Hi, in this video, I'll give you a review of Andrei Neagoie's academy Zero to Mastery. I've made a review of his courses before, and this time I want to show you the insights of the Zero to Mastery academy. And I want to answer your questions: is the Academy worth it? Will I get a job as a web developer after going through the courses inside the Academy? I like Andrei Nagoie because I see him as a great teacher. He explains topics in a super simple and understandable way, effectively balancing the theory and the practical work. He also succeeded in creating a great community willing to help fellow members. He posts frequent fun and rewarding activities.
So far, almost 200K students have joined the community. Here is a Discord channel for Zero to Mastery students. As you can see, there are many channels, and a lot of students live discussing all sorts of development topics, including coding and Zero to Mastery courses, job hunting, live coding, challenges, group projects, and local communities. Even ex Yugoslavia. I'm from Slovenia, so this is my crowd. But as you can see, there are communities all over the world.
Having a community is super important. It would help if you had a place where you can connect, ask questions. You will most likely be working with some of the people you meet here. So be social and help people when you feel you can. Now let me go through the courses. I'll assume you are a complete beginner, so I'll start with the beginner course.
The Complete Web Developer in 2021 This course is an introduction and an overview for a student completely new to web development. Andrei starts with the basics, like how the web works and the history of how it all started. Then you start with web basics, HTML 5, CSS. By the way I have a great video in this channel with a comprehensive overview of technologies and all the best courses to master the technologies for web developers in 2021.
You can find it here. Anyways after HTML and CSS, you start creating websites with Bootstrap and templates. You will create a landing page for a made-up startup. You will learn advanced CSS topics like CSS grid and layout. Then go to Javascript, the language of the web browsers, and to DOM manipulation.
You will learn some advanced Javascript and learn the basic commands for the Command line. You will optimize your developer environment and learn to use version control with GIT. Git is a must if you are a developer.
You will also learn npm and npm scripts and then dive into frontend frameworks. React is the most popular framework, so this is the best choice for you. You will learn how to make asynchronous requests to fetch data from the backend. And then you go to the backend. You start with an introduction to what the backend is and what a web service, an API is. Web apps communicate with API's, so this is a must know topic.
You learn the backend by doing a project. You'll be coding in node.js, which is a backend javascript. You will learn how to use the backend node.js framework called Express and use databases to store data. You will use the PostgreSQL database since it is a popular choice and a great database.
After you build an app, you will learn how to deploy it and set up production. What I like about Andrei is his motivational interaction. He also succeeded in creating a great community where members help each other.
Andrei also posts frequent activities and challenges, which are usually fun and rewarding. This course is a must-have for anyone who wants to break into Web Development. It is packed full of comprehensive instruction and includes links to extensive additional resources.
Some of you might think that this makes the course incomplete. But it's the opposite. The course cannot and should not provide all the information available. It should teach you to find the information you need by yourself since this will be your job. Your job is not web development; it is searching for the best solutions to a given problem.
The course does give you an excellent overview and an introduction to the popular technologies. The course is continually updated with information about changes in the field and the struggles actual students have experienced. The course has enough hands-on projects on different tools for web backend or frontend. The course will not give you complete knowledge about everything required by the employers, but it will show you the path to reach your destination. Be prepared to put in a lot of extra work to understand and apply what you learn within this course. There is one thing that could be better.
The exercises have a solution. It would be better if he explained while solving the exercises. But then again, some of you might then say that would be copy-paste. I really like that the Andrei delivers the lessons with energy and a positive attitude, which will keep you going. The next course I’ll review is Complete Python Developer in 2021 The course goes from Python introduction with Python basics, setting up the environment to advanced topics like object-oriented programming and functional programming, decorators, error handling, and generators. You'll learn how to create modules in Python, debug the code, deal with files, use regular expressions to search text, scrape data with Python.
The course also has a data science and machine learning introduction, but it is really a soft introduction. What I like is all the job advice he gives in his courses. If you take this course as a beginner, you certainly want to get a job, and Andrei will give you some great tips. The course is straightforward and easy to follow along. You'll get lots of useful resources and enough explanation to understand what's happening in the code, taking some detours if necessary. Andrei is a good instructor and explains everything so well that even if you have no Computer Science background, it will be fun learning how to code.
