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My best advice from a fellow 30 year old: Try to find an in-home caretaker that also knows programming. They're uncommon but invaluable when you find one. My caretaker is a young man currently in school for computer science. He comes by once a day to check on me and gives me brief programming lessons while heating up my soup, helping me up the stairs or doing jigsaw puzzles with me.
When I hit a wall in my early 30s, after a decade of testing and writing software, I went back to school and got a bachelors degree in CS. It has proven to be a good decision. It was not easy to manage the logistics, and it cost a small fortune in loans to maintain a family and mortgage through that, but it was worth it. I started out taking night classes at community college and eventually went back full time to fin…
I was working and took one class a week, at nights and/or on weekends. This was not all that bad because even if it went slowly, I really learned each subject well and got high marks.
At one point I got laid off, and went full-time on my severance, unemployment and savings. When unemployment ran out I got a low paying, part time consulting gig (and cut my classes from 5 a semester to 4 and then 3).
After class or office hours with your CS professors helps. They often know a lot.
Also, there are projects out there like this - https://github.com/danielgindi/Charts . It is in iOS, an OS you know. There are plenty of open issues, and there are plenty of pull requests that have been accepted. It is a pretty popular library, so the devs with commit access probably (although not necessarily) know what they're doing. I'm sure they'd appreciate you jumping in and looking through the issues and seeing if you can solve one of the problems. Then you send it in and see what they say. As you become familiar with the project, you can watch how they handle issues and write code, and will learn more.
That's just one project that might be up your alley, there are many more.
My best advice from a fellow 30 year old: Try to find an in-home caretaker that also knows programming. They're uncommon but invaluable when you find one. My caretaker is a young man currently in school for computer science. He comes by once a day to check on me and gives me brief programming lessons while heating up my soup, helping me up the stairs or doing jigsaw puzzles with me.
if you want to learn something, learn it. the resources at your disposal already are extremely broad and deep.
My best advice from a fellow 30 year old: Try to find an in-home caretaker that also knows programming. They're uncommon but invaluable when you find one. My caretaker is a young man currently in school for computer science. He comes by once a day to check on me and gives me brief programming lessons while heating up my soup, helping me up the stairs or doing jigsaw puzzles with me.
I'm guessing this is a reference from something. What's it from?
I think everyone here is being a bit cavalier when they say "it's never too late". Sure, just like it's theoretically never too late to start a company or even run for president. In reality, mentors tend to gravitate toward younger mentees. There are various reasons for this. Younger folks tend to be, in general, more enthusiastic and less knowledgeable and experienced -- fertile ground when you have something to giv…
Yep. There is something in the human heart that falls for people who are young enough to be their children. That same awe-shucks people get when they see a baby is the same feeling one gets when they feel the desire to mentor someone. In an industry where there isn't many people older than 30, it's going to be much harder to find someone who looks at you as the child they never had.
OP, in a university setting it is easier to find mentors. Look for professors, grad students and in-class TAs if possible.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep. There is something in the human heart that falls for people who are young enough to be their children. That same awe-shucks people get when they see a baby is the same feeling one gets when they feel the desire to mentor someone. In an industry where there isn't many people older than 30, it's going to be much harder to find someone who looks at you as the child they never had.
I don't really agree with this. 30 isn't that old. Also, some 30 year olds still look like they're in their early 20s, so you can't tell their age to begin with. OP, in a university setting it is easier to find mentors. Look for professors, grad students and in-class TAs if possible.
In any case, I was only confirming the answer I was replying to and sharing my thoughts, which you can choose to agree with or not.
The OP is 30, perhaps a bit late to take on a full college schedule.