

Ask HN:Finding a Break - de_la_espada

Hi,
I've been looking to get into programming (as a job) for a while now. I even moved abroad to pursue this idea, but that didn't turn out so good. I am...ancient. 26 in April.<p>I have set up www.freecoder.co.uk to attract some attention. Basically, I have discovered I lack intellectual self confidence (rightly or wrongly) so short of hacking my mind I would really like to work with a bunch of smart people for free for 3/6/9/12 months and just see how it goes.<p>I have considered working in open source, but would prefer to have people physically around.<p>Am I completely barking to even attempt this?<p>Everyday is filled with self doubt.
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iamelgringo
I have been an ER/Critical Care nurse for the past 15 years. I went to nursing
school right out of high school, because it was "a good steady job and you can
help people." I administered narcotics to a patient before I could drink
legally.

I had always wanted to be an engineer, but I believed people that told me I
wasn't smart enough.

I remember writing QBasic when I was 9 years old. I begged my father for a
modem for our computer for two full years. And, finally, when I was 14, he got
me a 2400 baud Hayes smartmodem. After weeks of mucking about with the
configuration and connection settings, I was at long last able to connect to
my first BBS. I thought I was in heaven.

I mucked around a bit on that BBS for an hour or so, only to have my father
try and make a phone call while the modem was connected. That's when it all
came crashing down. He was furious and forbade me from ever using the modem
again. I still don't know why it upset him so much. I think it had something
to do with the movie War Games that had come out a few years earlier. I think
Dad was scared I was going to hack into NORAD or something.

So, for years, I gave up on computers. I'd day-dream about being an engineer,
only to have people around me tell me I'd regret it, that I would hate it,
that I was too much of a "people person" and that my life would be a complete
waste if I spent it in front of a computer screen.

But, when I was 30, I finally decided to get back in touch with my inner geek.
I went back to school two classes a semester for 5 years. My work schedule as
a nurse constantly changed from nights, to days, to evenings, to weekends,
which forced me to go to school online. I kept plugging away at it and after 5
long years, I finished the engineering program at the University of Maryland
this past May. I still have some General Ed. credits to take, but I finally
finished the classes I'd need for their CMIS/software engineering degree.

This June I started to pick up web development and Django. For several months,
I thought I really sucked at, and I thought it all might have been a huge
mistake, because I could never get things to work right with Django. It wasn't
until 3 months later, when I went to DjangoCon, that I learned that the
release of Django that I had been working with for 3 months had been broken in
the lead-up to the 1.0 release.

Eight weeks ago, I cut down to part-time at work, so I could focus on boot-
strapping startups. If all goes well, I plan to release my first web app in a
couple of weeks. My plan is to keep bootstrapping startup after startup until
something takes off.

It's been a long, hard road, and I still have a long, long way to go and a lot
to learn. I've thought many times that I wasn't smart enough, or too old.
Things never really go according to plan. I get discouraged and frustrated a
bunch. But, the only thing that can really stop me from chasing my dreams is
my deciding to give them up for dead.

~~~
de_la_espada
Definite kudos to you. Thank you for posting. suerte.

~~~
iamelgringo
Gracias. Y a ti tambien.

------
dan_sim
Don't be afraid to ask for money. Money often means respect and with respect
comes self-confidence. If you are free, it means that you consider yourself so
bad at programming that people will not even consider you. You'll learn
nothing. You'll always be the "free guys" that everyone will laugh at. The one
that gets to debug stupid things or have to work on impossible projects. If
you don't need that money, give it to a charity but please, ask for money.

~~~
invisible
To add to this, remember people want your services. They want to feel warm and
fuzzy when they finally pay you and their product is working exactly how they
imagined (or how they require). If they never pay you, they will take a long
time to be satisfied.

