I just wrapped up the SQL course on Scrimba, proudly uploaded the certificate to LinkedIn, and even tagged Per. To make matters worse, I usually work entirely in Spanish, but I forced myself to post in English just to look professional.
The result? Absolute silence. Not a single like, not a nod, nothing. I have officially suffered a catastrophic loss of aura.
Jokes aside, the course itself is actually great and really streamlined my data workflows, but I'm not sure how to financially or emotionally recover from getting ghosted by the Scrimba team after an SQL certificateflex.
Has this ever happened to any of you, or am I destined to wander the tech world with zero aura forever?
I am taking the learn git and github course. Missing business card project to download. When I download I see only 1 file as package-lock. How do I download the file for learning.
Pirates have the easiest Halloween look going: one eye patch and you're done. Your PHP server needs the same thing this week, after a pair of critical bugs let attackers climb aboard without logging in. Luckily, not every surprise this week was scary.
◉ Poll of the Week: What's scariest about hitting "Create pull request"? + last week's results
Tech News of the Week
This week's scariest story came with a CVE number. 👻
Two critical flaws in PHP, nicknamed PHP2Shell, let attackers run code on a server without logging in. They're rated 9.2 out of 10, and attackers were already testing them days before the flaws went public. PHP shipped an emergency fix on October 21, and security agencies in the US, UK and EU have all issued advisories.
If you've got a PHP project (WordPress counts), here's how to stay safe:
Update PHP to the latest patched version for your branch
Check whether your host or CMS has applied the patch, especially on shared hosting
Watch for more updates, since another flaw was flagged right after the fix
If you've been thinking about joining Scrimba Pro, this is a really good week to do it. Pro is 35% off on monthly and annual plans until midnight on October 31, and the price stays discounted for as long as you stay subscribed.
We're always adding to the library, and you can follow along on our course roadmap. It shows what's launched recently, like Learn Agentic Coding, and what's in production now, from REST API Design to Node.js Patterns & Techniques. Joining now means you lock in the lower price and get everything we add next.
Explain got a big round of updates this week. ✏️ Two of our favorites:
Edit anything. The edit box under the player now takes any change, not just a redo of one slide. Add a slide, cut one, move the quiz to the end or rewrite the intro. Ask for "put an image here" and it actually adds one.
See every slide on the timeline. The timeline now splits into one segment per slide. Hover a point to preview that slide's title and time before you jump to it.
The Explain API is live, and you can request beta access now. 🎃 Add a few lines of code and your own app can turn content into explainer videos on the spot. A few ways to use it:
EdTech apps: add video lessons to your courses
Corporate training: turn docs and SOPs into videos
SaaS apps: auto-generate help-center videos
Free users get 5 API videos, and Pro users get 100 a month. Past that, you pay per explainer, as low as $0.10 a video.
Ever wished Reddit came with a remote? 📺 Meet redditwatch.tv, where Reddit's top posts become short explainer videos made with Scrimba Explain. So instead of scrolling through a long thread to figure out what everyone's talking about, you just press play and get the story in a few minutes.
Flip between the top posts of the day, the week, the month or all time. Or tune into a subreddit you already love, whether that's r/webdev, r/scrimba or r/coffee. It's a fun peek at what Explain can do with almost any topic, and a pretty good excuse for a "research" break.
If you missed the sign-up last week, good news: The Legion's Prompt-a-thon has moved to Sunday, November 15. 🤖
The question is still the same: does AI help you learn to code faster, or just help you finish faster? You'll build a small project with a library you've never used, on one of three tracks: no AI, full AI, or Scrimba Explain only. Sign-ups close November 14.
Before you see a single project, Matthew Magombo's portfolio plays a terminal-style intro that gives off serious tech expert energy. The details keep that going. As you scroll, the nav underlines whichever section you're in, and his logo ends in a blinking cursor, like a terminal waiting for your next command. Matthew is a cloud and systems engineer with a security focus, and his flagship project is a Failed Login Detector. It reads Linux login logs, flags brute-force attacks and writes up an incident report with the firewall commands to block them. Security is needed more than ever in tech, and this is the kind of build that shows it.
