Hour of Code
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7 Twitter accounts to follow if you want to learn to code

8 Dec 2017

To celebrate the Hour of Code, we’ve rounded up seven coders and programmers with a strong Twitter game to help you crack the code.

When people ask what the most important second language to learn is, someone usually smugly responds with ‘Javascript’, ‘Python’ or other programming languages.

While it might not be the answer you were looking for, programming languages are becoming more and more important every day.

The importance of learning how to code has even reached government level in a number of countries, with proposals to add it to the primary-level curriculum being put forward.

For total beginners, learning a programming language can be extremely daunting, but it doesn’t have to be. There are countless online resources, groups, meet-ups and free courses you can take to get started.

This week, the Hour of Code challenges people to spend one hour learning code to discover how easy it can be.

With this in mind, we’ve rounded up seven great coders, programmers and tech experts that would be ideal for you to add to your Twitter follow list if you’re interested in all things code.

CoderDojo (@CoderDojo)

We couldn’t compile a list of Twitter profiles for a budding coder without including CoderDojo.

Founded in Cork, CoderDojo is a global volunteer-led community of free programming clubs for young people between seven and 17.

CoderDojo is a must-follow for anyone interested in learning how to code.

Jennifer Dewalt (@JenniferDewalt)

Jennifer Dewalt built one website per day for 180 days, so she definitely knows a thing or two about coding.

She’s also the founder of Zube, a project management platform for agile development teams.

Her tweets and retweets are great inspiration for any budding coder who’s just starting out. She’s also a great advocate for diversity in tech.

Ben Evans (@kittylyst)

Ben Evans is an author, speaker, consultant and educator.

He also helps to organise the London Java community and serves on the Java community process executive committee, helping to define standards for the Java ecosystem.

Follow Evans on Twitter for all things Java in particular. For those a little further into their coding career, Evans also wrote about what developers need to know about Java 9.

Niamh Scanlon (@niamhscanlonirl)

At 15 years old, Niamh Scanlon is the youngest entry on our list, but she is a force to be reckoned with when it comes to coding.

Scanlon was named EU Digital Girl of the Year in 2015, she is a CoderDojo mentor and she has won several awards for her apps.

Scanlon is a huge advocate for women in science and technology, and she’s an inspiration to anyone who wants to become a coder.

Jeff Atwood (@codinghorror)

Jeff Atwood is the co-founder of Stack Overflow, an online community for developers to learn, share​ ​their programming ​knowledge and build their careers.

He recently mentioned taking a break from Twitter, but we decided to keep him on the list because he’s a person worth knowing if you want to be a coder.

His previous tweets are worth a look and he can still be found on his blog, CodingHorror.com.

Vicky Twomey-Lee (@whykay)

As a self-professed Pythonista, Vicky Twomey-Lee is has a strong Twitter game for anyone interested in programming, developing and learning code.

She is the co-founder of Coding Grace, a tech community that organises events and workshops for female coders.

Twomey-Lee is also an incredibly strong advocate and role model for women in tech, and speaks about the importance of diversity within the industry.

Eric Meyer (@meyerweb)

Eric Meyer is an American web design consultant and author.

He is best known for his advocacy work on behalf of web standards, most notably Cascading Style Sheets (CSS).

His Twitter account is a great one to follow for coders, no matter how experienced you are.

Jenny Darmody
By Jenny Darmody

Jenny Darmody became the editor of Silicon Republic in 2023, having worked as the deputy editor since February 2020. When she’s not writing about the science and tech industry, she’s writing short stories and attempting novels. She continuously buys more books than she can read in a lifetime and pretty stationery is her kryptonite. She also believes seagulls to be the root of all evil and her baking is the stuff of legends.

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