Reduce your learning Curve through Salesforce new learning tool Trialhead

4 Years back when I started Learning Salesforce ,I wish I had access to tool like TrailHead .

Please visit below URL to explore more

https://developer.salesforce.com/trailhead

What you need to complete TrailHead Challenges?
  
You will need Salesforce Developer ORG to work with TrailHead  Challenges .Make sure to have a work which has no custom domain enabled and also has no namespace.Recommend to sign up for new org.

You also require a sign up on developer.force.com .You enter into a world of Salesforce Developer Community through this site .


What will you gain by spending Time on TrailHead?

You will be able to do hands On Exercise which are carefully designed to test your understanding of the content presented and it makes sure that you work examples on developer org

What is Trailhead Badge? 

Once you complete a Challenge your developer profile on developer.force.com gets a badge to show case that you have completed all challenges and you have gained some pratical insight into subject presented in the module .

I came across this tool through twitter feeds and did not bother to try out assuming I will have no returns out of the tool since I almost knew all the topics that Initially Salesforce launched on this tool .Salesforce Lightning module was launched by salesforce when salesforce in this year Dreamforce .

I was quite confident that I would learn through salesforce release notes and developer guides .Because of hectic project work I really could not make time for going through release notes .One day I came across a twitter feed saying TrailHead is offering tutorial module on lightning components .This urged me to straight dig into this tool.

At the end of the modules ,I discovered this tool is really an excellent resource for anyone who is really new to any of salesforce topics .This is one of the reasons I went back and completed all the modules .

My favourite topic after covering all modules has been Visualforce Mobile .Lets walk through what we learn in this module

Get Started with Visualforce in Salesforce1

For a new developer before moving to this topic I would recommend to go through Visualforce Basics .Trailhead has a good module around this as well .Please visit below link if you are new to Visualforce

https://developer.salesforce.com/trailhead/force_com_programmatic_beginner/visualforce_fundamentals/visualforce_intro

Once you have completed Visualforce modules ,i would recommend some time to learn Javascript remoting and Remote Objects .This will help you understand this topic more 

You will learn how Visualforce pages can be used in Salesforce1 and also it will help you to reason out when to prefer  to develop mobile apps in Salesforce1 instead of using the Mobile SDK

Adding Visualforce Pages to the Navigation Menu

This module will help you understand how to make your VF available on your Salesforce 1 App.it covers concepts like sforce.one library

Implementing Global Actions with Visualforce Pages

This module will cover global actions and how to configure them for SF1 App.Also this will explain the the Publisher SDK and how to use CSS styling to get mobile look and feel for your Salesforce 1 app

Implementing Object-Specific Actions with Visualforce Pages

With this module you will discover you will now know how to develop VF pages and add an object-Specific action and configure the action to appear in SF1 App.

You will learn how to use publisher SDK to close the publisher and refresh the object page.

Using Visualforce Pages in Page Layouts and Mobile Cards

With Mobile Cards you can expose your VF on the Object related list in Sf1 app.This feature is explained and also you will become an expert on how to use Compact Layouts for Sf1 Apps.

Adopting User Interface Guidelines

This module came as surprise .Since I was not from design world ,I probably lacked this .This module will help you to learn responsive CSS and also the Visualforce components that should be avoided when building mobile apps.

Using CSS and JavaScript Mobile Frameworks

A complex Enterprise application will force us to adopt to one of well known frameworks when we are building an SF1 App using VF for responsiveness and ease .

Some of the JS and CSS frameworks we must be familiar for building Enterprise application  includes 

Bootstrap
Ratchet
Ionicframework
Angularjs


Hopefully this explains the importance of TrailHead .Also Trailhead team I have been knowing from Salesforce have been super helpful.

Please contact Josh,Sandeep Bhanot or Chris Duarte for any serious issues .I have tested all modules so far and they work great .

Tweet me if any issues and I am glad to help .

Also Trailhead has a developer forum and you can raise your issues here and developer community will be happy to help.