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Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

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Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#31

Post by slav »

There is a lot of good advice in previous comments.

I'm just wondering, how is that you say you can code and you cant find a job / project to work on. I did my first project for money in PHP when I was 16 - no degree, no experience and not much code to show - just few HelloWorld playpen projects.

People rarely ask developers for a degree and even if they do, once you have impressive code to show is worth much more.

So my advice would be maybe harsh but simple - stop complaining and get working!

you can always use "drug dealer's" method - do the first project for free :)

Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#32

Post by brudgers »

marquis wrote: post #3

You know what I'd like to do? Offer free work experience more. I took another young guy on today, to mentor him through a project that we need done but not so badly it was worth us prioritizing it in our schedule. We're not paying him, but he's getting our time for free, and a good resume piece and reference from us if he steps up to the challenge that I think he can meet. Maybe more of us need to be doing this in ou…

If the unpaid trainee is working on open source projects under your supervision, that might be ethical.

On the other hand, a traditional apprenticeship entails a formal contract which places substantial obligations on the master...that's why most industries use employees today.

Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#33

Post by valuegram »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #29
marquis wrote: post #3

You know what I'd like to do? Offer free work experience more. I took another young guy on today, to mentor him through a project that we need done but not so badly it was worth us prioritizing it in our schedule. We're not paying him, but he's getting our time for free, and a good resume piece and reference from us if he steps up to the challenge that I think he can meet. Maybe more of us need to be doing this in ou…

Experience is not payment. You are breaking the law and exploiting the kid.

Not necessarily. The US Department of Labor posts guidelines on unpaid interns: http://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/whdfs71.pdf

Of course item 4 will always be a grey area: "The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the intern" - few employers would take action that provides no advantage, or impedes their business.

Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#34

Post by yummyfajitas »

viscanti wrote: post #26
yummyfajitas wrote: post #4

But without a college degree, experience or a stack of projects in my pocket no one is going to believe me. Step 1: figure out which of this is easiest to change. Hint: it's "stack of projects". Step 2: change it. Yay, github.

You need to be building things to learn anyway, so github fits that perfectly. There's such a low barrier to entry with getting started and putting up a project or two, and then adding more as time goes on. The key is getting the first project up there, and realizing that it doesn't need to be 'perfect'. The other big advantage of having a github is that it shows you're familiar with version control. Having a github…

The other big advantage of having a github is that it shows you're familiar with version control.

Also, put in a readme, that makes it easier for me to evaluate the project. And put in tests, so I know you are familiar with those. In short, show me you know what you are doing by actually doing it.

Committing to build and grow a github is probably the single best thing a developer without a degree can do.

Or even a dev with a degree.

I've gotten a number of interviews based on my github and projects, without even sending a resume. For all the interviewer knows, I never went to school. And when I hire, I look at github first, maybe a resume if there isn't a github. Or, equally likely, no github -> resume goes into the circular file.

Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#35

Post by aercolino »

Sadly, one busks out of need more than passion. But it seems to me that hunger is a metafore in your case. Otherwise you could exchange your laptop for a guitar and some lessons.

To document your experience the best you can do is to fix bugs into any popular open source project, like WordPress, Rails, ... If you know how to program, it will be easy for you to enter those dev groups and be taken into account.

Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#36

Post by parfe »

valuegram wrote: post #33
eli_gottlieb wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Experience is not payment. You are breaking the law and exploiting the kid.

Not necessarily. The US Department of Labor posts guidelines on unpaid interns: http://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/whdfs71.pdf Of course item 4 will always be a grey area: "The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the intern" - few employers would take action that provides no advantage, or impedes their business.

I think #1 gets ignored when talking about that list.

Tech Schools and University programs offer syllabuses which outline teaching a breadth of knowledge. If you assign an unpaid intern a project based on a need of your company then you likely haven't designed the project to be a teaching tool. (Which then runs into #4).

Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#38

Post by viscanti »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #34
viscanti wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need to be building things to learn anyway, so github fits that perfectly. There's such a low barrier to entry with getting started and putting up a project or two, and then adding more as time goes on. The key is getting the first project up there, and realizing that it doesn't need to be 'perfect'. The other big advantage of having a github is that it shows you're familiar with version control. Having a github…

The other big advantage of having a github is that it shows you're familiar with version control. Also, put in a readme, that makes it easier for me to evaluate the project. And put in tests, so I know you are familiar with those. In short, show me you know what you are doing by actually doing it. Committing to build and grow a github is probably the single best thing a developer without a degree can do. Or even a de…

Adding the readme also shows some ability to document a project, which is always helpful.

Test coverage is nice to have, but I don't know that it's a requirement up front. I can't think of any circumstances where having test coverage will hurt, so I'd agree that it should probably be there, even if you're not a TDD/BDD zealot. It at least shows that you're familiar with testing and can do it.

Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#39

Post by SandersAK »

rch wrote: post #23
SandersAK wrote: post #16

EDIT: "our" startup We've always got room at the lodge: http://gdkr.ma/LodgingSociety Seriously, we're always welcoming hackers to come hang with us in NY. We put you up, give you plenty of your own time to work on what you want, and ask for a part time contribution to our startup. Hit me up if that interests you, Adrian

This really looks like fun -- I hope it works out for you.

thanks! we've gotten a few really good applicants and hosted some passerbys including some YC alums :)

Re: Ask HN: A place to sleep, a laptop, no résumé and a hungry man.

#40

Post by marquis »

brudgers wrote: post #32
marquis wrote: post #3

You know what I'd like to do? Offer free work experience more. I took another young guy on today, to mentor him through a project that we need done but not so badly it was worth us prioritizing it in our schedule. We're not paying him, but he's getting our time for free, and a good resume piece and reference from us if he steps up to the challenge that I think he can meet. Maybe more of us need to be doing this in ou…

If the unpaid trainee is working on open source projects under your supervision, that might be ethical. On the other hand, a traditional apprenticeship entails a formal contract which places substantial obligations on the master...that's why most industries use employees today.

Wow, this thread sparked a lot of criticism, I should have clarified that it's work on open source, he gets to totally own the code. We're also not U.S. based.
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