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The 100 Rules for Being a First-Time EntrepreneurIf you Google “entrepreneur” you get a lot of mindless cliches like “Think Big!” For me, being an “entrepreneur” doesn’t mean starting the next “Faceook”. Or even starting any business at all.It means finding the challenges you have in your life, and determining creative ways to overcome those challenges. However, in this post I focus mostly on the issues that come up when you first start your company. These rules also apply if you are taking an entrepreneurial stance within a much larger company (which all employees should do).Just as good to be an “entreployee” as an “entrepreneur”. Either one will help you survive this world of increased economic uncertainty.For me, I’ve started several businesses.Maybe 17 have failed out of 20. I fail quickly. I fail frequently. Entrepreneurship is a sentence of failures punctuated by brief success.I’m invested in about 28 private companies. I’ve advised probably another 50 private companies. I’m on the board of several private companies and one public company. The companies ranging from $0 in revenues to a billion in revenues.Along the way I’ve compiled a list of rules that have helped me deal with every aspect of being an entrepreneur in business and some in life.Here’s the real rules:A)        It’s not fun. I’m not going to explain why it’s not fun. These are rules. Not theories. I don’t need to prove them.But there’s a strong chance you can hate yourself throughout the process of being an entrepreneur. Keep sharp objects and pills away during your worst moments. And you will have them. If you are an entrepreneur and agree with me, please note this in the comments below.B)        Try not to hire people. You’ll have to hire people to expand your business. But it’s a good discipline to really question if you need each and every hire.C)       Get a customer. This seems obvious. But it’s not. Get a customer before you start your business, if you can.So many people say to me, “I have an idea. Can you introduce me to VCs?”There is a HUGE gap between “idea” and “professional venture capital”.In the middle of that gap is “customer”.D)        If you are offering a service, call it a product.Oracle did it. They claimed they had a database. But if you “bought” their database they would send in a team of consultants to help you “install” the database to fit your needs.In other words, for the first several years of their existence, they claimed to have a product but they really were a consulting company. Don’t forget this story. Products are valued higher than services.And almost EVERY major software product company was a service company in the beginning. Don’t forget that.E)       It’s OK to fail. Start over. Hopefully before you run out of money. Hopefully before you take in investor money. Or, don’t worry about it. Come up with new ideas. Start over.F)         Be profitable. Try to be profitable immediately. This seems obvious but it isn’t. Try not to raise money. That money is expensive.G)        When raising money: if it’s not easy then your idea is probably incapable of raising money. If its easy, then take as much as possible. If its TOO easy, then sell your company (unless you are Twitter, etc).(if its too easy, sell your company)H)        The same goes for selling your company. If it’s not easy, then you need to build more. Then sell. To sell your company, start getting in front of your acquirers a year in advance. Send them monthly updates describing your progress. Then, when they need a company like yours, your company is the first one that comes to mind.Don’t be like that guy in the TV show “Silicon Valley”. If someone offers you ten million for a company that has no revenues, then sell it. Not everything is going to be a Facebook. And even the Google guys tried to sell their company for ONE MILLION DOLLARS to Yahoo before they were revenue positive.SELL THE COMPANY.I)          Competition is good. It turns you into a killer. It helps you judge progress. It shows that other people value the space you are in. Your competitors are also your potential acquirors.J)         Don’t use a PR firm. Except maybe as a secretary. You are the PR for your company. You are your company’s brand. You personally.I’ve never had a good PR company. I’ve had good PR secretaries. But they are cheaper. One time I hired a PR company and they accidentally sent me the contract for Terry Bradshaw. He was paying $10,000 a month. How did they do for him?K)        Communicate with everyone. Employees. Customers. Investors. All the time. Every day.Employees want to know what to do. And they want to know you are thinking of their overall career.Customers want to know how to keep their bosses calm.Investors want to be your friend and want to know they can count on you when time’s are tough.L)         Do everything for your customers. This is very important.Get them girlfriends or boyfriends. Speak at their charities. Visit their parents for Thanksgiving. Help them find other firms to meet their needs. Even introduce them to your competitors if you think a competitor can help them or if you think you are about to be fired. Always think first, “What’s going to make my customer happy?”Note: EVEN if that means introduce them to a competitor. If you are the SOURCE, then everybody comes back to the source.M)        