Some projects and exercises could be longer, but the course is already quite long. The last few videos might be too fast and not much into details. But of course, machine learning is a topic that would need several courses, and here is just an introduction. For machine learning, I would instead go to Coursera.
They are the best for machine learning. Python is a great and super useful language. But if you decide to stick with the web, then I would go more in-depth with Javascript. JavaScript: The Advanced Concepts Is the next course I'll review.
If, after taking The Complete Web Developer in 2021, you feel you need to upgrade your JavaScript knowledge, you are right. Mastering JavaScript at a higher level is a must, especially if you want to proceed as a frontend developer or develop in node.js. The course will give you foundations and teach you the difference between object-oriented programming and functional programming. You will learn about clojures and prototypal inheritance.
You will learn about asynchronous javascript, promises, and async / await; all you need to know to properly use asynchronous features. Then you'll learn about modules and module patterns. Your code will need proper error handling.
As a developer, you will need to know data structures. One section focuses on data structures in JavaScript, arrays, string, hash tables. In my opinion, this would still be required basic knowledge for every JavaScript developer, so going through this course is a must. I love Andrei's courses because he goes deep into the specifics of "why" something works the way it does.
This one's no different. Another fun course from ZMT is JavaScript Web Projects Where you Build 20 Projects for Your Portfolio. You will build projects with pure JavaScript, HTML5, CSS3 with all code provided. In the course, you Learn UI/UX practices to build responsive and mobile-first web applications.
You will learn asynchronous programming with AJAX, Fetch API, Promises & Async + Await You will work with Web APIs (localStorage, DOM, and more) And you’ll go more in-depth to modern CSS3 (Animations, Transitions, Variables + more) The projects you’ll build are simple apps like quote generator, joke teller, music player, bookkeeper, drag and drop app, a paint clone, pong, and more. The projects are quick, fun, and everyone teaches you some new JavaScript tricks. The course is done together with Jacinto Wong, a Senior Developer with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
He is doing the projects; you are just along for the ride. My advice would be to take some of the ideas and tips that Jacinto teaches you and build your projects with that knowledge. I recommend this course to anyone who wants to sharpen their skills in vanilla Javascript. After this course, you are ready for a frontend framework like React.
Complete React Developer in 2021 The course will start with basic concepts like components, states, components lifecycle, router, forms, and authentication. You’ll be working on e-commerce projects where you will implement all concepts you learn. Advanced topics will introduce redux. Redux is a complex topic that will take some time.
You will also learn about session storage, advanced routing, state normalization. I like the course does not teach only React related features, but it teaches you all the things you will work with as a React developer. And, yes, sooner or later, you will implement payment to one of your apps. Andrei teaches how to implement Stripe payment. After you create the app, you will learn to deploy the app to production. Then you proceed to advanced topics like an asynchronous redux, redux-saga, react hooks, context API, and GraphQl and Apollo to manipulate data.
You will learn how to add mobile support to your app and improve performance to the app. As a bonus, you’ll learn about Progressive web apps and App testing. You’ll create a Gatsby blog, which again is not a React only topic. Gatsby is a static site generator with its specifics that are not only React specifics. But Gatsby uses React. It’s still a super useful tool to learn.
Most of the course has you working on a single project, which is an excellent way to dive deeper into advanced concepts since it is close to how real-life React development is like. Andrei knows how to teach and what the IT market needs from a software programmer. But I highly recommend you do a advanced JavaScript course before doing the React course. The next course I’ll review is Complete SQL + Databases Bootcamp The course aims to teach you all SQL and Database Concepts.
After the course, you'll know the difference between SQL and NoSQL, and you'll know when to use each. You'll be able to add SQL, PostgreSQL, MySQL, Redis, Database Management/Design to your knowledge stack. You will create your own databases and use SQL to query the data. You will use real-world data to generate insights and reports using SQL. You will learn advanced SQL topics like indexes, aggregates, caching to make your database queries efficient.
You will work with SQL across multiple tables and multiple databases. Mo Binni, the instructor in the course, is a solution architect. He has worked as a consultant for the majority of his career.
In the course, you don't just learn syntax; you gain a thorough understanding of the topics. The perfect course for SQL beginners but might be a bit slow if you already have experience. He also does not cover store procedures and functions, benchmarking, and optimizations. I recommend this course for true beginners in the field. And now the The Complete Junior to Senior Web Developer Roadmap (2021) This course has lots of learning material.
