Simon Willison’s Weblog

What is the best resource for someone who is non-technical to learn about computer programming/creating software?

8th August 2013

My answer to What is the best resource for someone who is non-technical to learn about computer programming/creating software? on Quora

Learn to program. You don’t need to learn programming to the standard where you could work professionally as a software engineer, but having enough programming knowledge to write some simple programs and automate some simple tasks will make you enormously more capable when it comes to working with programmers—or in business life in general.

Think about it like learning to write: being able to draft effective emails, blog posts and press releases is a valuable skill for any businessperson, even if you don’t write professionally to the standard required to produce magazine articles and novels.

As for the best resource... Code Academy is worth a look as a starting point.