Your customer is not a company. There’s a human there. What will make my human customer happy? Make him laugh. You want your customer to be happy.N)        Show up. Go to breakfast/lunch/dinner with customers. Treat.O)        History. Know the history of your customers in every way. Company history, personal history, marketing history, investing history, etc.P)         Micro-manage software development. Nobody knows your product better than you do. If you aren’t a technical person, learn how to be very specific in your product specification so that your programmers can’t say: “well you didn’t say that!”Q)        Hire local. You need to be able to see and talk to your programmers. Don’t outsource to India. I love India. But I won’t hire programmers from there while I’m living in the US.R)        Sleep. Don’t buy into the 20 hours a day entrepreneur myth. You need to sleep 8 hours a day to have a focused mind.If you are working 20 hours a day, then that means you have flaws in how you are managing your time. You can argue about this but it’s true.S)         Exercise. Same as above. If you are unhealthy, your product will be unhealthy.T)         Emotionally Fit. DON’T have dating problems and software development problems at the same time. VCs will smell this all over you.U)        Pray. You need to. Be grateful where you are. And pray for success. You deserve it. Pray for the success of your customers. Heck, pray for the success of your competitors. The better they do, it means the market is getting bigger. And if one of them breaks out, they can buy you.V)       Buy your employees gifts. Massages. Tickets. Whatever. I always imagined that at the end of each day my young, lesbian employees (for some reason, most employees at my first company were lesbian) would be calling their parents and their mom and dad would ask them: “Hi honey! How was your day today?” And I wanted them to be able to say: “It was the best!” Invite customers to masseuse day. W)       Treat your employees like they are your children. They need boundaries. They need to be told “no!” sometimes. And sometimes you need to hit them in the face (ha ha, just kidding). But within boundaries, let them play.X)        Don’t be greedy pricing your product. If your product is good and you price it cheap, people will buy. Then you can price upgrades, future products, and future services more expensive. Which goes along with the next rule.Y)        Distribution is everything. Branding is everything. Get your name out there, whatever it takes. The best distribution is of course word of mouth, which is why your initial pricing doesn’t matter.Write a blog about your industry and be very honest about all the flaws (even your own) that is currently in your industry.Authenticity is the best branding.Z)         Don’t kill yourself. It’s not worth it. Your employees need you.Your children or future children need you. It seems odd to include this in a post about entrepreneurship but we’re also taking about keeping it real.Most books or “rules” for entrepreneurs talk about things like “think big”, “go after your dreams”. But often dreams turn into nightmares. I’ll repeat it again. Don’t kill yourself. Call me if things get too stressful. Or more importantly, make sure you take proper medicationAA)     Give employees structure. Let each employee know how his or her path to success can be achieved. All of them will either leave you or replace you eventually. That’s OK. Give them the guidelines how that might happen. Tell them how they can get rich by working for you.BB)      Fire employees immediately. If an employee gets “the disease” he needs to be fired. If they ask for more money all the time. If they bad mouth you to other employees. If you even think they are talking behind your back, fire them.The disease has no cure. And it’s very contagious. Show no mercy. Show the employee the door. There are no second chances because the disease is incurable.I don’t say this because I want anyone to be hurt. But if you’ve followed the rules above then you are treating employees well already. NOBODY should spread the disease and badmouth you or your customers.CC)      Make friends with your landlord. If you ever have to sell your company, believe it or not, you are going to need his signature (because there’s going to be a new lease owner)DD)     Only move offices if you are so packed in that employees are sharing desks and there’s no room for people to walk.EE)      Have killer parties. But use your personal money. Not company money. Invite employees, customers, and investors. .FF)       If an employee comes to you crying, close the door or take him or her out of the building. Sit with him until it stops. Listen to what he has to say. If someone is crying then there’s been a major communication breakdown somewhere in the company. Listen to what it is and fix it. Don’t get angry at the culprit’s. Just fix the problem.