Post: #126

Very strong.

Post: #127

(05-24-2014 12:59 PM)TravellerJay Wrote:  Excellent post BLarsen. What was your education background? Did you have CS degree or engineering or what?

Congrats for a well done job. And yes, FC post is really inspirational

I have a B.A. in a Liberal Arts field. When I was at college I took 2 programming courses with no prior knowledge or experience and failed horribly at them.

In the early 2000's I gained some HTML and CSS experience when blogging first became popular.

I hadn't had any exposure to design or development concepts for about 10 years before I started 7 months ago.

Post: #128

BLarsen, congrats again. How was the interview meeting? was it hard? Did you read the cracking the code interview and was it helpful?

Did you feel that you would have landed eventually a 60K job had you met the recruiters who were emailing en mass?
And 2 more questions from my side, how much tax is deducted from those 60K annual salary?
do you have any bonus at all?

thanks and congrats one more time

Post: #129

Bumping this thread.

I finished the codecademy python course a few weeks ago and I think it did a good job of covering the basics of the language and some OOP concepts. This wasn't my first exposure to programming (I took a C course in college over a year ago and didn't really go anywhere with it from there), but I thought that the coursework was straightforward enough that most people will be able to catch on so long as they aren't afraid to look the occasional concept up on their own.

The program didn't go super deep into anything, which means that I will now be doing some other free courses to continue my learning (I will report back on those when I finish). I plan to eventually take up some freelance work while in school to make a bit of side money.

If you guys have any questions on this course or codecademy in general (I also did their html css course awhile ago), feel free to ask.

Also, if anyone has experience with getting work for python freelance projects, I would love to hear your experiences.

Post: #130

I am at the moment focused with LPTHW 3rd edition. Once completed will provide some update too. Next step should be Django as indicated by the OP and others.

Post: #131

thought id chime in again...

after knocking out a few django/rails apps, the next step is to learn how to host it yourself, which is what ive done

I hosted a django app, using the amazon web services framework, gunicorn and nginx

for more info on this check out this site http://www.fullstackpython.com/table-of-contents.html

Post: #132

You are awesome buddy!
although I am still learning, hosting should be the next step.

thanks for the chiming in

Post: #133

The site looks amazing, cannot wait to be in this stage of my progress.

Thanks again OP

Post: #134

(06-27-2014 12:44 PM)frenchcorporation Wrote:  thought id chime in again...

after knocking out a few django/rails apps, the next step is to learn how to host it yourself, which is what ive done

I hosted a django app, using the amazon web services framework, gunicorn and nginx

for more info on this check out this site http://www.fullstackpython.com/table-of-contents.html

Good info at that site. I was wondering what I will do down the line when I get a good handle on the python language itself and this lays everything out in a logical progression for learning everything you need for creating web apps. Thanks for the heads up

Post: #135

A small update

My boss (the guy who hired me) has left suddenly, and the route forward for the product is a bit murky.
And I've been at this job 6-7 months so I've applied for a few other jobs, but this time I'm focusing on contract jobs, which have all been in the range of £325 - £435 pounds a day.

Apart from the jump in money, the reason I'm applying for contract jobs is that I was at my first job for 6 months, and have been at my current one for just over 6 months. My reasoning is that although this might be an issue for employers looking to hire me permanently, employers looking for fixed-length workers shouldn't mind as much.

Landing one of these jobs isn't a wishful shot in the dark; I've got the experience in the technologies they want.

I got my last 2 jobs very quickly after applying, will be interesting to see how this goes.

Post: #136

Thanks for keeping us in the loop FC.
Good luck and best of success with new contract jobs.
By the way, how much tax will be deducted form the 325 to 435 pounds range?
will it be a one year fixed contract? or could it be maybe 6 months to see how you do with the job?

Post: #137

(07-10-2014 05:47 PM)TravellerJay Wrote:  Thanks for keeping us in the loop FC.
Good luck and best of success with new contract jobs.
By the way, how much tax will be deducted form the 325 to 435 pounds range?
will it be a one year fixed contract? or could it be maybe 6 months to see how you do with the job?

I would get taxed monthly , i did a quick calculation and if i was getting something in the middle of that range, e.g £380 a day ,id be getting taxed around 35% ... that's quite a lot when I think about it.

And the contract lengths specified ranged from 3 months then rolling, 6 months then rolling, and 12 months.

&my hunch about contract recruiters not caring about my 6 month stays at both my last jobs seems to have paid off,
Just heard back from one recruiter, having a skype interview on tuesday, then he said he's going to give me a list of potential contracts that I can choose from, in terms of what i want to go for

Post: #138

For a rising college junior who's a political science major...I'm trying to split up some time in my daily routine to learn coding so I can hopefully land an internship/something by next summer.. I've started with the odin project and codeacademy focusing on html and css. are there any other resources you'd recommend? Thank you so much for your valuable insight and information.

Post: #139

Around 5000 quids per month approx is not that bad, after taxes.
Tax is heavy mate BUT if the recruiter is giving you a list of contracts to choose from that is superb.

England is expensive like hell.

