71–80 of 150 posts
I learned to code at 33. I am now working full time in the field. Before that, I was a sysadmin. I worked as a sysadmin from about age 20. I understood ops coming in and this let me punch above my weight. It took about a year for me to get good enough to apply for jobs. I would now be considered a good developer by most standards. This only happened because I found a fantastic mentor. He took me under his wing and pu…
Self taught coder at 44. My memory isn’t the greatest, probably one of the hardest things I’ve done, required so much persistence to get through all the frustrations, only reason I made it was due to huge motivation. There’s no way in hell everyone can learn how to code. Even if most people had the intellectual capability to code (which they don’t), most don’t have the patience and persistence required to follow thro…
For many years I told tried coding and told myself that I couldn't do it when it got to hard. But the honest answer is that I simply didn't want to put in the work.
Later in life that changed, and I started seriously working at learning to code around age 35 because I was having fun. I decided to go for it professionally at age 38, and got my first coding gig at age 40.
I have a slightly cynical view about this sort of thing, and assume that most might have some counter-arguments for why my cynicism is misguided. I get that the point of the post is to encourage others, but proclaiming to have "learned how to code" feels misleading because there is no real finish line for it. This is an open-ended skill, there is no such thing as being done with it, same with most other skills. Maybe…
Knowing how to code means you're able to go from an idea to working implementation in a reasonable amount of time.
- Have an objective - otherwise it's hard to know if you're making progress.
- Essential to lose anxiety about not knowing everything. Many languages are so big that a beginner can feel lost in them for a long time.
- Some things just take time to 'click'.
- Understanding the basics of whole 'stack' is really useful. Some things are hard without a mental model of how the machine works.
- Basic code 'hygiene' is really important - found Sand Metz's POODR really useful in this. Also learn to use VC early on.
Finally - as others have mentioned persistence is key and that links strongly to how passionate about your objective you are. I almost gave up several times but the objective pulled me back in.
This part stood out to me: > Every weekday - 1 hour post work > Every weekend - 4 hours on Saturday and Sunday each > Done over 4.5 months, so total = 234 hours As an almost-40-year-old that has minor coding experience (but wants to do / learn more) I find that time is the component that's the most difficult to overcome. I have a wife, a 5 year old, a house... all of which require time. Getting 4 hours _per day_ on a…
The most important thing is that you code daily on something meaningful to you. Even finding an hour a day can be difficult, but should be doable for anyone.
Self taught coder at 44. My memory isn’t the greatest, probably one of the hardest things I’ve done, required so much persistence to get through all the frustrations, only reason I made it was due to huge motivation. There’s no way in hell everyone can learn how to code. Even if most people had the intellectual capability to code (which they don’t), most don’t have the patience and persistence required to follow thro…
Persistence in the face of frustrations along with an actual enjoyment of creating things with code is what got me through.
Programming seems like it would be a dreadful job for someone who didn't get some satisfaction out of typing code and then watching as your code does stuff. Definitely not for everyone.
In my case, I didn't start out wanting to learn programming. I wanted to create a web site for a business idea I had. To do that, I started learning javascript and python. Pretty soon I realized that I was much more interested in learning more about programming and web development than I was about my business idea and that I'd rather get paid by someone else with a business idea to write some code.
Self taught coder at 44. My memory isn’t the greatest, probably one of the hardest things I’ve done, required so much persistence to get through all the frustrations, only reason I made it was due to huge motivation. There’s no way in hell everyone can learn how to code. Even if most people had the intellectual capability to code (which they don’t), most don’t have the patience and persistence required to follow thro…
I learned at 43. Got my first developer job at 44. This description rings true for me. Persistence in the face of frustrations along with an actual enjoyment of creating things with code is what got me through. Programming seems like it would be a dreadful job for someone who didn't get some satisfaction out of typing code and then watching as your code does stuff. Definitely not for everyone. In my case, I didn't st…
I want to say that this is essentially what "the knack" is for a lot of engineering/programming types. It's the willingness to beat your head against a wall dealing with something unfamiliar until it works and you understand it a little more. Some people can't stand it - for others the dopamine hit of finally figuring it out makes all the frustration worthwhile.
Self taught coder at 44. My memory isn’t the greatest, probably one of the hardest things I’ve done, required so much persistence to get through all the frustrations, only reason I made it was due to huge motivation. There’s no way in hell everyone can learn how to code. Even if most people had the intellectual capability to code (which they don’t), most don’t have the patience and persistence required to follow thro…
I learned to code around the age of 7, and I too agree that there's no way in hell we can get everyone interested in learning how to code. It's something I basically can't explain why I enjoy doing. How would you even get someone who doesn't understand programming to get interested in a career of software engineering?
Well, money will make people interested, for better or for worse (for worse, I think).
I started at 37 and got my first full time job a couple of months after I turned 38. I was a lawyer and hated it - now I love going to work every day. But it wasn't easy. I was working full time in a demanding profession and I'm married with two kids under 5 years old. So basically I spent every free moment I had working on learning HTML/CSS/JavaScript. If my kids were asleep, I was coding. I basically had to burn th…
How difficult was it to transition into the job market? I have always wanted to make the jump (in finance & accounting now) but the most daunting thing seems like convincing someone to hire you.
I learned to code at 29, and I'm sorry to say that, compared to to the author, I don't have such a rosy outlook... For context, I was a Product Manager, and fell in love with CS/SEng by taking Harvard's CS50 in my free time. I then did other MOOCs on topics like algorithms and software architecture before finally settling on a 12-course masters in Software Engineering at Harvard Extension. I took a hybrid approach co…