Blog

The list will be updated occasionally

Web Development

The Modern JavaScript Tutorial – The king of all JavaScript tutorials, which provides a strong foundation. In my opinion, this tutorial alone (along with the React.js documentation and at least some minimal TypeScript knowledge) is enough to learn JavaScript for a junior-level position with a salary starting at $2,000 per month.

React – The official React.js website is a must-read. Don’t waste time searching for other courses or videos. Or you can watch them later and be surprised: "Why to make a variable the state if its change shouldn't trigger a re-render?", "Why to mutate DOM objects directly instead of adding a state and defining how the UI should change when the state changes?", "Why to update one state based on another inside an effect if that causes an unnecessary re-render?"

developedbyed – My programming journey didn’t actually start with documentation. During the COVID quarantine, I bought Ed’s courses, "The Creative JavaScript Course" and "The Creative React and Redux Course," for about $50. I learned documentation while working on projects similar to those in his tutorials. He has an awesome imagination, and his projects seem bright and exciting. Ed even encourages students to add the projects from his course to their portfolios (though it’s probably better to at least create your own version)

Information technology

If, just like me, you came into IT without a technical background, you might find interesting the books I'm reading to catch up on this gap

Operating Systems

Lectures from the "Introduction to Operating Systems" course on YouTube (in Russian) + the textbook can be found online. It's not the easiest (and quite abstract) reading, but still not as challenging as Tanenbaum, who, although often recommended for beginners, is somehow much harder to absorb (though some knowledge still sticks eventually)

Information Security

Internet privacy and security course – some articles date back to 2016, nevertheless, this resource seems invaluable — both for understanding what security and anonymity are, and for providing motivation to study information security. It would be especially useful for those who are not very familiar with information technology, use the same password across different services, might plug a found USB drive into a computer without a second thought, or click on links from unknown senders

"Everyday Cryptography: Fundamental Principles and Applications" by Keith Martin (link to some seller on Amazon) – if you want to understand cryptography but feel lost when hearing terms like "public and private keys," "RSA algorithm," "digital signature," or "distributed ledger," then this book will give you a kind of intuitive, almost tangible grasp of these concepts, something you can rely on later as you dive deeper into the subject

"Real-World Bug Hunting: A Field Guide to Web Hacking" by Peter Yaworski (on Amazon) - – a very interesting read because it dives into practice. It becomes clear what “port sniffing” is or how “code injection” happens, and where to be especially cautious in web development – for example, when passing URL as a parameter to the server.