Sep-13-2017, 07:13 PM
(Sep-13-2017, 05:40 PM)xBlackHeartx Wrote: And today my teacher rambled for an hour (literally) about how horrible the industry is. You don't have a say in anything, you're never going to be respected, you're going to be abused by idiots that don't know the first thing about code, you're going to spend 99% of your time doing stuff that I can't possibly do (such as actually interacting with people), and no matter what job you get, your life is going to be absolutely miserable.
I'm becoming increasingly convinced that I shouldn't be getting this degree. I'm never going to even try to look for a job in programming. Fuck it. Its not worth it. That's probably why their paid such ludicrous amounts of money for doing something that only takes an hour at most. Its because no one wants to do it. No one's willing to tolerate it for more than a few months. I'm really starting to understand why he teaches despite his experience working in the industry. I mean, the guy has a background in game production!
I don't even know what I'm going to do. There is nothing out there I can tolerate doing for any length of time. All I'm doing is wasting time getting this degree. I would just quit if I wasn't paying for this through financial aid.
I've been programming for about 14 years now. 12 years of that, I was getting paid. Some of that time, I was a consultant (ie: my own boss, working with people who don't know how to computer). The current job I have, I'm a software developer, and I've had this job for a little more than 5 years. That's just to help give a frame of reference for what I'm about to say.
Yes, you will run into people who think programming is dead simple. People who think building something complicated isn't a big deal, and can be done very quickly. This shouldn't be surprising, because there are also people who think building a house is as simple as slapping a frame together and screwing drywall to it. Lots of people think things are easier than they are, when they have no idea what's actually involved to do that thing.
If you get a job at a company that produces software/games, that will never be an issue for you. That's because your boss/managers used to be programmers themselves, so they're fully aware of what's involved, how time consuming things are, and how stressful it can sometimes be. These jobs are easy to spot before you're in them, as you can ask a few things during the interview like "what source control system do you use?", "what's your software development lifecycle consist of?", "do you follow any of the major processes, such as agile or scrum?", "what languages do you use?", "is using existing technology or libraries encouraged, or is it preferred to roll your own?", "is all your software written in the same language, or are your employees allowed to explore new technologies/languages?". For some of those, there really isn't a right or wrong answer, all that really matters is that they can actually answer them. If they say something like "I'm not sure, I'll have to check with {name}", then that person is probably not someone who knows much about programming.
If you can find a job with a well defined process, that's actually followed, or at the very least find a place that uses pair programming, it can be very enjoyable.
And remember, it doesn't really matter what languages you learn, as they'll eventually become outdated anyway. What matters is that you learn how to learn. Once you've become proficient in a couple languages, it shouldn't be too difficult for you to pick up a new language over a weekend or two ("oh, so {feature x} is just like in java, except it looks like this").
As to whether college is worth it, the answer is "yes". For now, anyway. Without a degree, it gets very hard to get an interview, regardless of how impressive your skills are. ...it also doesn't really matter what the degree is in, as the degree itself shows that you're capable of sticking with something for a period of time.