Screencast series for Programmers
As I run a large Perl-related site with screncasts I wanted to look more closely at some of the other sites and services out there offering high-quality screencasts.
Luckily, back in June 2013 Avdi Grimm posted a list of programming screencast series. I took that list, added some more links, and a lot of other information about the popularity of the sites, and about the cost of the subscriptions.
For each site I also looked up the Alexa ranking. It can give some indication about the relative popularity of those sites and you can also compare those number to real visitor statistics.
Backbone Rails
Backbone Rails Rails and Backbone.js by Brian Mann.
There are two free screencasts and two series that cost money. One of them costs $25 the other one $30.
Alexa 720,214
Build podcast
Build Podcast is a screencast show about technology tools for design and development by Sayanee Basu.
The screencasts are hosted on YouTube and on Vimeo. The first episode was published on 01 Jun 2012, the most recent one was published on 14 Dec 2014.
Alexa: 751,321
Clean Coders
Clean Coders about software design and discipline by Robert C Martin.
Alexa 562,906
February 2011 and it is still going on.
The screencast and videos on this site are much longer, they usually last 60-80 minutes. They are sold one-by-one. It seems all of them have the same price structure:
- $12 to watch online
- $18 to download
- $10/viewer for business
- $60 for a user group
There are some awesome sample videos on YouTube
Code School
Code School Not only screencasts, but also on-line, in-browser exercises in some of the subjects they cover which include JavaScript, HTML/CSS, Ruby, iOS, Git, and more.
There is a whole company behind it with ventura capital and all that. Alexa ranking is 5,460.
It costs $29 / month though longer subscription plans will get you some discount.
Destroy All Software
Destroy All Software provides screencasts about a mixture of subjects including Ruby, Unix, OO Design, TDD. The screencasts were created by Gary Bernhardt. (The guy who brought wat to the world). Alexa ranking 256,183.
The screencast was launched in February 2011 and ended in March 2013. Currently you can purchase 5 "seasons". Each "season" includes 18 screencasts and cost $40.
Devcasts
Devcasts various subjects such as Django, JQuery, Python, Ruby-on-Rails, etc.
Alexa 856,989
This is just a site hand-picking screencasts from various YouTube channels.
They are all freely accessible.
Egghead
Eggehead Bite-sized video training with AngularJS by John Lindquist.
There are almost 300 free videos and a lot of "pro" episods.
Alexa 29,537
$15 / month or $150/ year.
Emacs Rocks
Emacs Rocks free screencasts about Emacs by Christian Johansen
The screencasts are hosted on YouTube.
Alexa: 462,655
Ember 101
Ember 101 about Ember.js by Ryan Florence
Screencasts are free and are hosted on YouTube.
Alexa 1,154,038
Frontend Masters
Frontend Masters about JavaScript, Node.js, HTML5, CSS3, D3, Angular.js, Backbone.js by several several teachers.
Alexa 115,055
Fee: $39 / month or $390 / year.
Hack Emacs
Hack Emacs by Rick Dillon.
Videos are hosted on YouTube.
Metacasts
MetaCasts Go , CoffeScript, Backbone.js etc by Mark Bates.
Alexa: 1,370,254
$9 / month or $90 / year or buy individual episodes for $6 each.
The 3rd episode was published on November 21, 2012 (and I don't seem to be able to list the 1st episode). The most recent episode was on December 22, 2014.
Minimalist Programming (Jekor)
Minimalist Programming Haskell, Emacs. by Chris Forno.
This is basically a YouTube channel.
Must Hack
Must Hack Alexa: 9,640,651
There seem to be only 3 videos on the site. One of them is free. The other two cost $2.50 each.
Neckbeard Republic
Neckbeard Republic free Python and Django screencasts by Mahdi Yusuf.
Started in February 2013 and stopped in December 2013. At some point the screencasts were only available to subscribers, but now you can watch them freely.
Length: 10-25 minutes.
Alexa: 4,399,122
NS Screencast
NS Screencast weekly bite-sized screencasts on iOS development by Ben Scheirman.
Started on February 10, 2012, most recent episode on December 18, 2014 It started out with a few free episodes but within a few weeks subscription-based epiodes started to appear and today most of the episodes are for subscribers only. A subscription costs $9 / month or $100 / year.
The videos are between 5-25 min long.
Alexa: 415,958
Peer2Peer
Peer2Peer live coding videos by various people. I think the editor behind it is Drew Neil, who also runs Vimcasts.
