

Approching 30...What should I do? - OTAThirty

Hi All,<p>If this isnt a plea for help, I dont know what is!<p>I am hitting 30 next month. I am a qualified CS in UK on $65K+ Salary. For the last 5 years I have worked in 2 start-ups and 1 large telco in the UK. I have worked with outsourced developement teams in the 2 start-ups and I know how to do this effectively. Myself, I am a telcoms/Network Engineer with knowledge of VoIP systems and Cisco. I can fudge some php and basic Java (uni days), but am in no way a qualified programmer. I have longed to start something of my own up and being an idea's person, have kept a scrapbook of idea's for over 10 years. Most people probably find me eccentric, usually looking at problems with the world and trying to find solutions. I like inventing new ways to do old stuff, with little resources and no experiance, which most people find crazy, which I sometimes agree is, bacause most idea's never materialise!<p>Here's my problem (Aside from hitting 30 ofcourse), I can not completely understand the concepts of low level programming languages and be able to implement them e.g. C++ Pointers, polymorphism etc. Further more, I seem to have a great dificulty understanding MVC and therefore OO programming with PHP seems out of my league although I give most things functional in PHP a good shot. My second problem is I find it impossible to read books on programming and can not find the motivation to do this.<p>I have just started my first online SaaS using outsourced teams etc. Is this the right way to go? Anyone else in my position? What more can I do to motivate myself and further how do I program so I dont have pay others?<p>Am I going to make it? Please help me
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nailer
You can become a programmer from a non-programming computer profession. I was
a sysadmin for a decade. Now I code all day and get paid for it. I'm in London
too if you want to come talk at the London HN meetup next Thursday.

I suggest your issue may be you don't have the patience for a lot of non-
practical beginner type programming tutorials. Reading a book about Sally and
John sends you to sleep. It sends me to sleep too.

Here's what to do:

 __ _Make something really small that's useful to you._ __

> Myself, I am a telcoms/Network Engineer with knowledge of VoIP systems and
> Cisco.

Great!

* You need to SSH into boxes and run IOS commands right?

* Do people hand you spreadsheets with stuff to do?

* Maybe check if there's port capacity on a switch or something similar?

I'd make the smallest possible app to do that.

* First have it log into a box, run a command, and print the output

* Next perform some filtering, so rather than printing the output, it will check for something and tell you directly which ports have capacity.

* Next make it loop through multiple boxes in a text file

* Next make it read an Excel file with the switch names.

Python can do this (Paramiko does SSH, the xlrd & xlwt modules read and write
Excel), and is also currently the teaching language of choice. It's more
interesting than Java and more straightforward than PHP.

After that, I bet you've got some horrible annoying EnterpriseThing that
outputs some ugly XML, right? The lxml module has a cool feature called xpath
so you can extract the thing at '/report/stats/item[1]/' and do reporting on
it. You can make save it as JSON and use OpenFlashChart to make a cool flash
chart of the results.

Suddenly you're the guy that got info about 60 switches this morning. And made
cool capacity charts. People will love you for these simple ideas, and it will
make it easier to work on your more complex ideas.

~~~
OTAThirty
Thanks for your great effort here, its true, port capacity is an issue and one
that needs solving, so I can give what you've suggested, a try. Totally agree
with you about Sally and John, does my head in. If I have to write one more
"hello world" in a new language I am trying out..lol

I do love coding, I can get immersed in my code to the point where, 10-15 hour
stints head down, not an issue, especially helps being an insomniac!

I have done some Python already and agree, its ' the teaching language of
choice'. again, I will try the OpenFlashChart route and see how I get on.

One more issue I would love to address is CSS...Am lost with this one, is it
required? or should I simply ignore this for now altogether.

Thank you for your advise.

~~~
nailer
No prob. CSS I'd honestly leave to someone else right now. Sites like OSWD can
be helpful for getting pre-cut free stylesheets that don't look bad - focus
your own efforts on the Python code that collects and sends the data.

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xsmasher
I'll be the buzz kill here. It sounds like you are struggling with coding. You
seem to have a desire to learn more, but not the "motivation" to do the study
required.

Do you enjoy coding? If so, why no motivation? If not, why do you want to do
it? Find something you enjoy and/or something that matches your natural
ability. If coding has not clicked for you yet then it might never click.

~~~
xsmasher
Sorry to self-relpy, but I re-read your post and found your answer: "how do I
program so I don't have pay others." I think that's a terrible reason to get
into coding, and counterproductive.

I don't make my own clothes to save money, or build my own car to save money,
or even change my own oil to save money. I seriously doubt you can save money
by doing your own coding if you have no aptitude for it.

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petervandijck
You can start heaps of successful startups and program all the code without
knowing polymorphism. You don't need OO programming. You don't need MVC. Check
out Rasmus Lerdorf's blog, the creator of PHP. He doesn't use MVC, objects or
any of that stuff :)

But it sounds like you don't enjoy programming, which is a problem.
Outsourcing is NOT the way to go, a major pain. You'll get more leverage out
of getting a good technical cofounder. But then again, outsourcing might work
if you're great at project management (but very few non-technical people truly
are).

------
ivanstojic
> I seem to have a great dificulty understanding MVC and therefore OO
> programming with PHP seems out of my league

Are you sure you are not mixing up the order of learning things here?