Like with the ZTM course, Andrei delivers the critical and practical material for working as a full stack developer. The course has a good organization of content and a nice mix of theory and exercises. In the course, you will learn about - SSH, how it works, and how to set it up. - You'll learn about Linux Servers, Performance (everything from minimizing DOM updates to Load Balancing) Then Security, Code analysis, State Management.
And about serverless architectures with AWS Lambda. You will learn basic Typescript. And the difference between Server Side and Single Page Applications You will go deeper into Testing, containers with Docker, Sessions with JWT. Caching with Redis Advanced topics like Progressive Web Apps And Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery. These two principles are how most software companies now operate. Will you feel like a senior developer after the course? No, but you’ll have an awareness of information that may help you solve more complex problems.
This course won't make you an expert, but it will allow you to talk about technologies intelligently and give you a starting point for further exploration. The content is explained in simple words so everybody can easily understand. Andrei isn't there to teach how to code, but he gives you the right mindset and positive attitude. As with all the courses, what shines is Andrei's philosophy to life with tech. As a self-teaching developer, it is very easy to get lost and no longer see what is important. And this course gives you an outline to follow to not get lost.
Important course to check out is the Learning to Learn course Learning to learn is not a programming course, but it is a skill all developers urgently need. As a developer, you will constantly be learning. If you don’t like to learn new things, then quit this career at once, since you will feel frustrated otherwise.
Technology is changing rapidly; what was ok last year is obsolete this year. If this is frustrating for you, then find another job. If not, you need to find a way to learn effectively. This is an important aspect other courses don’t teach. The course aims to teach you the framework to achieve Mastery in any subject in the shortest amount of time. It introduces the learning strategies and techniques from over 25 world-class performers.
With the course, you will learn to choose the right topics to study to be successful without wasting your time. You will understand how the mind and brain function and use it to train your brain. The studies are backed with Neuroscience. Learning is a meta-skill to master for every developer.
You can see through the course Andrei has studied the subject and has put into practice what he teaches. Most of these techniques are known but to have them organized and explained helped put them in my long-term memory. The course takes you through principles like Pareto principle, learning vs winning the system, it teaches you how to view failures, and more… it teaches you to think about learning, It tells you why the sentence Follow your passion is not good advice.
And why you cannot trust one single person. Why avoiding risk is not a good strategy. It will give you the pillars for effective learning, back it up with science, give you the techniques to implement good habits, and invite you to life long learning.
I strongly recommend this course, even if it’s not a coding course. And now let’s go to Master the Coding Interview Master the coding interview is a great course, and I've made a review of this course in another video. I welcome you to watch it here. But in short. Andrei didn't stop with just data structures and algorithms, but he also did the non-technical part. This course is not just about teaching you about data structures and algorithms; it really is about getting a job in a big company.
And a non-technical part plays a significant role in hiring, which is as important as the technical part. The course will teach you in and out of arrays, strings, lists, queues, trees, heaps, graphs, the Big O notation... and more. Watch the complete review on this YouTube channel. Zero To Mastery has another course that focuses on interviews and job hunting. The other course is oriented to getting a job at a big company like Google, Amazon or Facebook. The bigger the company the more complex the hiring process is.
The Master the Coding Interview: Big Tech interviews course Provides Step by step guide to common questions, and the solutions onhow to solve them, optimize them, and present them during tech interviews. You will learn exactly how you need to answer difficult questions. And learnt to Use the right Data Structures and Algorithms. The course focuses heavily od data structure questions and explains all in detail. What I really miss is more in depth system design questions. It does not teach you how to think on a higher level.
He uses LeetCode to test the solution. Leetcode is the best platform to help you prepare for technical interviews. The course helps you advance so you have the relevant strategies for problem solving. It teaches you how to became efficient at solving coding problems using appropriate solutions. Yihua Zhang is teaching the class.
He has been working as a software developer for many years in Toronto. He was working for some of the largest tech companies in the world. Yihua is a self taught developer, so he fully understands the challenges and mindset you might struggle with.
His teaching style is excellent. Yihua explains the toughest of the concepts in such a way that it becomes 100x easier to understand. And here is the Complete Web & Mobile Designer in 2021 course The complete web & mobile designer course aims to teach you to build beautifully designed web and mobile projects for your customers using top companies' modern tools in 2021. It aims to give you a fantastic design portfolio customized and professionally completed by the end of the course. And help you get hired as a Designer or become a freelancer. It starts with sketching, how to find inspiration and how to stay inspired.
