In parallel to working on the product features, the team is currently thinking on how to help you build with Weweb thanks to a better documentation and a brand new university.
Our thinking was this one:
The university should help people understand visual programming concepts (kind of like Webflowâs university, but for web apps) and how to manage a nocode project with a client.
The docs should help you while building in Weweb, listing all the product capabilities/APIs.
My question to the community is: What would you like to see in the university and docs? Also, how would you like to navigate/use them?
This isnât a direct answer to your question, but I figure this tidbit might be helpful: Technically has been an invaluable resource to helping me understand fundamental web app concepts that have turned into mental models for building with WeWeb.
I think what is key is make it visual, specifically in video format. I came from webflow and didnât know how to code, but I know a thing or two about no-code backend. I always learn things by exploring and what helped me was by trying to do things and find out the way to do it, such as the cart function. There I learnt about variables, datatypes, inserting objects and manipulating objects, request and posting data to backend. Then I learnt about all the no-code tools in the logic. After I get the grip on weweb and can build most of the things I want to build, I found out the performance wasnât good enough for my case(which I reported) knew I had to wait and I trust on weweb. But then I went to learn to code with js and react, and found it so cumbersome. I think coding is hilarious when compared to weweb. I think anyone can build atleast 10 times faster with weweb, as for me a novice coder a 100 times faster. One of the annoying things is docs, I think videos are much much easier to understand. That is why I think you guys should prioritize on video format, short videos, maybe all the basic things first, then do a practical ones like for example a shopping cart.
Another input I can give is, I think webflow university taught me html and css, maybe weweb university can teach me javascript, and also a little bit about authentication and backend, since most people probably handling backend for the first time.
@Joyce has produced a ton of great videos. Unfortunately, Iâm more of a read-the-docs type of learner, as opposed to a watch-the-video learner.
It would be a tremendous help if WeWeb created written companion guides for these videos.
For an example, check out the documentation for the low-code API Management tool Zuplo.
In order to accommodate a diversity of learning styles, their team has made a concerted effort to publish a written guide alongside every video tutorial.
Written guides tend to have a longer shelf-life, too.
Future redesigns of WeWeb results in existing videos doing more harm (confusion) than help, whereas a written guide can persist across versions with minimal upkeep (replacing screenshots etc)
Iâm sure itâs a substantial project to retroactively document the entire WeWeb Academy, but with Youtube transcripts and summarization capabilities from Googleâs Bard, its actually rather manageable (and if you open-sourced the docs to the community, I would be happy to contribute)
Super happy to read this as Iâm working on a Google Doc handbook to accompany the upcoming level 2 course of the WeWeb Academy. I think you will find it super helpful to digest the big programming concepts we cover in that course but will be open to feedback of course
Yeah, it is a substantial project but we will get round to it for sure.
publish a new visual programming video course that digs further into security and scale
The new video course will be out in 2-3 weeks and we aim for a complete, best-in-class user doc with up-to-date build guides like the Zuplo one you mentioned by September. Hopefully then we have a bit more time to add a text-based element to the visual programming courses
Yes! We do plan to open-source the docs and would love you to contribute! Not sure when yet but we are actively discussing it
I am new to We Web and am also in the âlearn by readingâ camp. I have web design (and some dev) experience and have used other no-code tools over the last 15 months. However, the transition to we web has been slower than I expected.
My hypothesis is the slow start has been because there may not be enough âfoundationalâ content in the existing docs. By this I mean the basic concepts of we web are either not explained or not detailed enough in the text docs for someone to immediately start (re)building a project they may have built previously, elsewhere. A simple âoverviewâ page in the docs that explains the core terminology/features (âcollectionsâ for external data, common database designs/setups/tips, we web apps are SPAs, how basic user authentication works, etc.), with links for where to look in the docs for more info, might be super helpful.
The âbuild guidesâ here are nice, but it would be helpful if some of the common use cases were individually (and more thoroughly) explained in the docs. For example, in the âJob board with Xanoâ guide, step 4 (Redirect a user to a job description page in WeWeb) seems like a very common use case, but there isnât enough detail in this guide to truly understand what each piece is doing (and thus how to expand/adapt it for other uses)âand no links to where more detail resides. And you have to dig through that guide to find it.
I used Bubble most recently and their documentation is not without issue, but overall it is pretty good. It is split into two sections: one for explaining the platformâs core pieces (âuser manualâ) and one for referencing while building (âcore referenceâ). It was very helpful when
The videos can be very helpful, but often I have a specific question and its quite hard to scroll through a video searching for a specific topic!
As I mentioned, Iâm new. I expect I will figure things out over time and I can already see the power and potential of the system. But thought it might be worth reviving this topic since it is almost 2 years later and (at least one) new user(s) are spending a lot of time just trying to grasp the basics.
Deinitely worth reviving the topic! Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts with us @dhew Really appreciate it!
@Matthew_S joined us as Education Lead a few months back and started revamping the user docs to improve the experience. Thereâs more to come in that regard and the video academy will follow.
Please donât hesitate to keep sharing your thoughts on these topics as they come
Really appreciate it!