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How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

mattdeboard.net

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Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#71

Post by cfarnell »

From his blog a year ago:

"... have just started back to school for computer science. I’ve been poking clumsily at programming for a few years, but only in the past few months have I actually started to take ideas of my own and successfully bring them to life.

... While I don’t think I can study an algorithm and announce its big Oh complexity, I’m getting there.

... going to school does take time away from my actually programming and self-learning about computer science in general."

Twelve weeks not exactly starting from scratch.

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#72

Post by mattdeboard »

troels wrote: post #62
mattdeboard wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"learned" was DEFINITELY an overstatement. I knew they existed is more accurate.

I'd argue that it still predisposes you very strongly. If nothing else, just in the abstract sense that you are familiar with the computer and don't see it as some scary or magical thing.

No argument there.

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#73

Post by billyarzt »

gwern wrote: post #34
salem wrote: post #10

I'm sure the work ethic gained from 10 years in the USMC helped

Let's not confuse correlation with causation; I once looked around for studies showing experimental interventions which actually increased work ethic (specifically, I was looking for studies on the Big Five construct 'Conscientiousness') and didn't find any. So, I'm sure the work ethic that let him join and last 10 years in the USMC helped.

How about being a single parent too. Regardless, all commendable.

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#74

Post by spacemanaki »

meanJim wrote: post #43
mattdeboard wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I answered the questions people asked. Are you for real?

I applaud you for all the things you've achieved, it's pretty commendable ( always like to hear stories about people working hard and getting stuff done ). But the truth is, it wouldn't hurt to go and take the time to re-visit the topics he mentioned and tie up loose ends. It would help your career regardless of what was said here. 2 cents.

What's ridiculous about your comment and rorrr's trollish one is that he probably already has (re-)visited them. He writes that he watched 13 lectures of the MIT intro to computer science OCW class. That definitely touches on data structures and algorithms.

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#75

Post by dlf »

oz wrote: post #39

My mantra for the past 2 weeks has been that there's never been a better time to learn to code, simply because the resources are so abundant and available. I'm self-learning web development right now. Between HTML Dog, W3 Schools and Google, I have more than enough information. I wanted to play around with WordPress-fired up a VirtualBox VM with Fedora, and an hour later had completed the 'famous 5-minute install.' W…

HTML Dog is absolutely awesome for learning, but just make sure you follow that up with what's different in HTML5. It'll make your life a bit easier. net.tuts+ and webmonkey are great places to get up to date. I've been meaning to try out teamtreehouse.com too, but just haven't gotten around to it yet.

Right now I'm trying to learn Python using Zed Shaw's Learn Python the Hard Way and The New Boston tutorials. I think once I'm comfortable with the language I'm going to try to build something. It seems like the best way to learn how things really work.

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#76

Post by dlf »

tsewlliw wrote: post #54
oz wrote: post #39

My mantra for the past 2 weeks has been that there's never been a better time to learn to code, simply because the resources are so abundant and available. I'm self-learning web development right now. Between HTML Dog, W3 Schools and Google, I have more than enough information. I wanted to play around with WordPress-fired up a VirtualBox VM with Fedora, and an hour later had completed the 'famous 5-minute install.' W…

from me to you: http://developers.whatwg.org/ is an incredible resource you might put above w3schools, despite w3schools amazing google juice.

Or this... this looks like a great resource. Looks like I've got some reading to do.

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#77

Post by mattdeboard »

cantbecool wrote: post #65

I don't understand it. Some of the people posting comments on this topic are acting extremely pompous. The word 'programmer' on a resume does not mean you're in a elite club or society. It means what the job title implies: a programmer is someone who writes computer programs. There are all different variations of skill level though, just like in any profession.

I am very surprised confused and disappointed at the parochialism here.

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#78

Post by spacemanaki »

The amount of negativity in this thread is depressing. I think a lot of people either didn't read the article or just skimmed it. For those of you who are citing Peter Norvig's essay, I also thought of the essay when I read this; it's one of my favorites. I've read it several times because it is humbling and inspires me to rise to the challenge of really becoming a great programmer. If Matt reads it he might feel similarly (if he hasn't already).

But do you really think Norvig would suggest that someone at his level is not a programmer? By my count, he's done about half the things on Norvig's list already and could be within a tenth of the fabled 10,000 hours (12 wks * 7 days * 8-16 hrs = just over 1000 hrs).

I agree that the title might have been misleading given how much prior experience he had, but seriously, this is one of those "if you don't have anything nice to say" moments. If he received that many emails from some random comment on HN that means there are a lot of people reading this thread right now who are in the same boat as he was and as the people asking for help are. What kind of community are we (I mean we as programmers and we as HN) if we denigrate Matt's efforts and these kinds of blogposts?

There are going to be more and more programmers in the world as the pace of computing accelerates and people are exposed to gadgets and technologies that excite them enough to peek under the hood. We should be encouraging them and welcoming them and telling them "yes, programming is awesome!"

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#79

Post by viscanti »

spacemanaki wrote: post #78

The amount of negativity in this thread is depressing. I think a lot of people either didn't read the article or just skimmed it. For those of you who are citing Peter Norvig's essay, I also thought of the essay when I read this; it's one of my favorites. I've read it several times because it is humbling and inspires me to rise to the challenge of really becoming a great programmer. If Matt reads it he might feel sim…

My biggest problem with the article is that it's essentially a puff piece about how awesome the writer thinks he is, and how special he is for being able to learn the basics in a short amount of time. The post is entirely too hand-wavy about actual details; telling someone to read some blogs, Q&A sites and code doesn't help anyone.

Where is the substance? Were there any interesting ah-ha moments? What would he do differently? What guidelines would he give to someone else in a similar position? How did he find an appropriate mentor? What was he surprised to learn? What can he do now that he couldn't do when he started?

There's so many things he could have documented that would have been helpful. He didn't write any of them. Instead, he made the implementation details seem mystical and gives the opinion that "hard work" (whatever that is) is the only key.

Re: How I Became a Programmer in ~12 Weeks

#80

Post by vkatluri »

mattdeboard wrote: post #77
cantbecool wrote: post #65

I don't understand it. Some of the people posting comments on this topic are acting extremely pompous. The word 'programmer' on a resume does not mean you're in a elite club or society. It means what the job title implies: a programmer is someone who writes computer programs. There are all different variations of skill level though, just like in any profession.

I am very surprised confused and disappointed at the parochialism here.

It's probably because you scare them. Here are people who have spent several years in school to gain a certificate that shows they know how to program. You may never be a competition to them in the job market but the knowledge that someone spent close to 12 weeks (not even a semester) and was able to land a basic job programming is probably rubbing their sense of entitlement the wrong way. Me personally, I have a M.S. in Computer Science but I work with a group of people, who, with sheer will and hard work, are in much better programming situation than I am. Not everybody gets to, or needs to, write a compiler or an operating system. Most of the applications are crud applications. Just because you are not of Linus Torvald's caliber doesn't mean that you are not a programmer.
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