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Trying to Become a Programmer

I'm as cynical as the next guy, but this note I just got really made me stop and think about things like the meaning of Thanksgiving, and the fact that there are real people behind that 10.2% unemployment rate statistic.

Here it is, presented raw and unedited -- kinda like life:

dear mr.ramel

forgive my lack of proper punctuation and caps and spelling.i never took typing and dont know how to use word. I was happy to see someone who taght themselves C languages. I have been doing that for about three years. up until recently i had been working 60 and 70 hours aweek at a hotel dining room bussing tables for about 15 years. most of the guests in this melourne florida hotel work for NASA,Grumman,Harris,Rockwell etc. over time i made friends with some of the IT people who work for these places. i decided to try to improve myself and asked some of them what it is they do and what should i learn to aim myself in their direction. one guy said"if you learn c you can go anywhere". so I started with c++.its been like trying to learn how to fly a martian spacecraft. being computer illiterate five years ago didnt help.stumbling around barnes and noble i have managed to pick up quite a few tiles on the subject of programming.At someone elses urging i have dipped my toe into sql but it seems to be quite a frigid subject.Another of my guests got me interested in cisco so i now have several books on telecommunications and internetworking.VB (or studio whatever) and java are a little in the mix.Ruby and php too. I'm far along enough now thatthe rules and sytax of these languages are starting to resemble each other. Now my goal is certification or a degree from whatever accredited institution I can get myself onboard with. I've been unemployed for several months now so I'm trying to take advantage of offerings the state of florida hasas far as scholarships and grants and whathaveya.Nothing definite yet.Not ruling anything out elseware as far as that is concerned. I can tell you one thing though. It's that I have been bitten by the IT bug and I'm gonna persue it and hopefully make it my career. I'll be happy to get involved with your blog or just contribut in some way as an IT neophyte. I like to just surf around and glean whatever flavor of IT is sittiing out there for free. It's guilty pleasure to register for some free webinar and type ":student" as my proffession just to get in. I'm just looking forward to getting paid for having so much fun. vty josh

Posted by David Ramel on 11/19/2009 at 9:19 AM

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Reader Comments:

Wed, Dec 9, 2009 joebaby

one step at a time is right, little brother

Tue, Dec 8, 2009 josh melbourne florida

Dear Mr. Ramel, i had no idea that my comments would be of such interest to people - much less you. I am deeply touched that your readers (espacially Mr. Baisden and "Mr. T")bother to be either disquieted at my IT naivety or go the extra mile to share their hard earned wisdom. I promise to take all of this respondence to heart.Given the vicissitudes in my life (that most have rightly suspected ) everyone is going to have to wink at my daliance with Mr. Baisden's monster until I make up my mind though. vty josh

Fri, Dec 4, 2009 Jason Baisden

I find myself rather shocked by some of your comments. This is a guy that is really starting from nothing and pulling himself along as best he can. He's unemployed so money is obviously an issue so he really has no where to go to be taught and has rather taken it upon himself to learn. If you were him, how would you know where to start outside of the advice he's been given? And how often among programmers does that advice vary? Often. To mimic some of the positive suggestions here, my advice would be to pick a language and stick with it. Don't worry about technologies x, y, z, etc. or you'll go nuts. It's a monstrous amount of material to digest and even harder if you don't have a basic grounding in using a computer, grammar, and typical word processing applications. I don't know where to tell you to begin as there are pro's and cons to any language you pick. In my area, C/c++ jobs are rare; .Net and Java developers are a dime a dozen; the list goes on. I would simply suggest that you pick something from the c/c++, vb/c#/asp.net, or java group of languages and begin by writing simple applications from there. Write a program that just prints some text to the screen (Hello, World as it's called). From there write one that does basic file processing such as reading and writing to files. The idea is to direct your learning based on the application you're creating. That's pretty much how my entire career has been, but, of course, that's not the only way to do it. As the phrase goes, there's more than one way to skin a cat. The same applies here. I wish you the best of luck in your endeavors.

Tue, Dec 1, 2009 Mr T. New York

Getting into programming as a trainee/junior programmer is almost impossible. It's going to be tough, I get resumes every day from unemployed people with years of experience in multiple languages and technologies. Try starting by creating your own website, there are places (including Microsoft) that offer free space for your site, really learn the technology and create something eye catching. There are kids out there with incredible sites, so really work at it. Add it to your resume, getting a job with a web startup may be an option, but you'll need proof of skills, and lots of dedication. You don't need to buy any software, there is loads of free stuff out there, including free versions of Visual Studio.NET from MS, Java from Sun, HTML editors from about 20 companies, Google. The list goes on and on.

Wed, Nov 25, 2009

Kudos for the effort to pull yourself by the bootstraps, but ditto on the encouragement to focus on one thing (C/C++ would be wise) instead of just brushing over every subject you've seen in a magazine.

Mon, Nov 23, 2009

I seen this and feel like I need to respond.I can relate to this guy and it is hard,as for one topic at a time well you have to dip your toe in to know what asp.net,sql,silverlight, ado.net,.net,ide,iis,c#,c++ and many other letters really are.If you don't have money to pay someone to tell you, then you do what this guy does,are you smarter than him? I'm not sure.Free learning is a smart move for everyone,don't slam him for trying,why don't you seriously try to help him and me.We might invent the next widget not because we can write code but because we are aware of what average joe really needs.That is what open source is about.

Thu, Nov 19, 2009 David Ramel

OK, so I'm NOT as cynical as the next guy!

Thu, Nov 19, 2009 bigpalooka

It sounds like this guy is enamored with the concept of programming. He gives no indication that he can produce a "Hello World" application. He's gone far astray from the goal of actually learning something. I remember my intro to programming - reading a million books, studying during every free second. I knew the concepts inside out. But then I sat down at a PC and didn't know where to start. Listen, guy. Stop dreaming and start actually learning and practicing what you're learning. One step at a time, one topic at a time. If you can't produce any coherent code, bussing tables is the future. (I'm not knocking bussing tables. It's a living.) And learn to type.