For someone without programming experience, starting in web development can feel very daunting. You’re in that uncomfortable first stage of competence (“you don’t know what you don’t know”), so you might think that you have to spend months assembling a foundation in computer science before you can build a website of any sophistication. Not so! Web development and CS are different enough that you can start learning the former without having a strong base in the latter. I say this largely based on my own experience. When I started web development six months ago, I was a full time law school student and barely knew any programming – only the basic stuff you pick up in your first few hours of study. Four months after I started, I got a job offer from Pivotal Labs, took a leave from law school, and moved out to SF. I was extraordinarily lucky to run into awesome mentors (the benefit of attending Hacker School cannot be overstated), so I don’t mean for my story to be repr