

You can use Code School for free next weekend - tehwebguy
http://www.codeschool.com/free-weekend?fb_action_ids=10201128707883052&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_ref=.UZaSvvvXBpk.send&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=288381481237582

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mikenon
I was mildly interested until I read the T&C at the bottom. Not being
available to current or past users, agreeing to learn more about New Relic,
and explicitly stating no time extensions being possible came across as overly
negative for 2 days of free access.

~~~
Stratego
What you say simply isn't true. The Free Weekend is offered to all users (past
or present) as long as they don't currently have a subscription to Code
School.

Time extensions aren't stated because this is a limited-time event.

New Relic is our sponsor, in exchange with the agreement to be contacted by
them via email you obtain access to all our content for 48 hours — something
that would otherwise cost you $25. Is that really unreasonable?

~~~
mikenon
> What you say simply isn't true.

What did I say that isn't true? Negative T&C gave me pause about trying Code
School. This turned me off forever.

> The Free Weekend is offered to all users (past or present) as long as they
> don't currently have a subscription to Code School.

This is the only statement I see that differs from my interpretation of the
T&C. The line in question, "Free Weekend is not available for current or past
subscribers and is intended to allow new Code School users to sample the
benefits of a Code School education."

How common is it for a current or past user to not have a disqualifying
subscription? The wording makes it clear (intentionally or not) that the promo
is for new users.

> Is that really unreasonable?

I didn't say it was unreasonable, but that the T&C as a whole appeared to me
as overly negative for what they protect, 2 days of free content valued at
$25.

~~~
Stratego
> What did I say that isn't true?

Actually, I was wrong. The terms incorrectly stated that past subscribers
couldn't have access to the Free Weekend. That's what was untrue and has now
been fixed.

------
gales
They e-mailed me earlier today, with the message "New Relic wants to buy you a
free weekend of Code School to celebrate!" however, after typing in my e-mail
on the promo page, I was told I was not eligible! Have now added Codeschool to
my e-mail block list.

~~~
Felix21
You could have just unsubsidised. This will just do unnecessary harm to their
email delivery rates.

~~~
MisterBastahrd
Crappy business decisions deserve crappy responses. Don't advertise to your
existing customers and then tell them they're ineligible for the product you
spammed them with.

~~~
throwaway1979
Codeschool has made crappy decisions in the past. I paid for a course and
shortly after they made it free (but the free version had ads). They also
discontinued said course so I can't even watch it anymore. Yeah ... they lost
me as a customer.

------
iends
Code School is not for people who know how to program. I found their material
very basic and slow, even for things like node that I did not know at the
time. I felt like the same material could be absorbed much quicker using other
means (blogs, etc.)

~~~
Stratego
That's a rather bold statement. We've helped quite a few people with prior
programming experience learn new technologies and languages.

It's certainly possible that you're too experienced for the levels of
expertise we aim for. In that case, of course, there are surely more
appropriate resources for you out there.

------
paul9290
In April of 2011 we pitched codecademy type service at a startup weekend. It
didn't get picked as an idea to work on but after seeing reaction to
codecademy we created CodePupil and then everyone and their mom created a
codecademy clone too.

There is room for more/better, but to do these types of start-ups/concepts it
takes a ton of testing and iteration.

Good to see codeschool is still in the game, they were around prior to
codecademy.

~~~
edh649
I've tried codeacademy briefly before (Spent ~8 hours total on there). After
only 10 minutes on codeschool it feels a lot better. It seems like it's much
easier to learn it show you 'real life applications' which is one thing that I
thought codeacadmy didn't do well.

I'm definetly going to be spending some time on codeschool, seems like a great
site.

~~~
benatkin
Insightful review! What about HN? It seems you've spent about 10 minutes here.
That should qualify you to review it, right?