Each episode is a 90-120 min video showing two people implementing some functionality and discussing it. Each episode costs $25.
Alexa: 3,136,451
Pluralsight
PluralSight A platform that covers every subject (both PeepCode.com and Tekpub.com redirect here)
Alexa: 5,975
On this platform for individual authors can sign up and work with the PluralSoght people to prepare a course. They get paid a one-time fee when the course is completed and then monthly royaltees based on the percentage of time paying customers spent watching these screencasts.
Fee: $29 / month standard or $49 / month with extra features. Annual discounts apply.
Programming Tutorials
Programming tutorial by William Byrd.
A YouTube channel with a few videos.
Railscasts
Railscasts provides screencasts about Ruby on Rails. Alexa ranking is still 17,633 even though there has been no new episode since June 2013. The site and the screencasts were created by Ryan Bates. It was launched in 2007.
For a long time everything was free.
Then, at the end of 2011, he launched the "Pro" edition which meant additional screencasts for $9 / month. After a while he wrote that he could quit his day-job and focus on the Railcasts.
In June 2013, he ran out of steam and stopped publishing new screencasts. Both free and paid.
You can still subscriber, pay $9 once and get access to all the previous screencasts as well.
Ruby Tapas
Ruby Tapas provides 2 screencasts a week about the Ruby programming language. It was created by Avdi Grimm. The site was launched on 24 September 2012.
Two years later, on 24 Septeber 2014 he posted that the site has passed 2,000 subscribers.
The site has an Alexa ranking of 571,196. The actual content for the subscribers is served from another domain. (Event the personal web site of Avdi has better Alexa ranking at 256,253) Before he launched the RubyTapas site, Avdi has already self-published 2 books about Ruby.
Skillfeed
Skillfeed Platform that covers every subject.
Alexa: 24,311
A platform where people can upload their screencasts and courses. The site offers unlimited access to all the videos for $19 / month flat fee and then distributes a part of that money among the authors of the screencasts proportionally to the time their videos were watched in the given month.
Treeehouse
Treehouse about HTML, JavaScript, Ruby, PHP, CSS, iOS, etc.
Individuals can sign up to become teachers, but I have not figureed out how are they compensated.
Alexa 2,873
$25 / month or $49 / month
Udemy
Udemy Platform that covers every subject.
Alexa: 783
A platform where people can upload their courses. They sell the individula courses and share the revenue with the author. As I understand the course prices are decided by the authors themselves. I saw courses between 0-1000 USD. Though I think the majority are under 100 USD.
Vimcast
Vimcast free screencasts about vim by Drew Neil.
First episode was on Jan 4, 2010, the most recent episode was on Jul 23, 2014.
Drew does not charge money for the screencasts, but he uses it as a platform to sell his vim training sessions. He also started another project called Peer2Peer. See that separately.
Alexa: 245,800
Watchmecode
Watchmecode weekly screencasts about JavaScript by Derick Bailey.
Alexa 823,188
The free demos are served from YouTube.
Started on October 25, 2011 and the most recent was on December 18, 2014.
The monthly subscription fee in $14.
Each screencast is 3-8 min long.
EventedMind
EventedMind Alexa 214,802
Dot Enter
Dot Enter Site hosted on Github, videos on Vimeo.
deveo.tv
deveo.tv Alexa 16,660,171
Let's Code: Test-Driven JavaScript
Let's Code: Test-Driven JavaScript
Alexa 597,827
Motioncast
Alexa 2,988,213
Learning iOS Development with Azam Sharp
Learning iOS Development with Azam Sharp
A YouTube channel.
