OP, anybody can copy code.
The real test is, what can you make on your own?
Think up a project you'd like to make. Even if somebody's already done one, like a shopping cart app or something, try making one on your own. Without having any of the code for it.
It can be very simple and rudimentary. Then build it up with more sophisticated parts as you learn more.
Then move on to a new project when you feel inclined to do so.
This approach offers several advantages:
1) It lets you know exactly what you can and can't do.
2) It helps guide you toward learning things you're actually interested in and which you have a use for.
3) It gives you something to show prospective employers (though I think you're far away from that point) and say "I have experience with this technology, see I made this and this and that!"
You've no doubt heard that many college graduates go out into the private sector and can't get a job, because they have no experience.
Employers look at them and say "okay, you spent 16 years doing what you were told, now what can you do on your own?" and the graduates simply don't have an answer for that.
If you can point to personal projects that you've finished, and which don't suck, then that's a significant advantage which might outweigh the lack of formal training. It absolutely won't put you in the running with college graduates who DO have personal/side projects or solid internships or whatever, but they're a minority.
As with any other field, passion and drive count for a hell of a lot. And autonomy is very difficult to offshore; Indian programmers for instance are very poor at being handed a broad task and returning a solid solution for it. If you can turn a broad idea for a project into a complete solution, then you might have a shot at getting hired as a very junior level programming intern. And that gets you real experience, and can start you on a serious career path.
But it's all up to you.
If I were you, I'd start a thread "I need ideas for a software project" or "I need ideas for an iphone app" or something. Every suggestion will suck, but they might inspire one of your own. Do research on it and think it through before starting to code, because thinking is MUCH EASIER than coding. Trust me on that. "Measure twice cut once".
But for your very first thing, just start really small and simple. Hello, world.
AND DON'T USE EXISTING CODE FOR IT. Close the book and write on your own, see how far you can get without having to cheat. When you finally do give up and cheat, that's fine, but go back and try again without cheating.
Every experienced programmer and developer often uses existing code and solutions. But we're worthless if we're stuck without them. It's the parts that don't already exist, that's what you need competent people to do. If every problem was just copy/paste, then you could hire an idiot and just teach them copy/paste. So learn how to do things that don't already exist. And how do you do that? By doing things that don't already exist, or at least by pretending that they don't already exist.
17 Dec 2012, 4:08 am