(you don’t want your employees to be sad.)GG)     At Christmas, donate money to every customer’s favorite charity. But not for investors or employees.HH)     Have lunch with your competitors. Listen and try not to talk. One competitor (Bill Markel from Interactive 8) once told me a story about how the CEO of Toys R Us returned his call. He was telling me this because I never returned Bill’s calls. Ok, Bill, lesson noted.II)        Ask advice a lot. Ask your customers advice on how you can be introduced into other parts of their company. Then they will help you. Because of the next rule…JJ)        Hire your customers. Or not. But always leave open the possibility. Let it always dangle in the air between you and them. They can get rich with you. Maybe. Possibly. If they play along. So play.KK)     On any demo or delivery, do one extra surprise thing that was not expected. Always add bells and whistles that the customer didn’t pay for.This is such an easy way to over deliver I’m surprised people don’t do it 100% of the time. They do it maybe 1% of the time. So this is an easy way to compete and surprise and delight.LL)      Understand the demographic changes that are changing the world. Where are marketing dollars flowing and can you be in the middle. What services do aging baby boomers need? Is the world running out of clean water? Are newspapers going to survive? Etc. Etc. Read every day to understand what is going on.LLa) Don’t go to a lot of parties or “meetups” with other entrepreneurs. Work instead while they are partying.MM)    But, going along with the above rule, don’t listen to the doom and gloomers that are hogging the TV screen trying to tell you the world is over. They just want you to be scared so they can scoop up all the money.NN)     You have no more free time. In your free time you are thinking of new ideas for customers, new ideas for services to offer, new products.OO)     You have no more free time, part 2. In your free time, think of ideas for potential customers. Then send them emails: “I have 10 ideas for you. Would really like to show them to you. I think you will be blown away. Here’s five of them right now.”OOa) Depressions, recessions, don’t matter. There’s $15 trillion in the economy. You’re allowed a piece of it:FedEx, Microsoft, HewlettPackard, and many huge companies were started in recessions or depressions. Leave economics to the academics while they leave good business to you.PP)       Talk. Tell everyone you ever knew  what your company does. Your friends will help you find clients.QQ)     Always take someone with you to a meeting. You’re bad at following up. Because you have no free time. So, if you have another employee. Let them follow up. Plus, they will like to spend time with the boss. You’re going to be a mentor.RR)      If you are consumer focused: your advertisers are your customers. But always be thinking of new services for your consumers. Each new service has to make their life better. People’s lives are better if: they become healthier, richer, or have more sex. “Health” can be broadly defined.SS)       If your customers are advertisers: find sponsorship opportunities for them that drive customers straight into their arms. These are the most lucrative ad deals (see rule above). Ad inventory is a horrible business model. Sponsorships are better. Then you are talking to your customer.TT)      No friction. The harder it is for a consumer to sign up, the less consumers you will have. No confirmation emails, sign up forms, etc. The easier the better.TTA) No fiction, part 2. If you are making a website, have as much content as you can on the front page. You don’t want people to have to click to a second or third page if you can avoid it. Stuff that first page with content. You aren’t Google. (And, 10 Unusual Things You Didn’t Know About Google)UU)     No friction, part 3. Say “yes” to any opportunity that gets you in a room with a big decision maker. Doesn’t matter if it costs you money.VV)     Sell your company two years before you sell it. Get in the offices of the potential buyers of your company and start updating them on your progress every month.  Ask their advice on a regular basis in the guise of just an “industry catch-up”WW)    If you sell your company for stock, sell the stock as soon as you can. If you are selling your company for stock it means:a.         The market is such that lots of companies are being sold for stock.b.         AND, companies are using stock to buy other companies because they value their stock less than they value cash.c.         WHICH MEANS, that when everyone’s lockup period ends, EVERYONE will be selling stock across the country. So sell yours first.XX)     Execution is a dime a dozen. If you have an idea worth pursuing, then just make it. You can build any website for cheap. Hire a programmer and make a demo. Get at least one person to sign up and use your service. If you want to make Facebook pages for plumbers, find one plumber who will give you $10 to make his Facebook page. Just do it.Fail quickly. Good ideas are HARD. It’s execution that is a dime a dozen.YY)     Don’t use a PR firm, part II. Set up a blog. Tell your personal stories (see “33 tips to being a better writer” ). Let the customer know you are human, approachable, and have a real vision as to why they need to use you. Become the voice for your industry, the advocate for your products. If you make skin care products, tell your customers every day how they can be even more beautiful than they currently are and have more sex than they are currently getting. Blog your way to PR success. Be honest and bloody.ZZ)      Don’t save the world. If your product sounds too good to be true, then you are a liar.ZZa) Your company is always for sale.AAA)  Frame the first check. I’m staring at mine right now.BBB)   No free time, part 3. Pick a random