Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees • Hacker News Board

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#281

Post by adventured » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 4:17 AM UTC

Pete-Codes wrote: post #46

dyeje wrote: post #26

Was super confused by the name (was reading it as Noc Sok) until I clicked through to the about page which formats it as "No CS OK".

Fair enough - I might roll it into my other website No CS Degree in future.

Keep the name. Definitely keep the name. Six letter dotcom, easy to rhyme and easy to remember. Easy to brand, easy to put on things to distribute & promote.

At first glance the name seems a bit odd. That is quickly overwhelmed by the benefit of being easy to remember and being very short. It doesn't get much easier than noc sok (knock sock as someone else noted) when trying to remember the site later. Plus, this is a site for developers (for now anyway), they will appreciate the benefits of knock sock as a memory device, far outweighing the no-cs-ok vs noc-sok issue. And there's no bad connotation with noc sok (the classic ExpertSexchange issue).

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#282

Post by tjpnz » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 4:20 AM UTC

mywittyname wrote: post #151

tombert wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now, you should definitely get a CS degree or similar if you want to be a programmer. I would have done a lot better having one even though I got by without it. Also, my career path was ridiculous and is entirely non-replicable. I agree completely. As a dropout, I've had people bother me asking how they should go about a career in tech, and I will tell them unambigously "for the love of god, please go to school". S…

> Being self-taught is fun, but without credentials you end up having to work at companies that are willing to take chances, and as a result of that these companies have a propensity towards going bankrupt This is one of the notable difference between my pre- and post-degree careers: a degree opened the door to jobs with stable Megacorps. I still get the opportunity to work on cool, cutting-edge stuff, while also hav…

>Plus, if you enjoy programming, CS is an incredibly fun degree (when you take the right courses).

And in some countries it's also an incredibly affordable degree. I was able to pay off all my student debt with part time jobs between semesters.

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#283

Post by sportanova » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 4:25 AM UTC

amdavidson wrote: post #157

I understand the desire for a site like this from a job seeker's perspective (no CS degree here either), but what is the incentive for the employer? Are these no-CS job hunters not on every other site? As a job poster just put "No degree required" and your inbox should be flooded. I don't see "no degree" as a skill that needs to be sought by paying $99 to post a job.

It's another distribution channel for your job, with a highly concentrated audience.

It's like you want to advertise to parents, so you put your ad on the park bench at the playground

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#284

Post by winrid » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 4:33 AM UTC

mav3rick wrote: post #119

lostgame wrote: post #113

My lack of degree has never been relevant in my 12-year-long coding career, I have never had issues getting jobs I want and often seen them choose me over someone with a degree. Side projects, my obvious passion for coding, and eventually, of course, my experience got me where I’m at, making a triple-digit salary as a senior iOS developer at a major bank here in Canada. I’m so very glad I avoided the horrors of stude…

A lot of self taught programmers have gaps in knowledge especially when it comes to synchronization, how threading works, basic data structure and operation complexity on them. Whenever it's required they say "it's not required for web development". Of course I don't say this for all but many of them have this problem. Bootcamps don't help.

You can pick that up pretty easily and most do when they start interviewing for BigCorp jobs.

Feel like I had to comment since I'm self taught and I just read "Java Concurrency in Practice". :D

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#285

Post by winrid » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 4:34 AM UTC

I was so lucky that my high school was able to send me to a three year vocational CS class.

Don't have a real degree. But once I was shown what a function was my passion for this stuff just took off.

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#286

Post by ExtremisAndy » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 4:39 AM UTC

tombert wrote: post #168

mywittyname wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Being self-taught is fun, but without credentials you end up having to work at companies that are willing to take chances, and as a result of that these companies have a propensity towards going bankrupt This is one of the notable difference between my pre- and post-degree careers: a degree opened the door to jobs with stable Megacorps. I still get the opportunity to work on cool, cutting-edge stuff, while also hav…

I mean, I work for one of the biggest tech megacorps now (not going to say which one but I can guarantee you've heard of it), so it's definitely possible to get the stable job eventually as a dropout. That said, it was a rocky and scary road to get to this point; if you get your degree you can often start out immediately with some stability. I never took CS, as I was a math major before dropping out. Honestly, math i…

Not sure how helpful my reply is since I did my PhD in the humanities, but I absolutely did my doctorate while working full time and supporting my wife. Rare, certainly, but not as impossible as it once was. And this was at a legit, SACS accredited U.S. brick and mortar school, not some online diploma mill or anything like that.

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#287

Post by mixmastamyk » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 4:39 AM UTC

nullbyte wrote: post #203

mixmastamyk wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At a lot of places, yes. However, try getting even a "no thank you" form letter in response to a job post at a desirable company without a degree. First step in the hiring funnel: no 4-year degree --> /dev/nul. I live nearby Netflix, Space X, Hulu, JPL, etc with twenty years experience in what they do and have never even spoken to a single person at any of them despite applying for years. I'm good at what I do, now I…

Well there's your mistake. If you apply through their website, you're instantly being funneled into an HR tool that weeds out anyone without a BS in CS. The trick is to get in contact with that company's recruiters using a site like LinkedIn. Establish a bit of rapport, send your resume and portfolio, and let them handle setting up your phone screening and technical on-site. Recruiters are an amazing resource in our…

I won’t use linkedin and am gainfully employed on the east coast but get your point. I’ve talked to a few recruiters at meetups and such and it often goes well, unless they ask me to use linkedin. Too sleazy, no thanks.

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#288

Post by jlevers » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 4:51 AM UTC

I agree with the many people who've said (in essence) that for 90%+ of programming jobs -- i.e., writing CRUD apps or the like -- a CS degree is unnecessary.

But how about that last 10% of jobs? Does the degree open doors to cutting-edge, exciting opportunities that aren't available without it?

I'm in the process of deciding whether or not to drop out right now. I know that I have what it takes to self-study and get to a similar level of knowledge as a CS grad, but I'm wondering if not having a degree will preclude me from the less common, more exciting jobs that I'm most interested in.

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#289

Post by 19ylram49 » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 5:40 AM UTC

jedberg wrote: post #31

I've worked with a bunch of people who don't have degrees. At the more junior level, you can tell the difference, because while they tend to be really smart and can pick things up quickly, they have funny holes in their knowledge -- CS theory that you'd only pick up from a CS textbook, stuff like Big O notation or A* search (ok maybe that one is a bit more common now, but in the early 00s you didn't really learn that…

> By the senior levels you can't really tell the difference between someone with or without a CS degree. Experience definitely beats textbook knowledge after a couple of years.

Agreed. Absolutely correct!

Re: Show HN: I made a jobs board for developers without degrees

#290

Post by voxl » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 5:48 AM UTC

mav3rick wrote: post #123

benbristow wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did Big O Notation in college and I still can't remember which notation is faster/slower. After college/university you begin to forget a lot of the specific textbook stuff and begin to replace it with the put-food-on-your-table practical stuff.

This is not something to "remember". If you don't know this, you don't understand it.

I don't think so, I think this is one of the easiest things to forget.

Even in school, Big-O is used almost exclusively, very rarely do you see Big-Omega, Big-Theta, Little-O, etc. Even though in algorithmic analysis these are all used to give a more accurate characterization of the algorithms behavior.

Its funny, too, because the professionals (that are admittedly very smart) that like to talk down about Big-O as if it was a waste of time, seem to not realize there is a whole taxonomy of tools for analyzing and characterizing algorithmic complexity...