A little background: Through my teens in the 90’s I did a lot of the things you may expect. I was a script kiddie on mIRC, made a tank game in Unreal Engine, and did some Quake modding. From 2002-2004 I landed a job doing Java web dev, SQL, and overall database administration because my father’s friend needed someone that could do that. I was ok at the job, but not great. Being young, my hobby that turned into a 9-5 made me want to stab my eyes out and I quit.
With that said, I can understand a lot of what’s going on, but it doesn’t “click” anymore. I spent 20 years as a career machinist, but I physically can’t do that anymore. Here’s the rub - my twin brother is a brittle diabetic and can’t work (lots of other stuff going on as well), and our mother is getting old (father passed this year). The only reasonable way forward that I can see in order to be able to support my brother is trying to get back into development.
When I stopped, subversion was what we used. I’m trying to understand Git, but it’s a giant conceptual leap. I guess, what I’d like to hear from you all is a way to jump back in as quickly as possible in such a way that it may be a career.
Thanks
For getting a grip in current web development, I would recommend fullstackopen.com - it’s a free online course by the University of Helsinki and starts from basically zero, and gives you a lot of insights into web dev.
It may take some time, but it’s really worth it and an overall great course.
FSO is good, but it does assume some JS knowledge to start. I would argue that App Academy’s is more comprehensive (over 200hrs of material).
Or The Odin Project if you don’t want to cover Python in the curriculum and just stick to JavaScript.
https://www.theodinproject.com/
(The Odin Project also has an option for Ruby along with JavaScript)
When I stopped, subversion was what we used. I’m trying to understand Git, but it’s a giant conceptual leap.
It’s probably not ‘that much of a leap’ as you imagine. If you’re looking at Git tutorials, they’re usually covering all kinda complex scenarios of how to ‘properly use Git’. But a lot of people barely care about ‘properly using Git’ and they just kinda use it as a substitute for SVN… You create branches, you merge them back and forth, and that’s about it.
Like if you want to contribute to an open source project, all you have to do is create a fork (your own branch in SVN terms) - commit some stuff to it, and create a pull request (request to have your changes merged) back to the original branch. git pull is just svn update - getting someone elses commits
Not saying there aren’t more complex features in git, or that learning git properly isn’t worth it, just saying, I don’t think you have to see it as a ‘giant conceptual leap’ that’s preventing you from jumping back into programming. Easiest approach just to get started would be probably to just download a GUI like Sourcetree or Fork, and you just kinda pretend you’re still using SVN - approach wise
Someone will probably shoot me down for this but I actually find ChatGPT good for explaining concepts to me. Especially when I just want a high level understanding of a concept as I try to understand another one without getting too bogged down. A lot of Google results go into way too much detail.
I’m doing this now as I learn Unity and come back to C# after a couple decades away. It’s great for helping with syntax and reminding you of libraries, also with debugging steps as you mention. I haven’t had it full on hallucinate, but it has given me suggestions that fail to do the thing I specifically asked it for. I also went down a couple rabbit holes following its suggestions to later realize there was a much simpler answer that it didn’t tell me about. All in all, I’d still highly recommend it for my situation and OPs. If you’re able to follow the logic and point out the flaws, it’s a hell of a lot faster than googling or following tutorials.
Just remember: imposter syndrome is real. Everything you learn exposes you to ten things you don’t yet know. Successful devs are comfortable with this reality - the job is one of constant learning. Best of luck!
First of all, you can totally do it! The field is massive, but also full of very bad programmers, and seeing how you were able to write a coherent text of three paragraphs, that already puts you ahead of the curve. Determination and perseverance is key.
I would suggest to play to your strengths. Java is still Java. Most of the progress since the 1990s was in the libraries and tooling, which only recently have become passable. The language itself also evolved somewhat, but there’s nothing that you won’t pick up in a couple of days of working with it.
Start with [1], work through all the boxes that are unfamiliar to you, practice a little on a pet project, or an open source project, and you’ll land a job in no time.