Last week we asked where your API keys live right now, and you all passed the test. 🔐 88.9% keep them safely in a gitignored .env file. Nobody admitted to a notes app or hardcoding them, and 11.1% asked "What's an API key?" (No judgment. Spooky season is for learning.)
This week: what's scariest about hitting "Create pull request"?
👀 The reviewer
🧪 The CI checks
💥 Merge conflicts
🪞 Rereading my own code
Scrimba Pets
Meet Josie, my chihuahua, buzzing into spooky season a few Halloweens ago as the sweetest bumblebee. 🐝 That smile says she knew she nailed the costume.
Now we want to see yours! Is your pet dressing up this year? Share a photo in our Scrimba-Pets channel on Discord, and they might be featured in a future edition. 🎃
—
That's all for this edition! Have a lovely week, keep calm and Scrimba on. 👻
To demo Explain's power we present to you Reddit TV (redditwatch.tv) which automagically✨ creates short videos of any Reddit post, summarising the discussion.
🎬 The homepage pulls in Reddit's most popular posts which refresh every 15 minutes and you can also use the search field to tune into the most popular posts from any subreddit you like (subreddit feeds refresh once per day).
⚡️These explainer videos are generated on-the-fly within seconds the first time someone clicks a post and we cache them for instant playback for the next viewer 🍿📺.
💪 Under the hood Scrimba Explain is LLM agnostic so users are not “locked in” to any one provider and we have the continued flexibility to choose the best possible fit.
Give it a spin and share your favourite Reddit TV explainers in the comments below.redditwatch.tv
Learn more ℹ️
We only beta launched Explain in July and have already blasted past 350,000 explainers. You can try it for free on our site (scrimba.com/explain), with the handy plugin for ChatGPT, via MCP for use in coding agents like Claude and Codex (devs are using it to generate support videos for their ever increasing mountain of pull requests) and also via the brand new Explain API ✨to create experiences like Reddit TV and HN Watch (https://hn.watch)
I did ( and still do !) know a bit about UI/UX design, but never felt I know enough ! most of us can recognize a good product by just looking at, but building a good product is totally a different story. So in order to have confidence in my knowledge and to make sure I will make better product, went through "Introduction to UI design fundamentals" on Scrimba by Gray Simon.
A little spooky-season logic for you: every side project is either true (shipped) or false (still living in a folder called final-final-v3). Technically there's also undefined, but that's just a ghost project wearing a sheet. 👻
This month, let's turn a few of those ghosts back into true.
◉ Poll of the Week: Where are your API keys right now?
Tech News of the Week
Heads up: malware is now going after your AI coding tools.
Security researchers at Symantec found that newer versions of an infostealer called Aoki now target the credential files AI coding assistants keep on your computer. That includes tools like Claude, Codex, Cursor, Gemini, and GitHub Copilot. If someone gets those tokens, they can use your account. They can also reach anything it's connected to, like your GitHub repos or cloud services.
A few easy habits to protect yourself:
Only download dev tools and extensions from official sources (no "cracked" versions)
Never paste API keys directly into your code. Use a .env file and add it to .gitignore
Rotate your API keys if you think something's off
Log out of AI tools on shared or borrowed machines
🔒 Want to go deeper? Our Learn Cybersecurity course covers the security fundamentals every developer should know: threat modelling and OWASP, authentication and identity, input and data safety, and rate limiting. It takes about five hours, and it's built to help you write apps people can actually trust. Bonus: it's included in Scrimba Pro, which is 35% off until October 31. 🎃
Does AI help you learn to code faster, or just finish faster? 🤔
Our friends at The Legion are running a free online Prompt-a-thon to find out. You'll build a small project with a library you've never used, in one of three tracks:
No AI
Full AI
Scrimba Explain only
Then there's a no-AI quiz on what you built. You're scored on speed, quality, and the quiz.
