[Klug-general] Coding resources

[Paul Lenton]

Hi all,

I'm looking to move into a new line of work when I leave Kent sometime 
next year and would like to put my love of/knowledge of computing to 
some use.

Can anyone recommend any really good resources for learning coding? I 
currently know Python to a fairly decent standard (I'm writing a command 
line chess game in it for example) but I don't really know what 'good 
code' should be (a lot of my chess program is pretty ugly) or how I 
would learn 'good code' (whatever that may be!).

I've run through just about every track on codecademy.org as a starting 
point for my abilities (favourites were Python, HTML/CSS and Javascript) 
and I know the basics of C++.

Does anyone have any recommendations of:

a) a good language(s) to learn (one with wide uses, and therefore likely 
to be useful in software development)
b) good resources to learn that language (I learn best by reading and doing)
c) any way of gauging how competent one is in a certain language, in 
order to track learning progress

Thanks all

Paul