customer. Find five ideas for them that have nothing to do with your business. Call them and say, “I’ve been thinking about you. Have you tried this?”CCC)   No resale deals. Nobody cares about reselling your service. Those are always bad deals.DDD)   Your lawyer or accountant is not going to introduce you to any of their other clients. Those meetings are always a waste of time.EEE)    Celebrate every success. Your employees need it. They need a massage also. Get a professional masseuse in every Friday afternoon. Nobody leaves a job where there is a masseuse.FFF)     Sell your first company. I have to repeat this. Don’t take any chances. You don’t need to be Mark Zuckerberg. Sell your first company as quick as you can. You now have money in the bank and a notch on your belt. Make a billion on your next company.Note Mark Cuban’s story. Before he started Broadcast and rode it to a few billion, he sold his first software company for ten million.GGG)   Pay your employees before you pay yourself.HHH)   Give equity to get the first customer. If you have no product yet and no money, then give equity to a good partner in exchange for them being a paying customer.  Note: don’t blindly give equity. If you develop a product that someone asked for, don’t give them equity. Sell it to them. But if you want to get a big distribution partner whose funds can keep you going forever, then give equity to nail the deal.III)       Don’t worry about anyone stealing your ideas. Ideas are worthless anyway. It’s OK to steal something that’s worthless.IIIA) Follow me on twitter.Questions from ReadersQuestion: You say no free time but you also say keep emotionally fit, physically fit, etc. How do I do this if I’m constantly thinking of ideas for old and potential customers?Answer:  It’s not easy or everyone would be rich.Question: if I get really stressed about clients paying, how do I get sleep at night?Answer: medicationQuestion: how do I cold-call clients?Answer: email them. Email 40 of them. It’s OK if only 1 answers. Email 40 a day but make sure you have something of value to offer.Question: how can I find cheap programmers or designers?Answer: if you don’t know any and you want to be cheap: use Hire Freelancers & Find Freelance Jobs Online, Elance, or craigslist. But don’t hire them if they are from another country. You need to communicate with them even if it costs more money.Question: should I hire programmers?Answer: first…freelance. Then hire.Question: what if I build my product but I’m not getting customers?Answer: develop a service loosely based on your product and offer that to customers. But I hope you didn’t make a product without talking to customers to begin with?Question: I have the best idea in the world, but for it to work it requires a lot of people to already be using it. Like Twitter.Answer: if you’re not baked into the Silicon Valley ecosystem,  then find distribution and offer equity if you have to. Zuckerberg had Harvard. MySpace had the fans of all the local bands they set up with MySpace pages. I (in my own small way) had Stock Market - Business News, Market Data, Stock Analysis - TheStreet when I set up Stockpickr! Your Source for Stock Ideas. I also had 10 paying clients when i did my first successful business fulltime.Question: I just lost my biggest customer and now I have to fire people. I’ve never done this before. How do I do it?Answer:  one on meetings. Be Kind. State the facts. Say you have to let people go and that everyone is hurting but you want to keep in touch because they are a great employee. It was an honor to work with them and when business comes back you hope you can convince them come back. Then ask them if they have any questions. Your reputation and the reputation of your company are on the line here. You want to be a good guy. But you want them out of your office within 15 minutes. It’s a termination, not a negotiation. This is one reason why it’s good to start with freelancers.Question: I have a great idea. How do I attract VCs?Answer: build the product. Get a customer. Get money from customer. Get more customers. Build more services in the product. Get VC. Chances are by this point, the VCs are calling you.Question: I want to build a business day trading.Answer: bad ideaQuestion: I want to start a business but don’t know what my passion is:Answer: skip to the post: “How to be the luckiest person alive”. Do the Daily Practice. Within six months your life will be completely different.Question: I want to leave my job but I’m scared.Answer: same as above question.  The Daily Practice turns you into a healthy Idea Machine. Plus luck will flow in from every direction.Final rule: Things change. Every day. The title of this post, for instance, says “100 Rules”. But I gave about 70 rules (including the Q&A). Things change midway through. Be ready for it every day. In fact, every day figure out what you can change just slightly to shake things up and improve your product and company.Your business is not your life. When you start a business you also get a cognitive bias that makes you think your business is GREAT.Every day make sure you are not smoking crack. The most important thing is your health so you can be persistent. If you smoke crack you can die.I hope you succeed. Because I really need that smart toilet that sends my doctors text messages after doing urinalysis on my pee every day.Good luck.

