At the ending of last year, I found an amazing opportunity to become a software developer, studying at a global school for remote software developers that It’s call Microverse. To apply to Microverse you need to have some basic coding knowledge in HTML, CSS and a programming language of your preference to solve some coding challenges.

At that point i had some experience coding with java and python, but I had never coded in HTML and CSS. I only had a little approach in High School using Dreamweaver to create some basic webpage using the visual design environment.

So I started my own journey to learn the basic concepts of HTML and CSS having good results and after completing successfully all the challenges I got the acceptance to enter to Microverse program .

As a result, I decided to create this guide for all the people that are in a similar situation like mine, and want some help to start their learning journey.

Development Tools

Before you start learning you need to have some basic tools before you start coding.

IDE

The first tool that you need is your IDE ( Integrated Development Environment). The IDE is a software that contains multiple tools that help the programmers to consolidate the different aspects of writing code.

There are multiples IDE’s right now, and a lot of them are free. In this case that we are going to code in HTML & CSS. I’ll recommend you to use VS Code. It’s multi-platform. It works in Linux, Mac, and Windows. And it has one of the biggest extension library with multiple tools that you can install and makes coding easier.

For examples the Live Server extension that helps you to see in your browser what you are coding in real-time without the need of refresh your web site every time you make a change.

Web Browser

Also, you are going to need a Web Browser to display your HTML projects, in this case, I’ll recommend you Google Chrome.

Knowledge Resources

They are a lot of resources to get knowledge in this digital era. You need to find what types our resources are better for you. Some people learn more using books, other people prefer videos and other people learn with dynamic activities.

In my case I found some very helpful resources for the different learning stages.

To start learning the main concepts of HTML and CSS the best tool that worked for me was the HTML and CSS courses of Code Academy. That have a very good methodology, first, they explain the main concepts with a reading section and then you practice with a simple exercise. So you can start to understand how each line works.

After you understand the main concepts I’ll recommend you to take Web Development 101 - HTML and CSS Basic Course of the Odin Project.   So you can reinforce your knowledge and build a entire web page to practice your new skills.

There are also another additional materials that you can look when you have some questions about how some element or properties work,  like this HTML Guide and this CSS Guide

I hope this guide can help you to take the first step into HTML5 & CSS3 Coding, And remember that every failure is a step to success.

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