• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Did I catch... the programming bug?

E

Evolutionary

n00b
Joined
Apr 8, 2011
Messages
40
I've been doing a lot of thinking lately, and it looks like I've settled on programming as my future career. I've always been into and up-to-date on the hardware side of things, but I've never really payed much attention to the software side of things. Lately, while encountering various tasks and issues, I've found myself thinking a lot "Man, I wish I could create a program to show me X at Y time or make A happen at B time" and the like and have finally decided I want to pursue a career in making these tasks possible. I've enrolled myself into the edX course on Introduction to Computer Science and Programming, which teaches the basics of programming through Python 2.* over the course of a few months and even offers a certificate from MITx upon completion. I've went ahead and started doing some studying tonight to prepare myself and found that I couldn't get enough of the stuff. I've written a very basic program that finds the area of a rectangle seen below:

Code: 
l = input ("Length: ")
w = input ("Width: ")
print "Area: " + `l*w`
raw_input ("Press<enter>")

While very basic, I feel an odd sense of accomplishment and can't wait to get to the real meat of the language. Though I feel a bit frustrated that I don't know enough to build anything quite useful, I know it'll come with time and I'll be frustrated over more advanced things. :p

Not sure why I felt like creating this, but I'll probably be lurking around this sub-forum a lot soaking up all that I can. See you guys later. ;)
 
tinkering is fun, doing it for a living is a different ball game
 
You should sign up for cs50x too on edx while you're there. It's worth taking both courses side by side.
 
Software development can have a very rewarding feeling, but just make sure that you do not get frustrated too easily. There will be lots of new stuff that will take time to figure out (No matter how many years you've been doing it); it just takes some amount of persistence and stubbornness to succeed. A person who gets flustered easily will most likely give up on programming. You need to be the type of person who can beat his head against the same problem for a few weeks straight and not give up while knowing you'll eventually find the answer.
 
Welcome. I've had the bug since 99', I don't think I will ever loose it.

++ It does take a certain type of personality and you never stop learning (don't just write code, read!). But I don't think there is another field that crosses over with every single subject, definitely keeps you on your toes.
 
I am in the same boat as you. I have always been interested but until lately, have thought myself to be too busy to spend time away from my full time job and wife. I signed up for 6.00x and cs50x Fall 2012 and haven't looked back.

6.00x just wrapped up and you will learn a lot (although I'm guessing it's just a drop in the bucket of overall knowledge you'll end up seeking). I'm halfway through cs50x due to it's more lax pace, BUT I recommend staying on a sechedule in a self-study course. There were times when I didn't touch the class for a few weeks, and the weekly pset would take me 10-12 hours to complete. I think the key is to do a little each day, at a minimum. Weekdays, weekends, everyday. I agree with an above poster that cs50x would be a great class for you too.

Now I'm taking the Stanford Introduction to Databases class and after 2 weeks, I like it. I really feel like I should buy one of the books for this class though, but I don't want to spend the $100+.

However, I am waiting for Code Complete 2 to arrive in the mail. I'm sure that will make my head spin, but I think it will be fun reading.
 
Thanks for all the words of advice guys, I really appreciate it! Going to start the CS50x course tomorrow. :D
 
Evolutionary said:
I've enrolled myself into the edX course on Introduction to Computer Science and Programming, which teaches the basics of programming through Python 2...it looks like I've settled on programming as my future career
Click to expand...
Careful. You seem to have a genuine interest in programming. Great. However, the leap from genuine interest to "I've settled on this as a career" is enormous.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top