People call me one, it’s on a business card, so I guess so.I have a background in the social sciences and specialized in aspects of theory and research methods that helped build the foundation of who I am as a professional now. There was little coding beyond SPSS. It took me 3 tries to pass trig. I had taken a few statistics classes in undergrad. My Excel skills included very basic formulas and on a good day I could do some very rudimentary pivot tables. Most of my work was very germane and very niche.I was accepted to two programs in grad school as a dual MA student- one in Public Relations and one in International Relations. I accepted the offer thinking that two degrees is better than one. As a dual MA student we were required to arrive during the Summer and take courses in graphic design. I quickly found that I had a knack for making very simple, minimalist designs that conveyed a lot of meaning to the end user, however, I was hoping to obtain a job in national intelligence so why on earth would I need to be able to make pretty looking things in the signNow suite? I dropped that major thinking that I would never use the skills, but in my spare time I would redo major websites, logos, brands, and publication images for fun.At the same time I would quickly master a topic area, get bored, and move on to another. Same with methodology. The traditional college sequence of math courses wasn’t working for me so I bought some econometrics, probability, and linear algebra texts on Amazon and started reading, but beyond understanding concepts and being able to complete exercises I didn’t really see much applicability in the material. I tried to take a few SQL and R courses in the early MOOC days, but never managed to complete them. Meanwhile I was a bit bored with my course work and as soon as I obtained enough subject matter expertise to reasonably turn a research project into a dissertation I would eventually dissuade myself from doing so because 4 or 5 years seemed like way too long of a time to spend making a case for an argument that very few people would read or care about.A few years passed. I got a fairly entry level job, but it required a lot of Excel knowledge. I quickly realized that every single month we were basically hand-entering financial information from one spreadsheet into another. I built some macros. Soon I realized that I could just query the same info from a few servers and return the result as my finalized spreadsheet with a little bit of SQL. In a few weeks I taught myself enough VBA, SQL, and Python to completely automate my job. I got bored since there were no more challenges and I left.At my next job I was the only “Analyst”. I had to take basic business problems and figure out how we could analyze product metrics to create value propositions for clients of all verticals. Every single A/B test, RCT, or pilot was completely different. Use cases required everything from basic statistics to Naive Bayes models. All that time switching specialities in grad school, all the research methods, and a continued interest in statistics came into play. I finally had some real life examples to use to learn R, which at the time had very few packages today such as the amazing dplyr or ggplot and no IDE such as RStudio. By the time that company disbanded I had self-started and managed enough projects to be proficient in these tools and also dusted off those old linear algebra and other math books. The guy who couldn’t understand why he needed to master math about triangles in college (3 times!)was now fairly skilled in a level of math that would have taken another three years of college to get through. I needed real life examples to learn, not hundreds of problems that emphasized monotony over inquiry.I still felt pretty incomplete. I started Googling subjects I was interested in, looking for data and diving in. Many jobs have coding challenges or tests and I would find copies of those and run through them continually. At this point I was still pretty unsure of myself because unlike many data scientists I had no background in Computer Science, my college transcript had a pretty dismal Math track record, most people seem to think that applied econometrics and statistics without a degree in either means that you weren’t good enough to get past the entry level, and finally my work history was so varied that it was hard to make a case for my skills and abilities.Much to my surprise I actually received a lot of responses for the positions I applied to. At the end of the day there is not a single skill-set that a Data Scientist must possess, but they MUST be able to obtain data from wherever it may lie, process that data so that it is usable, conduct analysis of that data, and distribute the results to their end user in an actionable way. My approach to learning data munging came in handy as I had no preference on querying language, data structure, or anything that someone with more formal experience might have. I learned what I had to get the data I needed, just like in the past. R had advanced so much since I had last learned it and