~~~
edh649
I can't tell if you're comment is meant to be sarcastic ('10 minutes is not
long enough to review') or not but i'm going to go with not:

I've been lurking on HN for a few months, have recently come back to it after
a month hiatus and wanted to comment on something so signed up this morning :)

I love this site, I'm usually a redditor but I find that there is much more
interesting and gripping content here whereas reddit is more of a quick laugh.
I do find that I can easily waste an hour on the front page here but I just
learn so much in that hour! I'm sure that I'll stick around and find out lots
of new stuff.

~~~
kekekekkkkk
Go back to Reddit

------
cupcake-unicorn
I've been meaning to sign up so it's a good option for me, thanks for the
link. Am I supposed to get an email now or next week? Using a throwaway email
that sometimes gets blocked, so just wondering.

~~~
Stratego
You should receive a confirmation email soon, and you'll receive a link to
access your Free Weekend next week when it starts.

------
yashodhan
How is their Node.js course? Are there comparable courses out there for
learning Nodejs from scratch?

~~~
prezjordan
I really liked it. Good introduction, but it won't offer too much if you've
worked with Nodejs in the past. It goes over the basics, some refactoring,
then introduces socket.io and redis. Their Rails courses are also quite
excellent.

------
pubby
That's great and all, but why pay for an online coding school in the first
place? The web has a ton of freely available programming learning materials.

~~~
jschuur
CodeSchool has a consistent quality, with professionally done videos. By now,
the site has enough of a reputation, that you can show around your profile
that lists what challenges and courses you've passed.

~~~
quinndupont
Doesn't the old-fashioned Lynda.com offer much better videos? At first blush,
Codeschool doesn't seem to be teaching so much as introducing. The JavaScript
lessons seem way too high-level, and way too focused on frameworks and
libraries (these are important, but only once you have the basics down).

------
nhangen
My biggest gripe about Codeschool is that they switched to 'Paths,' seemingly
to compete with Treehouse. I much preferred the prior iterations of the
product.

I'm also not fond of partnerships pitched as courses. I'm not sure if revenue
is low, or if the money offered by partners (such as New Relic and Github) is
so good that they can't resist, but I lost interest in the product after the
TryGit course.

Both Treehouse and Codeschool are decent for beginners, but even amateur
programmers will outgrow them quickly as their thirst for new knowledge
outgrows the offerings. This is one of the reasons I like paying per course
instead of per month.

If you are new to programming and want to start learning quickly, I'd
recommend paying for Peepcode, Codeschool, Treehouse, and anything else you
can get your hands on. Having access to a variety of content and styles can be
invaluable.

------
koggit
If you're looking to learn iOS and know how to write other software, skip Code
School and go to iTunes U.

[https://itunes.apple.com/us/course/coding-together-
developin...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/course/coding-together-
developing/id593208016)

~~~
Stratego
Or you could skip iTunes U and check out Try Objective-C for free right now:
<http://tryobjectivec.codeschool.com/> ;-)

------
willbill
For the people who actually sign up for this and are learning rails -- ie have
done the M. Hartl tutorial but might not have seen many projects live -- take
a look a Rails Best Practices.

Its definitely doable within a weekend.

------
nicholassmith
If you're a newbie it says, which I know I'm not so keep that in mind.

Edit: whilst saying noobs it actually just means subscribers are out, anyone
already with an account seems eligible.

~~~
Stratego
We meant "Code School newbs" as in people who haven't tried Code School
before, not programming newbies.

------
therofler
IMO, there should be a free trial period who users who sign up. At least a
day, or one premium course? But yeah, looking forward to seeing what Code
School is all about

~~~
tehwebguy
They have seven courses that are always free, mostly intro stuff but they are
worth checking out: Ruby, RoR, Objective-C, DevTools, Git, R & jQuery

<http://www.codeschool.com/courses#all>

------
cbsmith
Does anyone else find this to be a cruel kindness to geeks given that it
coincides with the release of Arrested Development Season 4?

~~~
Stratego
We didn't plan for it but it's going to make for a perfect little refreshing
break for people between courses and we're definitely going to have Netflix
playing in the office while we work to keep everything running smoothly.

I don't think this was a huge mistake. ;-)