EmberCasts
Alexa: 1,679,273
Perl Maven
Alexa: 95,990
Coursera
Alexa 941
Let's Play: Test-Driven Development
Let's Play: Test-Driven Development> Alexa 766,074
Go Django
Go Django Alexa 311,165
Cost $9 / month or $90 / year
Mojocast
Mojocast Alexa 20,458,777
Mark Hagan .NET
Free ASP.Net C# Programming Video Tutorials Alexa 1,334,874
Web dev break
Web dev break Alexa 2,700,953
TutsOwl
TutsOwl Alexa 2,418,751
Laracasts
Laracasts Alexa 12,033
Drupalize Me
Drupalize me Alexa 88,858
Udacity
Udacity Alexa: 4,723
Levelup Tuts
Levelup Tuts Alexa 140,670
Learn Sampson ms
Learn Sampson ms Alexa na
Dashing D3.js
Dashing D3 Screencasts Alexa 134,398
Learn all the Nodes
Learn All the Nodes Alexa 1,421,737
Pragmatic Bookshelf
Pragmatic Bookshelf Alexa 48,643
tuts+
tuts+ Alexa 1,008
dnrTV
dnrTV Alexa 2,675,767
Nodetuts
Nodetuts 447,619
Parlons Ruby (French)
Parlons Ruby Alexa 27,810,336
Ruby on Rails (French)
Summary
Individuals
| Site | Subjects | Alexa rank | Length | Fee |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Backbone Rails | Rails with Backbone.js | 720,214 | $25 and $30 for 2 series | |
| Build Podcast | Technology | 751,321 | free | |
| Clean Coders | Software design and discipline | 562,906 | 60-80 | $12 online or $18 to download each episode |
| Destroy All Software | Ruby, Python, Unix, software design. | 256,183 | 10-15 min | No new videos but you can purchase 5 batches of 18 videos for $40 each. |
| Devcasts | Handpicked videos on various subjects. | 856,989 | various | free |
| Eggehead | AngularJS | 29,537 | $15/month or $150/year | |
| Ember 101 | Ember.js | 1,154,038 | 5-8 min | free |
| MetaCasts | Go, CoffeScript, Backbone.js etc | 1,370,254 | $9/month or $90/year or $6/episode | |
| Minimalist Programming (Jekor) | Haskell, Emacs | na | free | |
| Neckbeard Republic | Python and Django screencasts | 4,399,122 | 10-25 min | free |
| NS Screencast | iOS Development | 415,958 | 5-25 min | $9 / month or $100 / year |
| Peer2Peer | Live Pair coding | 3,136,451 | 90-120 min | $25 each episode |
| Programming tutorial | na | |||
| Railscasts | Ruby on Rails | 17,633 | 10-20 min | Was $9 / month. No new episodes, but you can watch the whole backlog for a single payment of $9 |
| Ruby Tapas | Ruby, TDD, and OOP | 571,196 | 2-5 min | $9 / month |
| Vimcast | 245,800 | free | ||
| Watchmecode | JavaScript/Node.js | 823,188 | 3-8 min | $14 / month |
| Emacs Rocks | Emacs | 462,655 | free | |
| Hack Emacs | Emacs | na | free | |
| Must Hack | 9,640,651 | |||
| EventedMind | 214,802 | |||
| deveo.tv | 16,660,171 | |||
| Let's Code: Test-Driven JavaScript | 597,827 | |||
| Motioncast | 2,988,213 | |||
| Perl Maven | 95,990 | |||
| EmberCasts | 1,679,273 | |||
| Coursera | 941 | |||
| Let's Play: Test-Driven Development> | 766,074 | |||
| Go Django | 311,165 | |||
| Mojocast | 20,458,777 | |||
| Free ASP.Net C# Programming Video Tutorials | 1,334,874 | |||
| Web dev break | 2,700,953 | |||
| TutsOwl | 2,418,751 | |||
| Laracasts | 12,033 | |||
| Drupalize me | 88,858 | |||
| Udacity | 4,723 | |||
| Levelup Tuts | 140,670 | |||
| Dashing D3 Screencasts | 134,398 | |||
| Learn All the Nodes | 1,421,737 | |||
| Pragmatic Bookshelf | 48,643 | |||
| tuts+ | 1,008 | |||
| dnrTV | 2,675,767 | |||
| Nodetuts | 447,619 | |||
| Learning iOS Development with Azam Sharp | na | |||
| Dot Enter | na | |||
| Learn Sampson ms | na |
Platforms
| Site | Subjects | Alexa rank | Length | Fee |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Code School | Ruby, Rails, iOS, JavaScript, HTML/CSS, etc. | 5,460 | 5-10 min | $29 / month or less for longer period. |
| Frontend Masters | JavaScript, Node.js, HTML5, CSS3, D3, Angular.js, Backbone.js | 115,055 | $39/month or $390/year | |
| PluralSight | everything | 5,975 | $29 / month standard or $49 / month with extra features. Annual discounts apply. | |
| Skillfeed | 24,311 | |||
| Treehouse | HTML, JavaScript, Ruby, PHP, CSS, iOS, etc. | 2,873 | $25 / month or $49 / month | |
| Udemy | everything | 783 | 0-$1000/course, most of them under $100 |
Non-English
| Site | Subjects | Alexa rank | Length | Fee |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Parlons Ruby (French) | 27,810,336 | |||
| Ruby on Rails in French | na |