How will it take me to become a Web Developer?

Question

I want to become a Web Developer in Ruby on Rail or asp.net
How long do you guys think it will take me? How many hours per day should I study?

Regards.

Answer 1

It really depends on two things:

What level you want to attain?
How quickly do you learn/comprehend new things?

If you want to be a hobbyist developer and learn quickly, you should be able to get your first website up in a few weeks, and be ready for some mediocre, small sites within several months. Of course, you can make a web site, period, in a matter of days, but we're assuming you want to be good enough that you don't embarrass yourself. If you're not a very faster learner or you don't pick up on new things very quickly, double those time estimates.

If you want to design/develop on a professional level, it can take a very, very long time. Web development represents a convergence of many highly evolved disciplines, including software architecture, graphic design, interaction design, database design, UI theory... the list goes on. Not to mention multiple programming languages and debug environments - c# or Ruby, SQL, JavaScript; and your markup languages. I have been doing web development for more than 10 years, for some of the biggest companies in the world, and I still have a long way to go.

I don't say that to discourage you, however. Such a huge investment can pay off substantially! Not just financially, but personally as well. It is a wonderful profession that, like many professions, can be done as well as you put in the effort. Some people will never branch out beyond FrontPage, and that is the limit of their reward. But for those who make web development a lifelong learning experience, it is very rewarding.

Answer 2

i started a job as a student doing one day a week at work and i had to learn HTML, asp (not .net) and java script as well as having to integrate it with the current site and it took me about 3-4 months to be able to do stuff alone but even now, nearly one year later i still need guidance on things from my supervisor

Answer 3

It all depends on how much time you have. I usually spend about an hour a day... Ruby is awesome!
Chunky Bacon!