For any developer, the faster you achieve “Time to First Hello World,” the better the overall experience. Whether you are a developer just learning how to code or have 10+ years of experience, the first “Hello World” with a new API, framework, or programming language is an amazing feeling. This benchmark becomes even more important for beginners. Along with less access to help, mentorship, and other resources, just getting started can be very challenging and potentially detrimental. If beginners can achieve small wins early on, an entire world of possible projects they can code on their own opens up. In this talk, we will explore the barriers beginner (and experienced) developers face when getting started with a new API, framework, or programming language. We will also discuss strategies for better documentation, examples, and tutorials that break down these barriers and ensure success early on. Lastly, we will talk about why it is important and mutually beneficial to care about beginners using your API, framework, or programming language.

1. BREAKING DOWN BARRIERS
TO “HELLO WORLD”

2. Community Engineer at Keen IO
taylor@keen.io
@taylor_atx
TAYLOR BARNETT

3. SHORT HISTORY OF
“HELLO WORLD”

5. TRANSCENDS HISTORY

6. WHY IS IT IMPORTANT?

7. PUT SOFTWARE TO
IMMEDIATE USE

9. EARLY WINS 🙌

11. BEGINNERS HAVE LESS
ACCESS

12. BARRIERS

15. 😨
😨

16. 1. OVERWHELMING

17. “THAT’S IT.”
“JUST READ THE SOURCE CODE.”
“JUST READ THE MANUAL.”

18. 😅 IS OKAY, BUT 😓 IS NOT

19. 2. WASTED ENERGY

20. SUBLIME TEXT VS ATOM
VISUAL STUDIO VS NETBEANS VS WEBSTORM
ECLIPSE VS NETBEANS VS INTELLIJ
PYCHARM VS SUBLIME TEXT VS ATOM

21. 3. BAD DOCS

23. 4. WORKING DEVELOPMENT
ENVIRONMENT

24. STRATEGIES

25. FROM “SIX WAYS TO ACCELERATE TIME
TO FIRST ‘HELLO WORLD’”
1. Make it clear what you do
2. Offer free or trial API access
3. Fast, automated setup
4. Clear, accurate documentation
5. Copious code samples
6. Provide tools

26. 1. BETTER DOCS

27. BETTER QUICKSTART
GUIDES

28. BASICS FIRST

29. TWILIO

30. GITHUB

31. SPRING FRAMEWORK

33. WORD CHOICE

34. COMMON ERRORS

35. EXAMPLES

37. 2. MORE WORKING
PROJECTS

38. AUTH0

39. MAKE IT EASY
TO EDIT,
DEPLOY, RUN

40. 3. MORE USER TESTING

42. 4. BETTER SUPPORT

43. CHAT
EMAIL
FORUM
GITHUB
STACKOVERFLOW

45. “Code is hard.”

46. Community Engineer at Keen IO
taylor@keen.io
@taylor_atx
TAYLOR BARNETT