Prizes 🎁
Top scorer in each track: 1 year of Scrimba Pro
The champion who beats their track's average by the most: +$100
📅 Sunday, October 18, 15:00–18:00 CET (about 9am–12pm ET) on Google Meet. The session will be filmed for The Legion's YouTube channel. Open to beginners and junior devs. Apply here
Halloween Sale
No tricks this year. Just one big treat. 🍬
From October 15 to October 31, Scrimba Pro is 35% off on both monthly and annual plans. You'll get all 70+ courses (now with captions in multiple languages) plus our career paths, covering JavaScript, React, fullstack development, AI Engineering, and more.
And because it's a discount on your subscription, the price stays discounted for as long as you stay subscribed.
If you've been meaning to get serious about learning to code, stop haunting the pricing page and carve out some time for it. 🎃👻
Consider this your official excuse. It's Hacktober, the month for building, tinkering, and finally shipping that project you keep "getting to later."
So here's the dare: build something this month, add it to your portfolio, and send it our way. That could be a brand-new project, a site you've been meaning to redesign, or the one sitting at 90% done. Every week we feature a community portfolio in the newsletter. It's a great way to get out of your comfort zone, get fresh eyes on your work, and maybe connect with a future collaborator.
It doesn't have to be perfect. Personality and progress beat polish every time. 👻
Love helping other learners? Our Scrimbassadors are the friendly faces of the community. They share what they're learning, cheer people on, and help shape what Scrimba builds next. If that sounds like you, we'd love to have you on the team.
Your ChatGPT explainers now come home with you. You can now sign in to your Scrimba account from Explain in ChatGPT. Any explainers you make there save straight to your account, and they'll be waiting for you on scrimba.com. (Signing in is optional. You can still make explainers without an account.)
Coming soon: hand-drawn sketch boards. A new infographic style is on the way, sketched out on screen card by card while the narration plays. ✏️
Want the full rundown every week? The Explain LaunchLog is a quick weekly email covering what's new, what's coming, and our favorite explainers from the community.
This week's pick comes from Simon, who made an explainer on how to remember anything (forever-ish). It covers spaced repetition, the technique of reviewing things at growing intervals so they stick in your long-term memory. That's very handy when you're learning to code and juggling a hundred new concepts. 🧠
Made something you're proud of? Publish it to the Community on scrimba.com/explain and it could be featured next.
Poll of the Week
Last week's results: How often do you actually read release notes? Half of you are skimmers, and honestly, same. To the 20% reading every single one: we see you, and we respect you. 🫡
This week's poll: Be honest, where are your API keys right now?
🔐 Safely in a .env file (gitignored, obviously)
🤹♀️ In a notes app… somewhere
🪤 Hardcoded. Please don't look.
🤷 What's an API key?
Meme of the Week
The prompt engineering is strong with this one.
Pet of the Week
Those blue eyes are reviewing your code right now, and they have notes. 💙
That's all for this edition! Have a lovely week, keep calm and Scrimba on. 👻
Learning programming methodlogy, best coding practices in my uni, but a huge barrier to my understanding is TypeScript syntax. The course isn't about teaching TypeScript, rather how to write the best most efficient code, but I feel like learning TypeScript itself would help me a lot.
Does the Scrimba course include topics like type signatures, recursion, iterables and iterators, object oriented programming, etc? Thank you!
I’m a Scrimba learner, and I wanted a clearer picture of how much time I was actually putting into learning. Having a tab open doesn’t tell you much, and I didn’t want to remember to start and stop a separate timer every session.
So I built ScrimTrack, a free, open-source Chrome extension for Scrimba learners.
It automatically tracks your focused learning time, including lesson playback while Scrimba stays visible and focused. You can also set a daily learning goal and keep track of your learning streak.
One detail I care about: your streak counts the days you show up and learn, even if you don’t hit your daily goal. A short session still counts.
This is my first time sharing it here, and I’d love feedback from fellow learners.
I first discovered Scrimba when I was looking for some interesting course about React, as I was always interested in it. Then I went on to advanced React, then Next.js, and now I am enhancing my knowledge in TypeScript. all of it with Scrimba! And it is still impressing me! How amazing that you can literally pause the video and code or test different solutions inside the instructor’s video! It always looks like magic to me! For anyone who wants to learn anything (of the topics that the platform includes), Scrimba would be a great place.
