chokk Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 Hey all,Topic title says all. I'm really curious - is it a hobby or do you do it for a living? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
justsomeguy Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 It's a hobby and a living. It's a craft and an art. I've been programming professionally for around 9 or 10 years, I got my degree in 2003 but was working prior to graduating. I started classes in 1998. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeffman Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 Hobby and supplementary income. (I have a full-time job doing other stuff.)I started programming when I was about 14, in 1977 or so. BASIC, the ancestor of VB, was the language I used. I dropped it for a while. When I got my first PC in 1989 I picked it up again. All MS-DOS systems came with BASIC built in, and a lot of software companies got their start writing code in BASIC. Then I learned C. Because I work at a college, I had Internet before there was even WWW: email, ftp, gopher. When HTML went live, I jumped on it. This was 1992-93 or so. Since then, I've just stayed on top of new developments. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowMage Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 Got to agree with JSG. It's both a hobby and a living. I've only been doing it as a career for about 2 years, but I've been programming for fun for about 5 or 6 years now. Problem is, I don't have a lot of time for the personal, hobbyist programming anymore......I've been working on a dairy herd management application for the last 2 or 3 years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
justsomeguy Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 Hmm.. a Bovine Management System, huh? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thescientist Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 I went to school for programming back in the early to mid part of the last decade, but didn't do much with it until about 2008 as my hobby in web development landed me a client at the job I worked at updating their website, and eventually completely re-doing it. I then moved a couple of states away and applied for a programming job here in RI and got the job. The job itself covers lots of languages (Javascript, Java, SQL, XML, HTML/CSS, PHP - pretty much in that order) and platforms (iTV development, web development) and on the side I make websites for my own little music recording hobby/business and for my friends and their hobbies/business. I came up with an idea to develop my own web app for musicians to manage songs in their repertoire, setlists, and gigs, etc. So far it's still in the thought stage, but have plans on taking it to the documentation/specification stage in the near future. I'm also half-way through an MBA program. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thescientist Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 Hmm.. a Bovine Management System, huh?methane distribution implemented to provide re-newable energy!orSim-Bovine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
justsomeguy Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 methane distribution implemented and providing energy renewabilityThe mDIAPER system. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
birbal Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 I am now student and persuing a degree for computer science.Its not only hobby for me, I am pationate about it...I spent most of hour of my day behind it,I love it lot. Dont want to think for living for now, just want to learn now.But In future i am willing to take it as proffesion. Its being around 1.5 year i am in my garduation...expect from that i did some course on c++ after my school final ..but that phase was quite isolated..Working with PHP less than one year...nothing impressive Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
birbal Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 I got my degree in 2003 but was working prior to graduating.I am little curious how did you got a job before your graduation? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeffman Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 Gotta be a passion. People come to this board on Monday with a question and don't look at the answer till Wednesday. I'm like, think about a different career. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thescientist Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 The mDIAPER system.catchy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowMage Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 The mDIAPER system. I like it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
packrat Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 since family life has settled in don't have much time for hobby programming... having nothing resembling free time anymore, got little kids instead.programming professionally since 1997 ( started Delphi I & III; object pascal )used to do a lot more hobby programming, when there was time to burn.I'm right there with Deirdre's Dad, right around 1977 taught myself BASIC by entering programs out of books into my TRS-80 COCO 4 (64k dream machine), think I was in the 5th grade at the time, give or take. I had some classes but don't have a degree in computer science, actually have a degree in studio art (oil painting) and technical theatre. Did have some mentors along the way, but by and large learned the most from reading and doing.Passion, dedication, and attention to detail are important, a little OCD probably helps as well, enough perfectionism that you're never completely satisfied with what you've done but not so much that you can't ever get anything done.my 2 cents... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thescientist Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 Passion, dedication, and attention to detail are important, a little OCD probably helps as well, enough perfectionism that you're never completely satisfied with what you've done but not so much that you can't ever get anything done.very well said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeffman Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 ^^ especially the OCD part. And who says changing all your tabs into spaces isn't "getting anything done"? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowMage Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 ^^ especially the OCD part. And who says changing all your tabs into spaces isn't "getting anything done"? I do that alot. Even when I'm "quickly" testing out code somebody posted here looking for help... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeffman Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 ^^ No kidding. How many times do we get a pile of code with no indentations??? Line up the braces, and BOOM! there's your error."Oh, but it takes so much time to hit the return key . . ." Bite me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dzhax Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 Took my first class in HTML my freshman year in high school. The same year I also took 2 VB classes and that really caught my attention. Got into a vo-tech program for the last 3 years of high school that taught BASIC, VB6, COBOL, C, C++ ,HTML, Server 2003, and typing. Graduated high school in 2008 and started at a technical school's 2 year program for Computer Networking Systems. Graduated there a quarter early and now working as a help desk for Comcast Cable. Currently working on multiple projects on the side both for work and other "clients" all of which are web based. I don't really program desktop applications anymore. I figured eventually everything will be in the cloud anyway so why not dive into it now so I don't get left behind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
justsomeguy Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 I am little curious how did you got a job before your graduation?It was an internship. I hadn't gotten my degree yet, but I had taken enough classes to know what I was doing with what the company needed me for. Once I graduated they just hired me full-time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
birbal Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 It was an internship. I hadn't gotten my degree yet, but I had taken enough classes to know what I was doing with what the company needed me for. Once I graduated they just hired me full-time.ohhh..it is so motivating. I thought it was not possible to work as proffesonal until you are not completed your graduation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thescientist Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 ohhh..it is so motivating. I thought it was not possible to work as proffesonal until you are not completed your graduation.experience and self-education can go long way towards making up for formal education (although it is highly recommended to have a degree this day in age). That's why everytime someone here posts about whether or not they should get a W3Schools certification, we often recommend it's just better to have a good portfolio and let your work speak for yourself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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