Even if they had known of it, few people would have recognised the significance of an event that occurred towards the end of October 1969. The occasion marked the first successful attempt to transmit a message wirelessly between two computers, more than 550 kilometres apart. The transmission relied on a new communication protocol named TCP/IP, now the basis of the massive computer network we know as the internet. Before web developer courses became widely available, websites were comparatively scarce and owned mainly by large businesses or government bodies. Today, there are close to two billion, and many of those belong to individuals.

Anyone with the confidence, patience and time, can now build a passable, though somewhat generic website, with no previous knowledge or experience. Using a graphical user interface (GUI), one can drag and drop pre-made objects and functions onto a template to form the site. On the other hand, by attending the appropriate web developer courses, you could learn how to code objects and functions to your preferred specifications and create a more unique and feature-rich online presence. 

That said, what you can do for yourself, you can do for others, so your newly-found knowledge could become the key to a profitable new career in some big brand’s marketing department. Alternatively, if you are an entrepreneur at heart, it could offer a freelancing opportunity. If you have an artistic streak and a flair for eye-catching designs, augmenting your natural talent with the technical skills learned from a web developer course could be a way to open new doors.

Worldwide, each day sees more than half a million new sites. Consequently, there is never likely to be a shortage of opportunities for anyone with a sound knowledge of hypertext markup language (HTML), cascading style sheets (CSS) and an object-oriented programming language such as Visual Basic, Java, Python or C++. If you prefer to be a player rather than a spectator, you won’t need to wait until the technikons and varsities return to normal. You can choose from a wide range of web developer courses available from Geeks4Learning as an e-learning option. 

The company’s goal is twofold, combining efforts to combat the growing problem of your unemployment while addressing the national shortage of computer skills. To further those objectives, it offers a mix of short, medium-length and longer courses. Some of these require an entrant to have some pre-existing programming knowledge, while others are open to complete beginners. All course content is both industry-aligned and internationally approved. Those who attend one of the Geeks4Learning web developer courses receive their instruction via online mentoring and webinars combined with classroom-based workshops. Continuous assessment through regular quizzes provides learners with a measure of their theoretical and practical performance.

If you are a beginner, the front-end developer course offers a good starting point. It runs over three months and aims to familiarise the learner with the basics of web page design using HTML5 and CSS3, and JavaScript programming. The coursework also covers the Angular4 framework for building web applications and TypeScript. After mastering these fundamental web developer tools, courses in Python or Java offer a way to expand your skills.