I started 20 years ago when I was in the 4th grade. Asked my dad who was a software consultant to teach me what he new about web dev. From there I got interested in video game development. I dabbled in flash, game maker, and unity over the following decade. By the time I had my BS Computer Science, I was no longer interested in game development. But the passion for solving problems with code remained. So that’s what I do to make a living now.
this post was submitted on 02 Jun 2023
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Programming
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Think it went, starting in the late 90s: Basic -> C++ -> Java -> C -> Ruby -> Java -> Python -> Nim.
No professional ambition and never got particularly proficient. Enjoy making code that does something I need it to do.
Necessity. I hate having to program, but there are many things I want or need that simply do not have a ready made solution. One example was writing a program to sync my off-brand RF controlled RGBW LED lights to the day/night cycle.
Copied basic code out of computer magazines, read a DOS 3.1 book cover to cover in the 80s as a kid. Just always drawn to it. Today I wrote some bicep code to allow my dev team to access the key vault in the lower environments but not the upper. I've done Vb6, flash actionscript, objective c, Java, C#, python, C++, SQL, ruby, spingboot, jquery, angular, react, Perl, PHP, VBA, Foxpro, T-SQL, and many other languages.
It's still fun.
I used computers since 5, but have only actually getting into programming when I got into CS degree in university by blind choose. It was difficult for me at first, but I have gone through most of that and now it's my final year. Wish me luck!
My stepfather Michael. I owe it to him.
He did drafting and design. One day ion the nineteen eighty's at work, someone gave him a TRS-80. He let me use it. It came with the obligatory box of unlabeled disks and several copies of 'digital' magazine. Among the disks was one labelled 'edtasm' in blue pen. It was the editor program for writing in assembly. I bought books on assembly (mail order through a local bookshop) and tried to create the 'pong' game. It was terrible. So much frustration.
When my stepdad saw that, he bought me an Atari 65XE home computer, which had an editor for writing in basic and had a port for saving the data off to a cassette tape so you could reload later. That was a fun time in my life and a good skill to learn early on. It made me unfearful of learning programming, which might have helped me more. I would go on to learn VB, C, C#, Autolisp and VBA.
Today, I'm a refractory designer, and my pet project at home is loading 3D CADD models into Unity where I play it like a video game, manipulatiing them in VR. At the moment it's mostly taking a hammer to it, but when my stress goes back down and I get back to it, it shows real promise.
I started a WoW guild in 2007, and installed a basic phpbb forum. But that was too generic for my liking, and I had a grand vision of setting ourselves apart via an awesome website built off the back of the forum login system.
What was I going to do? Pay an expert to do a proper job? With my money?
So that's how I got into PHP, and HTML /CSS, and everything since has just spiraled from there.
And yes, one of the first guild applications we got through my swanky new system failed because of an apostrophe. But this is how we learn!
Took a random programming fundamentals course in college. The rest is the rest
I started when I was 7 on an old Amstrad CPC464, together with a book teaching you BASIC. I mainly copy/pasted programs from the book until I learned some basics. It's been programmer's life ever since.
What a trajectory your life can take from one simple child's enjoyment.