~~~
chris11
Yeah, people usually want to pay for services they think are valuable. Right
now, I'm getting tutoring in one of my classes. My tutor was nice enough to
offer to do it for free, but I definitely wanted to pay him. He was doing
something for me that I considered valuable, and even though I'm a college
student who does not have a whole lot of money, I wanted to compensate him for
the tutoring.

------
physcab
You should look for small web development firms that might offer internships.
Right now I'm doing an unpaid internship. I don't have a car and the place is
10 miles away, so everyday I take the bus for 5 miles, bike the other 5 miles,
then do the same thing coming home. It's a ton of work for an unpaid job. The
work is stressful. But I'm learning the best practices of coding, how to scale
applications accordingly, and my work actually benefits the company. This has
been such an ideal opportunity, because before coding was just a hobby and so
I hadn't been challenged. But now that I've found a good community of
programmers and designers, I learn new lessons everyday and build up
confidence in my skills.

------
vicky
A spoonful of medicine to help overcome self-doubt here =>
<http://ub0.cc/0l/12> and here => <http://ub0.cc/4J/1j>

~~~
bd
Amazing. Instantly reminded me of Dean Kamen's robotic arm.

<http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/05/dean-kamens-rob.html>

------
lacker
Don't work for free.

Try finding a smaller software company (like under 10 people, perhaps a
startup) and working for them in any capacity they need people. Running ad
campaigns, managing forums, tech support, whatever. Once you have a job with
the company, you can then start helping out with programming to whatever
degree you are able.

------
utnick
WOW, you are selling yourself WAY short.

You are more than qualified for an entry level developer job FOR PAY.

Its a programmers market out there, if you can communicate half decently and
have a java cert from sun, you will be able to find a job no problem. Just
delete that webpage and keep sending resumes out.

------
rjprins
Hmm, I'll be 27 in a few months.. And I thought I was stil young!

Geez, now I think I'm old too..

~~~
de_la_espada
oops. sorry if my anxiety has proven infectious... The panic started to set in
when I realised I was rounding up to 30 and not rounding down to 20... Thanks
to everyone for their comments.

~~~
spoiledtechie
I can still round down to 20.... Thank god. I will be rounding up though this
year..

Can you guess how old I am. lol

------
wesleyd
Yeah, working in close physical proximity to quality people is hard to beat,
but you can learn a _lot_ even working remotely on a pre-existing project. So
go scratch an open source itch.

Also there ain't no such thing as a free lunch^Wprogrammer.

------
vidar
I like your idea, I cant help you per se but if it helps your selfdoubt then I
think you will do fine, based on your courage to try such an unconventional
path. And whatever you do, keep learning on your own time ... that never gets
old!

~~~
de_la_espada
Thanks for your support. I think the continual learning point is particularly
pertinent.

------
spoiledtechie
I will hire you for free.

Ill give you experience to work in the real world and work with you.

A few months down the road after the projects we have worked on together start
making money, you will then become a paid programmer.

If this is a serious inquiry, get in contact with me. We can work something
out. I only work in asp.net and C# and will accept vb.net so you have to want
to learn...

I am a one man team with the help of one other guy working on a few websites
ideas I have.

------
biohacker42
Self doubt is healthy.

Getting depressed and/or discouraged because of self doubt is not.

And your situation is by no means unique. It is VERY hard to catch your first
break as a professional programmer.

That is just how the industry is, the best way to get around that, is to do
what you're doing.

You don't HAVE to work for free but if there's no other way it's OK.

Work, produce code, make it open source, bring a sample of of your code to
your next interview.

------
RK
Maybe you should try working on some open source projects and or your own
projects while working in a shared space with other programmers, allowing you
to bounce ideas off them.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coworking>

------
vaksel
if you want to work for free...why not find something simple and do a startup
around that? Then release more and more apps as you learn more skills

------
quellhorst
I am willing to hire any and all free coders.

~~~
gaius
It'll be worth every penny.

------
cchooper
I got my first paid programming job at 25. I've never found age to be a
problem.

