Starting December 1, you can learn a bit of code for free at your local Apple Store. The retailer’s annual ‘Hour of Code’ event runs from December 1 to December 14 - and most Aussie stores are participating. Here are the details!

If you want to learn how to code, there are a ton of resources out there to help you learn how. Websites like Codecademy, Udacity, and Khan Academy can help you kick the tires a little bit and see if coding is for you. This week, a group from Google launched another option, a mobile app called Grasshopper that can help you learn Javascript during your morning commute.

Coding school App Academy has opened a free online interactive version of its 12-week curriculum. That’s a pretty good deal, since the Academy’s in-person classes in San Francisco and New York can cost as much as a semester in university. The online version involves less direct human interaction, but it includes online mentors and access to a community Slack chat.

Ever had a great idea for an app but don't know how to code? In this article, we'll walk you through the process of creating your own app by examining five software tools to get the job done.

There are as many ways to learn to code as there are ways to use your coding ability. You can learn it from college courses, books, online resources — or from one of several growing boot camps for developers of all ages. We talked to the founders of two such boot camps: David Graham of Code Ninjas, for kids 7–14 and Michael Choi of Coding Dojo, for teens and adults. They explained their different approaches, both of which give their students the ability to build their own applications.

Keen to set your kids up for the future? Here's 10 ways to get them coding.

Dear Lifehacker, I'm a teenager in year 10 and I've started looking at things like programming and coding. I was wondering if you could tell me how to get started with programs like C and Python? I've struggled to find helpful tutorials online for teenagers.

If you're learning CSS, or you want a friendly introduction to some of its terms and concepts, try 30 Seconds of CSS. Each entry on this site shows a different bit of code, demonstrates the result, and explains how each part of the code works.

If you're new to building web apps, check out the first issue of You Got This! a friendly zine from developer community Glitch. The issue teaches the basic concepts behind web servers, and the npm package manager for Javascript. It also features career profiles of three community-leading web developers, and blurbs of advice from a dozen more developers from places such as Google, Mozilla and Slack.

Machine learning (AKA AI) seems bizarre and complicated. It's the tech behind image and speech recognition, recommendation systems, and all kinds of tasks that computers used to be really bad at but are now really good at. It involves teaching a computer to teach itself. And you can learn to do it in well under a year, according to data scientist Bargava. You'll need to put in a solid 10-20 hours a week, but you will learn a lot along the way.

As a product manager at IBM, Anamita Guha works on bots, AR/VR technology and AI - including Watson, the most famous AI that doesn't come packaged on a phone. She also leads analytics for TEDxSanFrancisco and serve as a technical consultant to a clinical research lab at UCSF. We talked to her about her work habits, as general as deepening relationships and as specific as colour-coding notebooks.

French coding school, Le Wagon, is setting up campuses in Melbourne and Sydney, with a focus on giving entrepreneurs and creative professionals technical and product development skills via an intensive and selective nine-week program. The school boasts that over a hundred of their alumni have launched startups, with many successfully getting funding for their new companies.

Code Like A Girl will be launching in Adelaide this Thursday, 9 February 2018, with their part networking/part storytelling providing a great forum for both experienced and aspiring female developers. It's a formula that has had great success, since the first meeting when founder Ally Watson had over 100 women turn up for an informal get-together she advertised online.

Every friend I have with a job that involves picking up something heavier than a laptop more than twice a week eventually finds a way to slip something like this into conversation: "Bro, you don't work hard. I just worked a 4700-hour week digging a tunnel under Mordor with a screwdriver."

Changing career paths, getting an idea for an app out of your head, or just learning something new and useful are all great reasons to get started programming. Learning a programming language might sound as intimidating as learning an actual foreign language, but with the right tips, hints and resources (conveniently provided below), you can go from bumbling bash user to the viscount of vim.

Nintendo's upcoming Labo series of games is novel in more ways than one: the DIY cardboard construction kits are filled with accessories like fishing rods, pianos, and even a robot-controlling, pulley-powered backpack, paired with games compatible with Nintendo's portable Switch console.

You've probably got some downtime during the holidays, whether you're taking a few days off from work (you should), or enjoying your winter break after studying for exams (you didn't). With 2018 on the way, you can start the new year on the right foot by prepping your resolution plans beforehand. Of course, resolutions come in all shapes and sizes, so the real question is this: how are you getting a head start on yours?

Brian Fox is a titan of open source software. As the first employee of Richard Stallman's Free Software Foundation, he wrote several core GNU components, including the GNU Bash shell. Now he's a board member of the National Association of Voting Officials and co-founder of Orchid Labs, which delivers uncensored and private internet access to users such as those behind China's firewall. We talked to him about his career and how he works.

It's Computer Science Education Week, and Apple is offering thousands of free coding sessions at all Apple Stores. There are all sorts of workshops happening - at my local store, aspiring coders can learn the basics of the Swift programming language, design a maze and navigate Star Wars droids through obstacles, and bring robots to life using the Swift Playgrounds iPad app.