It will teach you what user flows are and how you can create your own. You will learn how to create sitemaps for pages and projects. It will teach you about the design process, how you go from wireframes, prototypes to feedback, and how you iterate this loop until the final product.
The course will explain the design theory, the grid, typography, colors, visual assets, and accessibility. You will learn about design patterns, mobile design, motion, and micro-interactions. I like the course because it also tackles topics like how to work with a client.
It does not help you to be an outstanding designer if you cannot work with clients. And in the end, you build your portfolio. The course is put together with Daniel Schifano. Daniel is a designer who's expertise expands across multiple design disciplines. The course is a good collection of tools and concepts. It would be great to have a more extensive section on UI design patterns and aesthetics.
The course teaches essential skills and prepares you for real-world situations. My humble opinion is that Andrei is a much better teacher than Daniel, but still, you can learn a lot from this course. I also miss having more assignments in the course. There is one course on the ZMT Academy I have not gone into deeper. It's Complete ethical Hacking. This course would take me longer to complete, and I might do it later.
With the coronavirus and complete lockdown in my country, my time is quite limited. So, I cannot tell you much about the course. The same goes for a complete Machine learning course. I will do these two courses later and maybe create a standalone review.
In this video, I wanted to focus on web development since this is my specialty. There is one more course left. Deno This is my topic. Why? Well, because I also wrote a book on Deno. I wrote a book about Deno, and you can get it on the LeanPub site. Here.
It will go great with this course. Deno is a new language created by the author of Node.js. He says he made mistakes with Node.js, and Deno is the answer.
Deno is a simple, modern, and secure runtime for JavaScript and TypeScript. Deno works in the V8 Chromium Engine and is built in Rust programming language. Deno is super new, and I would not use it for production yet.
It’s a delight if you are a developer. His strengths are security since it’s built with Rust. It explicitly takes on the role of both runtime and package manager, so no npm with Deno. What I also like about the Zero To Mastery platform are the workshops. If you are a beginner, then Getting your First Dev Job is a great resource.
It will give you great tips on how to get your first dev job. I liked his latest Future-Proof Yourself workshop. I’ve written my 5year plan along with my values.
It is a great workshop, and the timing was perfect. I was doing it in the first days of January. Great time to make goals.
Well, actually making goals and being in touch with your values and happiness factors are useful anytime in the year. I also like his ebook Principles for programmers that, in a simple form, gives guidance for any developer who wants to be great at his job and at life. The community includes a very active Discord server. As A ZMT member, you will have monthly coding challenges events, you can add yourself to a job board to be available for the recruiters.
Every month Andrei sends a monthly with resources and articles. And this is the best part of this community: having support if you need it. In Discord, you have many channels to get help, from general to dev-resources, help-me, woman in tech, lookwhatImade to remote. Then you have channels for specific courses and topics and way down here job hunting https://discord.com/channels/423464391791476747/439165703266762752. All the courses available on the platform are also available on Udemy.
Except for the workshops, like those I mention; the Get your first job workshop and Future proof yourself workshop. Both are really good. Also, in the Academy you get all courses for a monthly subscription, you don’t need to buy each.
So, what would be my final review? Is the Zero to Mastery Academy worth it? Are the courses any good? My very personal opinion is yes. The hardest thing if you are beginning is knowing what is important and whatnot. You can waste months going down a rabbit hole and learning something that is not even that relevant.
Having it all together in one place is a great plus. Just let me tell you something straight. Even if you join the Academy, it does not mean you won’t have to research on your own, and everything will come on a silver platter.
You will still research. Researching and solving problems is what developers do. That is the job you are after. The Academy will make it easier for you and give you foundations so that when you are creating your own projects, you know what to search for and know how things are connected.
If I was in your shoes and there was a sale on Udemy for $10, I would probably buy a course on Udemy. But I would not get the workshops. And if I wanted to get started right now and have all courses available for me right away, I would join the Academy. Andrei is a great instructor in both cases and will explain all web development concepts in a simple way. And more than that, he will give you the right mindset, which is even more critical.
Have a great day,
2021-02-03