CodeRookie has a really good introduction to starting your script by writing pseudocode. Particularly if you didn’t come from a more formal programming background, you may never have written pseudocode. I know that more than once I’ve written pseudocode for a junior programmer only to have them look at me like I just handed them complete gibberish.

Writing out exactly what you intend the code to do before you put a single bit of executable code into the file can help you understand the problem and your solution better. It also makes collaboration easier and has the extra bonus of leaving you with a well-documented bit of code when you’re done.

It’s a nice guide if you’re curious how to go about it and uses PHP as its example language.