Python was already a powerful tool, so I learned as I went. When I made a mistake, I Stack Overflow’d it, but I also took the time to learn what it was about what I was doing that was causing the error. I learned to write functions when my work was consistent enough to warrant doing so. I started to write C++ when I really needed to optimize my code. Oh, and those graphic design skills- they’re probably the most useful part of my job as my end users are not data wonks and need to see very complex model outputs in a very clean, understandable manner.So, I guess I’m self taught, but I don’t really see it that way. I really like finding new challenges that I know very little about initially and applying various parts of my background to create projects that combine all of my experiences. There is no way I would be close to what I am today if I didn’t have each of these disparate components. I have worked with many people that are experts in specific areas of Data Science that make my skills in that area look amateurish, but I can do the same to them in other areas as well. Our jobs are different and we apply the skills we need to succeed and use our work and challenges to become better and better.Everyone learns differently and there is no “right” way to teach yourself, but after seeing many MOOC superstars be unable to do much with their “skills” when they weren’t fed curated sample data and walked through problems, I highly recommend that people follow their intuition and internal motivation and learn based on the challenges they face in their work and are motivated to pursue. I would be extremely unhappy as just a visual designer or developer and I will never be a master of either, but I continue to improve in those areas because it makes my work better. Find a problem that interests you, tackle it with the best tools and methods to get a result, repeat!

Register and pay on the Pearson VUE website using the following steps:Step 1. Go to www.pearsonvue.com/oracle/ (you will be directed here if you click the first option from Oracle Certification page). Click on “Schedule online” in “Schedule an exam” section.Step 2. Select "Sign In." Click on “proctored” in the “what type of exam you are planning to take” section. Select this exam as "Information Technology (IT)" ä "Oracle" ä "Proctored." Then you'll be asked to sign in. Step 3. Log in to your web account on the Pearson site. If you don’t have one, create one; you will get the user name and password by the e-mail you provide. When you log in first time, you need to change your password and set security questions and their answers. When you are done with this, you’re ready to schedule your exam.Step 4. Once logged in, you'll get the list of Oracle exams to select from. Select the following exam: · For example, 1Z0-809, Java SE 8Programmer II(aka OCPJP 8 exam)These exams are in English (You can choose another language if you wish and if it is available in the list). This page will also show you the cost of the exam. Click Next.Step 5. Now you need to select your test location. Choose Country, City, State/Province, and you'll be shown test locations close to you. Each center will have an icon for information: click it for the address and directions. Select up to four centers near your location and click Next.Step 6. Select a test center and select a date and time for appointments. The page will indicate the available dates and time slots; choose the one most convenient for you. If you have an exam voucher or Oracle University coupon or Oracle promotion code, enter it here. Step 7. Select from the available payment options (the usual way is to pay using your credit card) and pay your exam fees. Make sure that you have selected the right exam, appropriate test center, and date/time before paying the fees.Step 8. Done! You will get an appointment confirmation payment receipt by e-mail. You will find useful links, articles and presentations which helps you in preparing for  OCPJP 8 exam here http://ocpjava.wordpress.com

You have to register at Pearson VUE for the Java certification exams. These are the authorized testing centers for Oracle exams across the world. You can book it online or directly go and purchase the voucher from the testing centers.How to Register and Buy a Voucher?Once you have registered for the exam, then you have to prepare for the exam. Once you have completed the exam, then only Oracle will issue the certificate.How to prepare for OCPJP Certification Exam?I hope this helps you.

My manager and her crony.[Long answer but worth it.]I don’t go anonymous so bear with me. I won't be disclosing the company name publicly. I believe building a brand takes decades, it shouldn't be maligned because of few employees.Resigning from a job is not a knee jerk reaction for any sane employee. There occurs a series of unjust treatments over which employee loses all control, which when crossed threshold one capable takes decision to move on.In jan of 2016 I joined a company in Domlur Bangalore after quitting Wipro. I chose this company over 7 offers. I took this decision after readin...

