shane_burkhart

I really like this idea! It has a very real world feel and I'm not sure there is another course that does what you're talking about.

I think the course is more advanced than my target audience could handle right now, but it might a nice follow up to a bigger web app course.

I'll definitely write this down as an idea for a future course. I'd like to create a series of courses that take people from zero to employable and I think that would be a nice addition. Thanks!

100% this. I learned rails with that tutorial and highly recommend it.

There are already enough barriers to overcome when getting started, I didn't want money to be an additional barrier. I have a bunch of friends that want to learn to code, but have struggled with courses that try to get technical too quickly. My goal was to create the best resource for getting from 0 to 1.

I'm always going to offer this course, and a few others, for free. Having said that, some people want to keep learning after taking these courses. I'm going to offer a paid course that builds a full web app with users, payments, git, etc. People that take the paid course will be able to build just about any web app they want. My hope is, with a little more practice, they would be able to get a job as a web developer.

Hey, love the product, but there were just a few things I needed to be a little better.

The code highlighting was a big one, but I also had issues when updating raw HTML. I would create a code block in raw HTML and then go to update it later. When I updated it, the elements that were there previously would be escaped after updating. So any time I needed to update raw HTML, I had to recopy the entire snippet since saving it would mess up what was there.

Other than that, I would've liked a little more detail for stats. I think I was trying to segment users by how much of the course they completed, but didn't find an easy way to do that.

I like the Teachable platform and I'll be making other courses in the future. I'll more than likely switch back to Teachable when the syntax highlighting gets done.

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out at shane at trysparkschool.com. Thanks!

Yeah you can definitely do that. The links don't expire.

It's sent out one lesson per day for 7 days. I used to do all in one day, but the course completion rate was significantly lower. I think people were getting overwhelmed.

Yeah long story on how I ended up here. I was using http://teachable.com, but then I decided it would be easier to use jekyll since it's good for code highlighting. I already had the homepage built in leadpages, so I used their snippet to include it on the page.

I don't like it, but I haven't had time to rewrite the page.

I don't have time right now, but I'll definitely write that down as an idea for a future course. Thanks for the recommendation!

Good catch! I updated it, thanks.

Thanks. Unfortunately, it came back with an error when I uploaded my image.

You're right. I built the page with leadpages so I figured they would do that for me. I'll have to shrink it down manually.

Thanks for the awesome recommendation and I'm glad you enjoyed the course!

Thanks! I love hearing these things. I hope you enjoy the rest of the course :)

Thanks for the comments and email! I'll be responding to your email in a few minutes.

I'm going to make another course, but not sure what it's going to be over yet. I'll be asking people that completed the Twitter clone course what they are interested in, but I'm leaning towards building a full web app (user, payments, etc).

Haha I saw some people tried to do injection attacks. That's pretty great. We have you covered though :)

Hey I'm Shane, the creator of http://trysparkschool.com.

I really like your site and I'm glad the course helped you get it built. Keep up the good work!

Thanks I'll look into it.

I was in high school when I started CS (now a junior in college) and if there is one thing I would suggest is not to go for the internship this early. Not only is he/she going to have to settle on an ok to subpar internship because of his/her age, but he/she is also going to never have more free time than now to create some kind of business on their own. In this time, I would experiment with different business ideas and try to start something awesome. Something that helps people solve problems.

I love CS, but I am the type that more than anything wants to build a company and help people. I understand if he/she is not the same way, but if I would have recommend not jumping into the workforce so immediately.

The day quickly approaches where I have to make a decision to either start my own thing or get a job somewhere. A job takes a majority of your time which would really put a damper on my dream. There are stories of people doing both, but if it happened all the time, it wouldn't be a story. I'm not using that as an excuse, I am using it to bring home the point to enjoy and take advantage of the time you currently have without responsibilities.

Bottom line is have fun. Experiment with different ideas. Try to make something cool that people want. There are more than enough resources to get started. Just do it.

My family isn't quite to that level but no one really understands what I do or where I want to go. I feel like this goes for a lot of startup people. Most people don't see what we see or understand the opportunity.

One thing that I've decided is to stop worrying about what they think. Ya they are your family but don't let them dictate your life or dissuade from what you want to do. I live in Missouri, and plan on moving to SF when I graduate. No one in my family is happy about that, but it isn't going to change anything. You still love them, they still love you. They obviously are concerned about your future. That's excellent because the startup path is not an easy one and encouragement is welcome.

As far as grades go, they aren't the most important thing, but don't let them tank. Keep them manageable. They have taken a lower priority for me but I am still able to keep them to about half A's, half B's. That's fairly sufficient for anyone as long as you have a lot of side work so show for the rest of your knowledge. I can tell you I've learned more on my own than I have in any of my classes.

Overall, don't worry about your family's perception of you because it will improve and they will eventually see where this path leads. People see startups as a big failure, but simply put you fail to succeed. Just keep pursuing your passion.

Very interesting. The site is beautiful and I like what you guys are doing. Good luck to you!

I'm curious of the title of the thread. What do you mean by the job Kickstarter started?

I really like this. One thing I suggest however, is to stress why you are delivering at night. I have to go all the way to the bottom of the purpose page to find exactly why this service would be beneficial. Your homepage is beautiful but there needs to be something along the lines of "Don't miss another package" above the fold. Tell me why I want the service.

We definitely have that in the plans.

Liquid yeast is a real pain when it comes to shipping. We would have to charge a couple bucks extra just for the packaging.

I agree 15 dollars is high but shipping 10 or so pounds is about that much.

Very valid point. Do you think that offering a kit every other month would be a better solution? Or perhaps having tiers, where one would be 3 kits a year, and another 6, and so on.

Right now we can't afford to do a huge amount of bulk grain since we aren't that big. The price will come down as we grow. One thing to keep in mind is that these are extract kits, not all-grain. So they will run a little more expensive. We went with extract because it is easier and a majority of brewers are extract brewers.