What does it take to become a web developer or designer?

How long would it take to become a back-end web developer?

• As in someone with a full time job doing back end web development. Lets assume zero knowledge. Also I would appreciate it if someone went through what they would exactly study/do. The amount of information is a bit overwhelming.

• Answer:

  If you go by the rule that it takes around ten thousand hours of practice to master something, it'd take you a little over a year if you worked at it 24 hours a day. So lets say 2 years if you devote the majority of your non-sleep time. I imagine that at this point you'd be able to get the job if everything else was in order. If I were to start today, I'd take Harvard's CS50 course on iTunes U. It's free and really does a great job of teaching fundamental concepts and conventions. Upon completion, I'd read about some of the different server side languages and try to learn one or two by writing some basic applications.