I am checking Odin site (http://www.theodinproject.com) and looks ok IF you are going for Web Development.
Codecademy was ok for me at first.., but I am trying to follow FC recommendation as well as others: Learning code the hard way, Python.
After that, learning a 2nd language should be easier, not guaranteed but looks like the structure of code is similar in all languages and I CAN tell after weeks seeing code that I can READ code and understand it, now moving to writing the code which is the more complicated part.
I will need some help and when the time comes I will ask help to you FC and any other programmer here.

Post: #140

(07-11-2014 08:20 AM)swishhboy25 Wrote:  For a rising college junior who's a political science major...I'm trying to split up some time in my daily routine to learn coding so I can hopefully land an internship/something by next summer.. I've started with the odin project and codeacademy focusing on html and css. are there any other resources you'd recommend? Thank you so much for your valuable insight and information.

If you're doing the odin project I'll assume you're learning ruby, id stick with that course, its seems pretty extensive

I havent tried any ruby/rails resources that much, but learnrubythehard way : http://ruby.learncodethehardway.org/ seems like a good shout, its python equivalent is very good

Post: #141

Hey frenchcorporation, how are you doing? Please keep us posted, how is your job doing? Did you get a new contract?

thank you for keeping this post alive

Cheers

Post: #142

(09-01-2014 09:43 PM)TravellerJay Wrote:  Hey frenchcorporation, how are you doing? Please keep us posted, how is your job doing? Did you get a new contract?

thank you for keeping this post alive

Cheers

When I made the post about contract jobs, I had applied for one, but was rejected. I went on holiday, and decided to try again when I came back.

I have one contract/consulting offer in the bag, as of an hour ago, that pays £290 a day/ £5800 a month, and I'll find out tomorow if another final round interview was successful, and that one pays £260 a day/£5200 a month.

Both are 3 month minimum contracts but the latter has more potential work beyond the 3 months.

I started my first python job in july 2013 on 1750 a month before taxes, so when i accept one of these jobs tommorrow, I will have tripled my salary in 14-15 months.

I see my next steps being along the lines of taking a couple months out after I finish whichever job I pick, and stepping up the learning of Scala I've been doing , to get to the 500-700 a day range

Its mad really, I didnt think it would happen this quickly.

Post: #143

Thanks for the update frenchcorporation. I think it's time to pull my thumb out of my arse and start hitting the books / practicing.

Post: #144

Amazing mate, truly amazing. And inspirational.

Wish I could dedicate more time. My current PM job nearly kills my spirit and any free time. I did some progress but had to leave it behind as projects were piling up.
Odd thing, I might be kicked out of the office and paid a compensation package so i could definitely have time to study
it s hard but rewarding

Post: #145

Long time lurker in this thread. It's probably one of the most inspirational threads on RVF, hands down. It got me motivated to seriously start learning programming, despite the fact I've got a decent paying job at the moment. Possessing a readily marketable skillset that is in demand all over the world is just too much to pass up.

@ frenchcorporation, I've got a couple questions for you. During your initial 8 month long learning process, did you focus solely on Python or also work on HTML, CSS, and a client side scripting language? Also, did you land your first job strictly on the basis of your python skills? I've done some initial due diligence on junior dev positions for different languages and most seem to require strong skills in that language as well as a crapload of other stuff like databases, linux, etc. In general, how much ancillary expertise is needed in addition to your main language in order to land a job?

Much appreciated!

Post: #146

There's a course on coursera teaching the rudiments of python starting today (September 15th) if anyone's interested. It's free to follow along and I've seen quite a few positive reviews (http://www.topfreeclasses.com/course/688...-in-Python) for it.

https://www.coursera.org/course/interactivepython

I'm signing up now, if anyone else does as well, let me know!

Post: #147

(09-15-2014 09:36 AM)el_cojonudo Wrote:  There's a course on coursera teaching the rudiments of python starting today (September 15th) if anyone's interested. It's free to follow along and I've seen quite a few positive reviews (http://www.topfreeclasses.com/course/688...-in-Python) for it.

https://www.coursera.org/course/interactivepython

I'm signing up now, if anyone else does as well, let me know!

Signed up.

Post: #148

(09-15-2014 01:06 PM)rekruler Wrote:  

(09-15-2014 09:36 AM)el_cojonudo Wrote:  ...

I'm signing up now, if anyone else does as well, let me know!

Signed up.

+1

Post: #149

I am in, signed up now. I know I should follow only one course or book at a time but what the heck, multitasking with job, life, etc

Post: #150

Just a heads up to everyone considering this route, and also to those who have no software engineering background.

As a software developer myself, software/app development is a lot more than programming. It's problem solving.
Don't just learn the syntax of a language, a 5 year old can do that. Learn the fundamentals of software development in itself, such as object oriented concepts and patterns, linked list, multithreading, queues and stacks, Arrays, client-server architecture, SQL, etc. and your life at work will be so much simpler and you'll write better software.
Also, never stop learning and improving yourself. Just because you made 50 websites doesn't make you a good web designer.
There's a lot of money to be made out there for IT guys who know what they're doing.