of time you can sink into every individual field. And if you're like me and constantly try too much at the same time, you'll either get overwhelmed/disappointed from time to time because there isn't much progress. Or end up with the drawer of unfinished electronics projects we all have 🤣
But that shouldn't stop you. And that's mostly something you should keep in mind while starting out. Luckily we have tons of tutorial videos, online documentation and stuff available to us. If you start with some pre-made stuff and already existing projects it'll make it considerably easier to get some results early on.
I mean you do you. I've learned programming from textbooks and I think this is the way. At least it teaches you things properly and why you do something instead of just copying code. It takes some patience, though. I don't know what learning type you are. I think computer stuff and social degrees require a bit different ways of thinking. But it's not rocket science. Just have fun and explore. If you experience major setbacks or want to get a bit more serious, consider going to the library and get a book on Python or find one online (or a course).
Hosting stuff on your Raspberry is also rewarding. But I'd really consider starting with something pre-configured. All the sys-admin stuff (when starting from scratch) takes a good amount of knowledge with several topics, and some experience with the specific tools and frameworks. Other people might disagree but I think it's less rewarding than for example programming and you'll get a steep learning curve early on. On the other hand it's super useful to run your own internet services. And we have the projects available that make it easier.
So, happy tinkering... Keep us posted in case you start another low-tech blog coming from Spain to us. And don't let any complexity stop you 😊
Regarding home server, get yourself a Raspberry Pi. Doesnt need to be the latest one, whatever you can find. You can install linux and get yourself a webserver up and running in no time. Check out any of the selfhosting communites for more ideas. Be aware that this is not really programming, its more system administration, although the line can get blurry.
As for arduino, my advice is to hop on aliexpress, and get some ESP32 dev boards (Comes with wifi, bluetooth, and supported by arduino IDE. RP2040 also viable), and some sensors (temp, humidity, airquality, whatever, displays?). Work out how to interface the sensors with the esp32 to output the sensor values to a webpage (or some other interface). All the parts are inexpensive, so I suggest getting multiples as youll probably kill one or two when wiring them up. Youll probably need dupont jumper cables as well, and maybe access to a soldering iron, but you should be able to go a long way with dev boards.
I personally find learning by doing is going to be better than reading books and articles, but your learning style may be different.
My brother-in-law gave me a Raspberry P1, so I might be able to do something! I'll be checking those communities, thank you!
As for Arduino, I bought years ago an Arduino Super (?), but it doesn't have wifi nor bluetooth is it essential, or I could use this one? I'll have a look at those sensors. It came with a little screen, so I might be able to do some of that!
Probably because of my background I'm used to learning and understanding something before getting my hands dirty, so to speak. This might prove as a good chance to try another approach. Thank you!
No wifi is fine, my first arduino was a regular one, but I've found that its kinda limited. Making an LED blink is a bit dull. But given it has a screen, you can probably display the sensor data on it, so its probably worth starting with it? Like i said, parts are inexpensive, so upgrading later is a recompile away.
Your Arduino not having Bluetooth or WiFi is fine (obviously depending on what you want to do with it). Arduinos are for much lower level projects than PIs. Where a PI might run a webserver, an Arduino might just start and stop things based on timers.
Do you have more specific goals? Running a home server and website isn’t really programming, more sysadmin work. If you want your website to be a web app that’s a different story.
For arduino work C would be the most directly relatable. It’s a simple language but can be a bit tricky since the language itself doesn’t do much hand holding for you. Arduino does make it a bit easier though.
The C Programming Language is probably the best programming book ever written for any language.
Since I don't quite understand how all this works (in fact, my field are humanities and sociology lol) I can only talk about what I've seen surfing. A website that I could host and requires little to run sounds super fun to me and also a nice way to dip my toes in this world, although I might be wrong about that.
I recently discovered the Fediverse and matrix, and thought it would be neat to try to host my own stuff. But again, I don't know how literate you need to be to do any of that, and I'm probably a few months away from even understanding the basics.
Thanks for the reply! I'll check if I can find the book in the public libraries nearby!
All good. Learning and exploring is part of the journey! For example hosting a website can be as simple as running a program
(eg
while true ; do nc -l -p 80 -c ‘echo -e “HTTP/1.1 200 OK\n\n $(date)”’; done)or as complicated as an entire application with multiple databases and processes.
For your first goal - what do you want your website to do? Blog? A bio about yourself? Are you interested in creating the HTML or do you want to focus on getting someone else’s application (eg matrix) up and running?