Can we fix the glaring typo in this article title?
Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
11–20 of 49 posts
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#12tl;dr - Yes.
Studying is still very important and valued by a lot of companies. I'd recommend to study in something else "complimentary" that passionate you and learn/improve in software engineering outside school to have a more diversified skillset. That's what I did 4 years ago, landed my first software engineer job and now had the opportunity to move to London because of that!
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#13I was in the same situation and after 3 years of open source projects, figuring out what language I wanted to stick with and finally nailing a interview "after many many strange ones" I got a great job. I've quickly grown in my company and others look to me for guidance "I actually introduced them to git". I hated general college classes that weren't related to programming and sitting in rooms where after a semester…
So what did you stick with? Im having the same dilemna...I think PHP, Java, JavaScript and C# are the way to go. So far focusing on just js and php has shown noticeable improvements...
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#14In order to get a job, you have to get an interview. You are way more likely to get an interview with a CS degree, then without. It really doesn't matter how good of a self-taught programmer you are, because no one will take you seriously. In my experience, side projects and code tinkering are discounted during the interview and hiring process - I agree, this is dumb.
I don't like or agree with any of the above, but that's how most of the world works. Put in the time, get it done. 10 years from now you will be very happy you did.
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#15Some will, some won't - concentrate on smaller companies, and have a portfolio of your achievements. Try to target a niche. Don't be put off by rejections, you only need one yes and you get infinite lives.
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#1695,476 jobs posted
http://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=%22bachelors+degree%22&l=
5,308 jobs posted http://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=%22in+lieu+of+degree%22&l=
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#17I was in a similar boat.
Classes did nothing but made me yawn, spent time creating web apps for myself and for personal group of people.
Soon, people realize that is your specialty, got a few part time job as a web developer during college through invitation. It was good to know how a paid job works.
I quit college seeing no hope of willing to complete it, then several years later, started to work in a company for a year just for the sake of it, now I go independent getting enough work without asking for one for years all thanks to the knowledge I acquired back then.
If you're imterested in a tech, dive into it, create something out of it, so you and others realize what you're capable of. Take your time to learn what you like, it pays off well later as you have no time to learn deeply after you start working as schedule becomes more important than quality of your work most of the time.
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#18Try this two site
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#19work on your own projects whilst doing whatever you need to complete college? most degrees require miniscule amounts of work. I graduated top 5% of my class and basically never attended....
Re: Ask HN: Do companies accept self-taught programmers?
#20TL;DR --> You can find programming jobs flooding on the internet 24/7/365. If you have confidence in your skill, theoretically speaking, you'll get a job in an hour or less. Just search for "freelance programming jobs online".
Learning C++ course on college may not do much to enhancing your problem solving capabilities in programming because when the classes are not fun itself (as you mentioned), I can assure you that you will not learn much but detest the programming classes itself and I regret to tell you this but you may end up renouncing programming itself, which you just said you want a job in. Albert Einstein said that after a year or more of mind-numbing classes in highschool that did nothing to excite his creative potential, he found that the same scientific concepts that fascinated him in the past felt utterly distasteful for almost a year when he entered college.
Finally, after reading half of the Internet's how-to on "how to code" and "how to be a skilled programmer", one answer was always common in all of them:
- THINK OF AN IDEA AND WORK ON IT.
They mention that if you don't have a purpose to learn to code, you shouldn't learn to code at all. So, let me link to eye-opening articles that debunk the myths of programming I found in this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9823985.
- http://fourhourworkweek.com/2013/11/03/productivity-hacks/ - http://blog.codinghorror.com/please-dont-learn-to-code/ - http://norvig.com/21-days.html - http://www.invokemedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/venndi...
When you build apps or websites that do something you wanted, only then you gain the confidence and skill to work for others on their projects, isn't it? And that time will come when you will be overwhelmed by the number of jobs you can apply to. So, "no skill, no job". :-)