While it isn't directly related to the topic of the thread, is the Imposter's Handbook a suitable purchase for someone who didn't major in CS in college to "catch up"? I had two intro to CS courses during my undergrad and took several night courses while employed at my first job and did get a tech-facing career, but once I got that job I haven't had the energy to go back and tackle things like Data Structures and the maths I have to take all with the pressure of a grade.
OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
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Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#12I'm not sure this is meaningful as a path to employment in the US if you don't actually get a degree at the end.
I've gotten calls from at least five recruiters this week alone all excited to have finally found someone who's at least done some C only to realize that I haven't finished the community service hours for my degree (I've done all the classes but the university won't officially confer the degree until I've finished this, that's made my summer pretty complicated which has actually made it a lot harder than it needs to be, thankfully I'll be done in a couple weeks.)
What you actually know only matters once you're hired (at least for your first couple jobs.)
But it is always good to be learning new things and if that's why you're doing this than good! I've been teaching myself violin and I can definitely appreciate classical music more because of it, I absolutely don't expect it to get me a job.
Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#13Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think you're missing the point here. Most college students don't even pick a major until their sophomore year. Many "self-taught" developers went to college and took "pointless" philosophy classes, they just decided later in life they wanted to learn software development. Most people who attend bootcamps have college degrees, including many in other engineering disciplines. College CS courses aren't necessarily des…
> College CS courses aren't necessarily designed to be practical; many are more theoretical and not really practical for day-to-day SWE jobs. This is the mentality that I really dislike about these courses. How exactly do you get to decide if something is just "theoretical" and "not really practical"? Everything in CS was purely theoretical at one point. It's easy to say "practical means stuff that is used in the ind…
I guess my question is if there's even such a thing as a "non self taught front end developer"?
No 4 year university will teach you React as part of a CS degree. Most probably won't even teach JavaScript. Point is, becoming a good developer is largely a self-taught discipline as is.
Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#14Browsing throughout those courses I found out that more then 50% of them require you to either sign in with FB or Google in order to access them, so no thank you. Remember, if something is free then you're the product.
it doesn't always have to be nefarious.
By having a FB/Google sign in a website won't have to deal with implementing login, registration, email verification, forgotten passwords, etc.
Oh and even better; if they get hacked then all the hackers will be left with are hashed FB/Google IDs.
Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#15Earlier quoted context omitted.
> College CS courses aren't necessarily designed to be practical; many are more theoretical and not really practical for day-to-day SWE jobs. This is the mentality that I really dislike about these courses. How exactly do you get to decide if something is just "theoretical" and "not really practical"? Everything in CS was purely theoretical at one point. It's easy to say "practical means stuff that is used in the ind…
I guess my question is if there's even such a thing as a "non self taught front end developer"? No 4 year university will teach you React as part of a CS degree. Most probably won't even teach JavaScript. Point is, becoming a good developer is largely a self-taught discipline as is.
>No 4 year university will teach you React as part of a CS degree. Most probably won't even teach JavaScript.
You're conflicting computer science with being a developer. A CS degree isn't about learning how to program in the industry.
Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#16You could also get a free Udacity account and watch the Georgia Tech CS Master classes (OMSCS). Algorithms, Machine Learning, Operating Systems, etc. It's a good program.
Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#17Does anyone have a similar resource for applied math?
I am looking for something that goes beyond the standard calculus, linear algebra and stats material. For example, optimization, numerical analysis, stochastic processes, dynamical systems etc.
Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#18I really like this list, but believe it's wrongly titled. I'm a nuclear engineer, who pretty much just writes modelling software all day. The software architecture stuff is something I've never been taught and always felt would be immensely valuable to learn. Some good resources for that on this list.
Also a request for any resources of scientists trying to get their head around how to write good software, we're all pretty much people who once read a C++ tutorial and just went with it.
Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
I guess my question is if there's even such a thing as a "non self taught front end developer"? No 4 year university will teach you React as part of a CS degree. Most probably won't even teach JavaScript. Point is, becoming a good developer is largely a self-taught discipline as is.
>No 4 year university will teach you React as part of a CS degree. Most probably won't even teach JavaScript. You're conflicting computer science with being a developer. A CS degree isn't about learning how to program in the industry.
No, I'm in agreement with that view. I'm responding to OP's line "If you're learning to code just for fun, these things are totally fine and can be incredibly fun, but if you're learning to code for a job, please don't treat these things as an "alternative" to college."
Re: OSSU: A path to a free self-taught education in computer science
#20Browsing throughout those courses I found out that more then 50% of them require you to either sign in with FB or Google in order to access them, so no thank you. Remember, if something is free then you're the product.
Make a fake google/facebook account.