Roundup! The top 10 (mostly) free resources for learning Android app developmentLike losing weight, building muscle or learning a new language, learning to create Android apps is an ambition shared by many. Just like those other goals though, it’s also an ambition that many of us will never get around to. Partly this is because there are more pressing concerns on our radar (like watching the rest of Game of Thrones…) but partly it’s a matter of knowing where to start. Learning to develop for Android means setting up Android Studio, downloading the SDK, learning Java and more… It’s not exactly something you can just dip into! And certainly not after a hard day at work.Sometimes you just need a nudge in the right direction, or a little structure to help guide you through the process. Happily, there are a number of great resources out there that can help including several completely free, fully-fledged courses. Next time you have a free hour in the evening, try dipping into one of these and you can start building up a foundation of knowledge that will set you on track to becoming a pro developer! Here we’ll take a look at some of the best free resources available and compare these to more traditional options such as attending a college or paid course.developer.android.comThe first and the most up-to-date source you have access to is Android’s very own website. Android Developers is one of the best places for all Android related resources on the web. One of the lesser known features that it includes is a full how-to with exercises on Android app development. These cover setting up and installing your developer environment all the way through implementing Google Cloud Messaging in your app and beyond. This site contains an incredibly vast supply of information and it is fortunate that the Android team has taken the time to go into such detail at the beginner level in addition to some of the more experienced developer content. The link above will start you at the beginning, but you will likely do good to make yourself familiar with the API Guides, Reference and Samples sections to get the most out of what Google has to offer here.JavaWhile you are certainly welcomed to dive head first into Android development, a preliminary scan of the materials above might have clued you in to the need for a little background knowledge. Android uses Java. At this site, Oracle (the company that owns Java) provides a good introduction to the basics of the Java language. It’s not a bad place to start if you are reading this and asking yourself, “What is Java?”. This is also where you need to head if you’re going to download the Java JDK to get started.CodecademyCodecademy has been around for a little while now. It is another site that, while not specifically geared towards Android itself, is a great place for the novice to acclimate themselves with computer code. Codecademy has many great hands-on tutorials of popular programming languages such as Python, Java Script and HTML which can help get you familiar with a lot of the terms and concepts used throughout computer programming. While you won’t come away with a working Android application here, you’re still going to learn something that will come in handy.VogellaMuch like Android’s own developer site, Vogella is filled with in-depth tutorials on some of the more advanced concepts in Android development, but it also starts at the beginning. Vogella is a great resource because it is free but will gladly accept your donations, especially if you go on to create the next Instagram. The tutorials here are easy enough to follow and include plenty of screenshots and code snippets. The site is pretty basic as far as online learning goes these days, so you won’t find any interactive quizes or exercises here. But as always, you can’t beat free.Envatotuts+Formerly Mobiletuts+, Envatotuts+ is another free resource that is based around written tutorials. There are a huge selection of courses on offer here which range from general overviews, to more specific tasks like handling intents and acquiring device sensor data. There’s even a short course on developing for Google Cardboard! There are also a good number of general Java tutorials, with some being geared specifically towards Android development! This is especially useful if you are someone who finds themselves asking “How does this pertain to me and what I want to do?” as you master some of the foundational programming materials.TreehouseMoving to something that is not entirely free, Treehouse is a whimsical combination of traditional e-learning and Sesame Street. This is not an exaggerated analysis as there really are talking puppets involved. Nevertheless, there is a wealth of information offered within this alternative learning experience. Treehouse offers a fully interactive experience for learning software development and gets about as close as you can to having your hand held throughout the entire process. Sections are filled with videos and interactive code challenges with plenty of quizzes and additional reading material to reinforce your learning along the way.Treehouse is a whimsical combination of traditional e-learning and Sesame Street.The site offers different learning tracks for many of the more common and popular programming languages, including tracks for Android and iOS development which will walk you through creating apps. As mentioned previously, the service is mostly free. You are able to access all of the video and printed tutorial content without signing up, but the code challenges, quizzes and the ability to download videos will require a monthly or yearly subscription. You’re looking at $25 or $49 per month for the Basic and Pro packages respectively. While we all love free, Treehouse manages to offer a more traditional learning experience for a fraction of the cost of a brick and mortar institution. You still won’t get a fancy piece of paper at the end, but you might just have an app to show for it.UdemyUdemy is another semi-free solution for learning Android development. There are a number of different courses of varying lengths and content taught by different instructors. Many of the courses cover the basics with