~~~
MisterWebz
I think he's mixing it up because, like he said, he doesn't like reading
programming books. He probably didn't read everything very thorough and
skipped a few chapters. I used to do this too. I ended up not being able to
solve simple problems which could've been solved easily if i had read some of
the chapters more carefully.

------
petervandijck
and pps: nobody wants idea persons. Being an idea person is just another way
of saying you have no skills. Having ideas is not a skill, and thinking your
ideas are great isn't a skill either :) ok that was too harsh but you know
what I mean?

~~~
OTAThirty
Thanks for the advise, although I disagree with you when you say 'Having ideas
is not a skill'. Having idea's is a massive skill and I found this out when
working on two great startup. Coders who just code, simply could not think out
of the scope of their languages and coding skills, hence they create a great
product, but could not think of a single way to monetize it/improve the design
aspects of it. I sat back and watched an entire team of very talented coders
and PM's battle it out in the board room and yest, no result.

I don't think am brilliant, in fact ATM, the exact opposite, am hitting a very
depressive time and don't think much of myself at all, but I do remember that
day very clearly and when the arguing stopped I simply said, How about we do
this and see how we got on, not one person including the founders, had though
of it and not one of them disagreed. Anyone out there who has idea's should
consider this a massive asset and I encourage it greatly in all types of work
places. Too many thinks are done, because "we've always dont it this way".

Not all idea's are great either and one should know this when throwing idea's
to a group of people, accepted criticism is a massive part of being an 'idea
person'

Again, thanks for the advise above.

------
raintrees
Are you having fun? Are you enjoying life? Are you increasingly feeling
safe/more comfortable? For me, these questions remind me to enjoy the journey,
periodically make a course correction, and make sure I am stashing something
for the future while I have the resources.

What is the value of 30? Or 40? Beyond symbolism, don't the first group of
questions stay the same?

~~~
OTAThirty
Am always enjoying life, but I want to be more successful and run my own
startup. I make a good living, have all the necessities in life, which being a
basic person, is a roof, a set of clothes and some bread and water (some
chicken thrown in ofcourse..lol). I live a basic life and have excess amounts
of cash to invest into the AIM etc.

Here's what I missed out...am not having fun. A 9-5, I can not stand but lucky
for me, I don't do have to do this. I go in when I want and finish when I
want, my employers know I get the job done and just leave me to it. However,
working for an organisation which its not allowed to make a profit is dragging
me down.

I had the motivation to create great products managing teams, highly
successful business models and double/triple profits for my employers. This
may have left me feeling sh*t if my employers cashed in and I didnt, but most
times, I was rewarded heavily. I have dont this for employers, now I want to
do this for me.

Currently, I just keep a non-profit organisation plodding along, and so long
as we break even at the end of the year, everyone keeps their job and we plod
along!

This was important to me 2 years ago. My marriage had ended and I needed a
stable thing, with the huge mortgage burdon she had left me with. I still have
this morgage burdon, one I could seriously do without considering I dont care
to live in a house or a caravan but with the market at an all time low, am
stuck in a position where I will loss over 40K if I sell now. All my cash and
not the banks so am not in negative-equite with them. You'll think am crazy
here, but I dont care about cash, and have considers loosing 50K to get out.
To me, its only money and hapiness is definately more important, however, when
I evaluated my life once I sell, I simply end up renting and paying the same
as the mortgage, so there's no point. How can I have fun in what I currently
do is the question am asking myself now?

Thanks for helping me reach this far.

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warp
Don't worry about MVC just yet. Just start coding, get domething up and
running ASAP. At some point you will start writing some code and think, "there
must be a better way to do this". At that moment, research a few design
patterns and other solutions.

It is more difficult to learn the solution to a problem if you have not
encountered the problem yet.

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srgseg
If you hit it hard, don't give up and are relentlessly resourceful, anything
is possible.

However, esp if you live in London, the real question is whether you're
willing to endure several years of pain in case you're not immediately
successful and profitable.

------
hga
For motivation, have you tried the approach of starting with a _modest_
problem and a book on a language and learned the (beginning of the) language
as well as basic programming through solving the problem?

------
petervandijck
ps: why is hitting 30 a problem? You seem to be doing just fine?

~~~
OTAThirty
30 is hitting hard on me and I agree with the other posters here and yourself,
am stressing but its just a number!

I have a need, its simple, I need to be financially independent. This doesn't
mean I need multi-million pounds and be able to afford lambo's. I am a basic
person, so for me, to have enough income to live, a house paid off and little
excess money to go out every month although this latter isn't a requirement,
considering I have gone out every weekend for 2 years and have spent no more
than a couple hundred pound. I don't drink and my friends don't let me ever
pay for theirs.

