I’m happy to announce the release of a free community website Code School built from scratch, JavaScript.com — created as an online learning resource for aspiring and existing developers. Read on if you’re wondering how this site came to be and what we built it for.

How It Started

When we initially launched Code School, the majority of our customers were Ruby on Rails developers. As we’ve grown, we’ve attracted many HTML/CSS and JavaScript users too. Our JavaScript courses have quickly become our most popular.

So naturally, when I was presented with the opportunity to purchase JavaScript.com, it started a spark for me. But what would be the right thing to do with a domain that represents such an important language? What was most difficult about first learning JavaScript? How could we support experienced developers?

What We Built

We decided to begin brainstorming with the question, “If JavaScript had a homepage, what might you find there?” After coming up with many different ideas, we boiled them down to a few features, which you can see today on JavaScript.com:

• A quick, interactive course that’s a starting place for learning JavaScript.
• A video walkthrough of what JavaScript is, where it came from, and why it matters.
• A curated list of free online resources to start learning JavaScript.
• A community news feature where any developer can spread the word about their JavaScript library, tutorial, blog post, or event.
• A pathway to FiveJS, our free JavaScript news podcast and newsletter.

Look around the site, pass it to a new JavaScript programmer, or make a post that will help educate the community. However you choose to use the site, I’d love to hear what you think by leaving a comment below or tweeting at @javascriptcom.