What is the best way to get into SWE?
A 30 year old friend with only a highschool education and no programming experince was asking me how he could get into this field. I was suggesting him to learn python/ javascript, create mini projects on github and try to apply for internships. I would be really interested what would be your advice to him. TC: £90k (not at Samsung)
Depends on what he wants to do. If he doesn't care and just wants to break into the industry, I suggest he does frontend. I was in a similar situation as him. Started later in my life with no degree and now I am a swe. I suggest he starts with html, css, js. Learn those three from code academy. Then purchase "The complete web developer in 2019: Zero to hero" and "Junior to Senior web developer roadmap" both from Andrei Neagoie on udemy. That should be enough to land him a job and for him to know what he needs to study to further progress his career. Total cost of investment: ~$25 Or he could get a degree which I highly recommend. Hope that helps.
Very good advice thanks. My main concern was that noone will talk to him if he has no work experience or formal education. How was that for you?
It was difficult. I was ghosted by a lot of companies. But I never stopped. I kept honing my skills and doing side projects to make up for the lack of degree. It all worked out at the end. He shouldn't be afraid, companies will hire people without degrees as long as everything is rock solid: Coding skills Interview skills (behavioral and technical) resume Online portfolio Just note this path is harder due to always having impostor syndrome. If he is not self motivated and cant push through obstacles without help then I suggest a cs degree. Self taught is path requires a fuck load of persistence and discipline.
Maybe learn himself, do some side projects, then do a bootcamp to round it out and have some degree of legitimacy? He won’t get a high paying job at FANG but there are way more jobs that just require basic technical/programming skills.
The goal is just to get into the field as fast as possible and then maybe work his way up to FANG. In the begining even a shitty job would be ok just to have something on his cv. The question is what do you need to do to get those shitty jobs?
I started life as a software engineer in my 30s and it's completely doable to change careers. I did a second BS in CS but he could do a bootcamp, get a degree, join the air Force and get a programming MOS, or self study.
Golang, not python.