[kam2701]

Im not sure what to start learning next.

I´ve leant css, html and just polishing those so I decided to learn about flash and feel the animation aspects of the program i´ve now got a handle on.

Should I go for actionscript or php.

I cant decide... I dont think ill feel that comfortable doing backend work.

I dunno help me decide please.

[Tom]

Really it depends where you want to focus your talents. I'm a designer, but I learnt PHP alongside HTML/CSS. While I don't really take development jobs myself, I outsource to a couple of developers. It's incredibly helpful being able to understand the code and make slight modifications if needed. It also means I can tackle the smaller PHP work myself - basic contact forms, PHP template systems etc.

I've never paid a huge amount of attention to flash, my clients rarely ask for it and if they do I outsource it. I can't justify spending the time learning it as the demand isn't there (in my case anyway).

So to sum up, I'm really pleased I chose the PHP route instead of Flash. Once you understand it it makes other languagues, like javascript, much easier to pick up and generally gave me a much deeper understanding of the web. Plus I found it fairly easy to pick up the basics, I think (I could be wrong) actionscript is harder to pick up.

[dcman007]

Tom, on 30 July 2009 - 11:20 AM, said:

Really it depends where you want to focus your talents. I'm a designer, but I learnt PHP alongside HTML/CSS. While I don't really take development jobs myself, I outsource to a couple of developers. It's incredibly helpful being able to understand the code and make slight modifications if needed. It also means I can tackle the smaller PHP work myself - basic contact forms, PHP template systems etc.

I've never paid a huge amount of attention to flash, my clients rarely ask for it and if they do I outsource it. I can't justify spending the time learning it as the demand isn't there (in my case anyway).

So to sum up, I'm really pleased I chose the PHP route instead of Flash. Once you understand it it makes other languagues, like javascript, much easier to pick up and generally gave me a much deeper understanding of the web. Plus I found it fairly easy to pick up the basics, I think (I could be wrong) actionscript is harder to pick up.

Totally agree with this post, PHP for sure. It's more widely used across the web and will also output correctly on devices like iPhone.

When HTML 5 is finalised (quite a way off I know) you'll be able to do a lot of things that flash does directly in that too with no need for plug-ins or knowledge of flash actionscript.

[kam2701]

I think Im going to take the route of know a bit about actionscript and php. If I get a job where I need to do some serious programming in those languages I can pass on the work to a programmer.


I realise the dangers of being a jack of all trades but I think knowing a bit about those languages is almost essential to web design these days and certainly in the future.

Thanks for the replies :-)

[kam2701]

I think Im going to take the route of know a bit about actionscript and php. If I get a job where I need to do some serious programming in those languages I can pass on the work to a programmer.


I realise the dangers of being a jack of all trades but I think knowing a bit about those languages is almost essential to web design these days and certainly in the future.

Thanks for the replies :-)

[AdamG]

kam2701, on 31 July 2009 - 01:14 AM, said:

I think Im going to take the route of know a bit about actionscript and php. If I get a job where I need to do some serious programming in those languages I can pass on the work to a programmer.


I realise the dangers of being a jack of all trades but I think knowing a bit about those languages is almost essential to web design these days and certainly in the future.

Thanks for the replies :-)

I know AS3 and PHP quite well and I think you are making the right choice learning both.

But overall I think you should study PHP in much more depth than ActionScript.

You are definitely going to be using PHP much more than ActionScript when making websites, and PHP is much easier to learn and get your head around. So I think you should put more time into learning PHP as it will benefit you much more in the future, but I think it is also a good idea to have a good understanding of the basics of Actionscript, as every so often there might be something simple you could do in flash that could really make that site look and feel that extra bit better.

Hope that helps.

[kam2701]

AdamG, on 31 July 2009 - 02:32 AM, said:

I know AS3 and PHP quite well and I think you are making the right choice learning both.

But overall I think you should study PHP in much more depth than ActionScript.

You are definitely going to be using PHP much more than ActionScript when making websites, and PHP is much easier to learn and get your head around. So I think you should put more time into learning PHP as it will benefit you much more in the future, but I think it is also a good idea to have a good understanding of the basics of Actionscript, as every so often there might be something simple you could do in flash that could really make that site look and feel that extra bit better.

Hope that helps.

Being a designer means I have to dip into many subjects so I don't expect to get much beyond intermediate level with PHP. As long as I can tweak a bit of code work along side a programmer id be happy with that and wont feel like im overstretching myself.


Thanks for the advice :-)