others offering more advanced and specialized subject matter. Some of the shorter courses are offered for free while others will run you up to $99. There is a lot offered here and I would recommend browsing the catalog thoroughly before making your selection. You can also find courses on pretty much every other subject matter here too, whether you want to learn cooking or German!CourseraOne more resource that is not entirely Android specific but is becoming a pioneer in free online education is Coursera. Coursera is unique in that its courses are taught by real college professors from real universities across the country. Founded by educators out of Stanford University, Coursera manages to offer real college classes online for free. Courses featured on the site consist of the same material taught by the same professors found at their respective universities. Classes have beginning and end dates, but can be started at any time while the course is being offered. Classes consist of recorded lectures, interactive knowledge checks, tests, quizzes and even homework! Students also receive a certificate of completion at the end. There is plenty offered here in the way of computer programming and technology related learning, but if you happen to feel like brushing up on your art history it is there as well. Perspective mobile developers will likely find something more specific to their needs.Android Developers on Google+ and YouTubeWhen it comes to the many helpful resources available to assist you in your app endeavors, it pays to go straight to the source. In addition to the vast quantities of information that can be found on Android Developers, the Android Developer Relations Team also maintains regularly updated Google+ and YouTube accounts. While they won’t take you from start to finish in developing your first app, they are the best way to stay up to date on the most recent changes in Android. Google+ can be especially useful when you have questions. If you are stuck on how to implement something or just want to know if one design you are working on looks better than another, there are generally plenty of community participants willing to offer help or opinions. The Android Developers account also maintains several Communities such as Android Developer Tools and Android Development, which are good for getting involved in more specific conversation topics.The Android Developers YouTube account is equally chock full of information. Here you get access to what feels like the entire Android team through videos on topics ranging from app design to marketing and visibility in Google Play. Learn from the pros as they offer live hangouts and discussions on implementing new features, best practices and even game development. As you go through the process of learning to develop for Android, this site can provide valuable perspective and help to refine your knowledge so you can get your app right the first time. Of course YouTube is generally a great resource for tutorials, howtos and lessons from the community as well. If you want to quickly learn to do something specific, or find a step-by-step tutorial for creating a video game/social app/whatever else, then searching on YouTube is often a good option.SchoolAnd now for something that is definitely not free. While there are plenty of people who have managed to gain a great deal of experience and know-how all on their own, there is still no substitute for a formal degree from an accredited institution. Especially for those hoping to parlay their development skills over to full time, gainful employment, “self taught” is not a word that shows up regularly on job boards.Actually going to school is very expensive (and time consuming). According to the College Board, the average cost of a four year degree for 2015-2016 was “$32,405 at private colleges, $9,410 for state residents at public colleges, and $23,893 for out-of-state residents attending public universities”. Not insignNow sums of money there! The average student also graduated with $35,5051 in debt, but the payoff for a degree such as computer science or software engineering can still be well worth it. Recently, Forbes ranked the top highest paying majors for 2015 and listed computer engineering as number 9 with a mean average salary of $87,000 between the ages of 25 and 59. Of course this is an industry that is still rapidly growing and figures like these don’t even take into account all the freelance developers and startups that are striking out on their own. This means that paying off that degree may not be a problem in the long run. Something else to consider is this: if you are employed at the moment then there is a good chance that your current employer also offers some sort of tuition reimbursement as part of your benefits.Ultimately, if you are looking to go it alone and make Android development a personal quest, hobby, or bullet point on a resume, then these are some of the best sources on the web you have access to. On the other hand, if you are hoping to get millions in seed funding and make a big splash in the crowded pond of filtered water that is Silicon Valley, then a formal degree might be the way to go. It certainly won’t go against you anyway and if you’re thinking of doing any degree, a coding degree will certainly be one of the more vocational options.There are plenty of zero-to-hero stories of self-taught developers creating world-changing apps from their Mums' basementsThen again, there are plenty of zero-to-hero stories of self-taught developers creating world-changing apps from their Mums’ basements (basement optional). Fortunately, the Android community has always proven willing to lend help and support for any direction you choose to take your skills as a developer. Many of these sources above are also great places to signNow out and get assistance or to hear some success stories from people like you. We welcome the conversation here as well. If you are looking for a place to start developing, struck out on your own and have a success story to share, or you went the traditional route and gave it the old college try, we would love to hear from you. Please share your thoughts in the comments below.