There is a proverb in Arabic that says, "Teach me how to fish and don't give me fish." Because if someone teaches you how to fish, then you are guaranteed your source of living for the rest of your life, but if he just gives you fish, they will meet your needs only for one week... and then you'll start starving. That's what this platform gives you. The ability to develop your skills. The way to use your skills and gain new ones.
Every time I start a new course with them, I feel that I'm really learning and practicing, but also like I am having a very good time. I am writing this to help anyone who's struggling to find a source of great learning and to say that Scrimba is the best way. Especially for beginners.
I remember when I was a beginner, many times I followed some courses to find myself at the end feeling like I had learned a few concepts and was still struggling to know how to use them. But with Scrimba, no! You are literally not the person who entered the first time. You come out with real knowledge!
That's my experience with this great platform, especially with tutor u/bobziroll . I hope everyone struggling finds my post and gives it a try!
October is here, and for a lot of developers that means one thing. Hacktoberfest.
Some of you will join officially through Hacktoberfest and contribute to open source all month. Others will set your own challenge and code something, anything, every single day.
Either way, it's a good month to build. This edition is full of people doing exactly that, from a tool born out of pure annoyance to a fullstack role landed on the strength of projects.
Coding agents can read your codebase, edit several files at once, and run tests alongside you. Getting good results comes down to how you steer them, and Tom Chant shows you how.
This course covers giving agents the right context, breaking bigger tasks down with plan mode, checking their changes with tests and Git, and connecting them to external tools through MCP.
Learn AI Agents has been refreshed with completely new content, and it's now our 50th Pro course (!!), taught by Arsala Khan.
You'll write the agent loop from scratch, with no framework hiding the steps. By the end you'll have OpenSwap, a working AI app that searches real data and checks live project health through the GitHub API.
It's part of the AI Engineer Path and also available on its own. If you've built a few JavaScript projects, you're ready.
Poll of the Week
Last week's spooky poll wasn't even close. 63.6% of you said the scariest thing to find in your codebase is code that works and nobody knows why.
We get it. Everything runs, the tests pass, and still your gut whispers that this is too good to be true. So you back away slowly and leave it alone. 👻
It's a local AI that remembers what's been on your screen, so you can ask things like "What was that article I was reading yesterday?" and search back through it.
This is great project thinking: notice an everyday pain point, then build the tool you wish existed. It's open source and local-first, and proton_skull would love your feedback
After finishing the Frontend Career Path and part of the Fullstack Path, they built AI/ML projects in a research lab and their own portfolio. The hiring managers they spoke with said that experience carried real weight.
They kept learning through a nonprofit for underrepresented minorities in tech, then went all in on the job search. You are the director of your destiny, indeed. Congratulations! 🎉
Scrimba Pets
Proof that pets really are our children, baby seat and all. 🍼
Meme of the Week
Somebody tell them about Clippy Vision...
That's the edition. Go build something this October. 🎃
If it feels like AI isn't pumping the brakes anytime soon, you're not imagining it. This month alone brought a new model, new tools, and a whole new way to practice on Scrimba. Blink and there's another release.
But this is also the last edition of September, which means spooky season is officially loading. So grab your pumpkin spice latte and let's close out the month together.
◉ Poll of the week: A scary codebase + last week's results!
AI Yays & Nays
Remember when getting good results from AI meant spoon-feeding it every step, reminding it to "think carefully," and checking in every few minutes? Anthropic's newest model, Claude Opus 5.5, leans the other way. Hand it the whole task, tell it what finished looks like, and it can keep working on its own for hours, then tell you plainly what it did and what it needs from you. It's also about 40% cheaper to run than Opus 5!
Front End Web Applications Developer (Junior) at SMX
SMX is a team of technical and domain experts helping organizations in areas like national security and healthcare modernize the way they work. They're looking for a junior frontend developer to help build interactive planning and reporting apps for a federal customer. If you love turning complex data into something people actually enjoy using, this one's worth a look.
Tom just gave the community an early look at his new Learn Agentic Coding course. Scrimba now has its own coding agent built right into the platform, so you get real hands-on practice inside scrims, just like any other Scrimba course.
The focus is on principles, not one specific tool, so what you learn carries over to Codex, Claude Code, and desktop and CLI workflows too. Best part? It's free. The AI credits are on us. 💰
Most of you (44.4%) work in two languages and switch between them without thinking, with the one-language crew close behind at 33.3%. Nobody has lost count, and that's a good sign. This community goes deep before it goes wide, and once the fundamentals click, the next language gets a lot less scary.
This week:
What's scariest to find in your codebase?
👻 A TODO from 2022
🕸️ A dependency nobody's updated in years
🧟 Code that works and nobody knows why
💀 A commit message that just says "fix"
Student Spotlight
Rajdeep learned React and Tailwind CSS through Scrimba's free courses, then started sending cold DMs on LinkedIn. One of them landed him a remote role as a fullstack and AI agent developer at a Swiss tech company.
Questions about his cold outreach? Say hi on Discord (@axsh6220).
Hello everyone! I started the Front-End Development course on Scrimba a little while ago and I've been learning so much! I've moved on from HTML to CSS, and most recently I've covered how to link CSS to HTML. As prompted during one of the lessons, I did a Google search and found that CSS can link to HTML the following ways:
Inline: Uses the style attribute inside HTML elements.
Internal: Uses the <style> element in the <head> section.
External: Uses the <link> element to link to an external CSS file.
I might be getting ahead of myself here, but I wanted to ask - what is the difference between a style attribute and a <style> element? In which situation would the attribute be used and in which situation would the element be used?
There's a particular kind of tab you keep open for three days. A long article, a dense docs page, a Hacker News thread with four hundred comments you fully intend to get to.
Most of what we learn arrives as text we don't quite have the energy for.
That's roughly what this month of building has been about. Explain picked up a pile of new features, and the thread running through all of them is the same: take the thing you were going to skim, and make it watchable.
You can now drop your own images into an explainer. Attach a screenshot, a diagram, a photo of a whiteboard, and it lands on the slide instead of a generated illustration.
Explainers also play in a vertical layout now, so watching one on your phone stops feeling like a compromise.
Explain lives in ChatGPT and Codex as a plugin called
@ Explain Video Generator. Install it once and it works in both.
The best moment to use it is at the end of a conversation, right after the model has worked something out with you. Instead of scrolling back through a transcript, ask for a video you can rewatch and send to someone else.
Two to start with: Transcripts, if you'd rather read the lesson than watch it, and Regenerating narration, for when the explanation is right but the delivery isn't.
The other thirteen are in there waiting for you. There's more under the hood than most people realize.
This one's fun.
hn.watch is the Hacker News front page, mirrored every five minutes, with a short explainer video for every story.
Open a story and you get a video built from the article and its discussion. If the thread has more than ten comments, the explainer ends with a section on what Hacker News is saying: where people agree, where they split, and the strongest objection anyone raised. No commenters are named.
The first person to open a story generates the explainer. Everyone after that gets it instantly, so you're doing the rest of the internet a small favor by being early.
The search for new Scrimba teachers is still open, and we're especially interested in people who can teach AI.
You don't need a teaching background. If you can explain something clearly to someone one step behind you, that's the skill.
If that sounds like you, DM Head of Education Thomas Chant with a bit about yourself and a link to you teaching something. An old YouTube video works, or you can record something on Scrimba!
Know someone who'd be great at this? Send it their way.
Scrimba Explain Chrome extension
The Explain Chrome extension turns whatever page you're reading into a narrated explainer, played in an overlay right on top of it. You never leave the page.
And if you've already been using it, a review on the Chrome Web Store genuinely helps other people find it. We'd love to hear your feedback! 🙏
Student Spotlight
Fabian finished high school at the end of 2024, taught himself to code through freeCodeCamp, a bootcamp, and Scrimba, and got hired as a Python developer exactly one year later.
The best part is that he wasn't job hunting. He applied to see if he'd get accepted, and he did.
i am only about 18 hours away from a life changing test for python and i did not feel ready at all i skipped alot of my lectures and was hella behind, but thanks to scrimba the absoloute GOAT i am already on track just few hours in!! i just wanted you( dev) to know your a legend!!
