I wanna quit my job and code all day!

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Hello,

I am a lawyer in Chicago, almost 30, with no formal education or experience in software.

Within the past couple of years, I’ve spent a lot of my spare time on Codecademy, Treehouse, Lynda, etc. I’ve toyed with Java, Objective-C, HTML/CSS, Python, and Ruby, and I’ve loved it all. Can’t get enough of the stuff.

It’s clear to me that I want to make a career switch asap, and I’ve narrowed my focus to learning Ruby/Rails in hopes of becoming a back-end developer as soon as possible. I’m still only studying beginner level tutorials, but I feel like it’s just a matter of time…

In hopes of accelerating the process I looked closely at Dev Bootcamp, but each of my developer friends said it’s not worth the money - everything that one needs to learn is free online. While I still see the value of the guidance and community support that Dev Bootcamp would offer, I also know that my friends are right in that I’ve already found more free learning resources than I can count. The biggest limitation to my advancement is that I have to go to work and do legal research all day. After experiencing 3 years of marathon cramming in law school, and considering my growing passion for software, I started to wonder if I really need a bootcamp? What if I just quit my job and code all day for a few months, networking and making friends in the tech community along the way?

I already saved up a bunch of money, intending to pay for Dev Bootcamp. Plus, my amazingly supportive wife has a good job that could support us if necessary, and she actually likes this crazy idea more than the thought of me being tied up all evenings and weekends to study for the next year or two.

So, what do you guys think? If a novice could code all day long, and draw upon the networks and communities online and in Chicago, how long would it take to find that first job? I’d be happy to take any junior developer/apprentice/internship or whatever in Chicago or Minneapolis. The only question for me is how fast can I get there.

Most people suggest it takes a year or two for someone to learn enough to get there first job in the field. Does it have to take that long? Even if all I do all day is study for months?

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Weeks or even months of tutorial and book-learning will get you started, but it’s the actual real-world experience that will get you to a point where you could take on a project by yourself, or even as a productive member of a team.

The books and tutorials teach you what is possible/feasible; the real-life will generally provide the best-case methods and help to make you a better programmer/developer. And, depending upon which language you decide to become proficient in, there is always the right way, the wrong way, and the {insert company name here} way to do it; especially true of Microsoft - you have to learn THEIR way of doing in order to be certified, even though the way they teach it isn’t always the best way to do something. It can be frustrating, for sure.

If you’re truly serious about a career switch, then learn as much as you can and do a small project for a friend or family member, from start to finish, and then do another. If by the third or fourth project completion you still want to switch to coding all day long, then go for it, and more power to you! But, be prepared for some really frustrating troubleshooting scenarios, or even working for a department that seems to suffer from rectal-cranial inversion (happens more often than you might think.)

Just my $0.03176 worth.

HTH,

:slight_smile:

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I agree with @WolfShade in that “real world” experience is the most valuable learning there is. You probably found that studying law in the classroom didn’t quite prepare you for the daily challenges when you started, coding is no different really.

I’d suggest building yourself a personal site, if you don’t already have one, using Ruby (your focus). Use it as a test bed for creating bits of code that does stuff, eg create a Ruby blogging tool, a photo gallery, maybe something like pulling in an RSS feed from somewhere - anything to build on the skills you already have. Set yourself some of these sort of challenges and it should start getting you into the mindset of solving problems. You could ask people for ideas, eg build me a telephone directory with a search facility!

You could always go part time, do law stuff a couple of days a week and leave the other time for developing your skills, networking etc so you can still bring in some money.

Lastly it may be worth your while getting to a Ruby developers conference if you can, nothing like a bit of networking, seeing some presentations and learning how people do things.

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Dev conference, user group meeting, look for meetups that aren’t at someone’s house (you never know.)

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At your age, it sounds like you could make a drastic career change but you may have to expect… a major paycut. Also, not all programming fields are rainbows and unicorns. If you have a spouse who can support you financially then you have the power to take riskier job that would be more fun to you. In my 15 years, I’ve had to take 2 jobs where I had a major boost in pay… but it wasn’t all that fun.

As for education, you have 2 major choices.

  1. Go back to college and get a CS degree. This will get you in to the reputable Tech companies like Google/Apple/Microsoft/etc… These companies hires only the one’s with college degree.

  2. Freelancing - You can either pay small amount or lean free online. I’ve rarely found any good ‘complete’ lessons on a particular technology. I just buy a book w/ good reviews and call it a day. If you buy e-book then it’s 50% of the cost.

I strongly recommend Option 1) Good luck! IT is definitely fun! but it has it’s own up’s and down but most important factor is that you must LOVE to code.

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… and a twisted sense of humour can go a long way, too.

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…and if you go Freelance think of it as a lifestyle rather than a job, you’re likely to earn a lot less than you’re used to, but if you can make it work the flexibility (and related freedom) you can’t put a price on.

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Without repeating what has already been stated, I agree and would say: There is no substitute for experience.
As a long time Rails developer I am very pleased to hear you are enthralled by Rails.
My specific advice is to set a goal for yourself to build a site a day (or something similar). It does not need to be fancy or even useful. Just go through the process of building something. Then - and here is the really hard part - DELETE ALL YOUR CODE.
This technique of Build-Destroy-Repeat has helped me to sharpen my skills in many areas of software development. The “muscle memory” you develop over time is priceless.

The great thing about software development is that you can do it repeatedly. I would guess that any Law related work is pointless without a client. You can’t ‘pretend’ to build a case - although you could do research for a “make-believe” client.

Best of luck on your pursuit.

Why have we not seen a software developer who wants to become a lawyer??

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Effort, would be my guess. I think there’s much more involved with becoming a lawyer than there is a developer.

V/r,

:slight_smile:

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I’m not too sure about that. I once met a developer who almost had a PHD in Chemistry (can’t remember exact name). The main reason was his health where he will be surrounded by harmful chemicals. To this day, he is the most talented programmer I know.

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I’ve got a M.Sc in Science of Natural Hazards (volcanoes and stuff) which doesn’t really relate to me being a website designer?! but what it did do was give me a way in as i am the website officer for a marine conservation charity.

If i was you i would seriously think about specializing in law based websites. You have the knowledge to know what works in that field. I often know if something is wrong or to question things that i put on our site as i have background knowledge. If i built a law website i would just put up what i was told and mistakes would slip through. The mistakes wouldn’t necessarily be mine but i would be able to do a better job for the client by knowing the subject area.

The other thing to consider is sitting in front of a machine all day. I want to do less to be honest as sitting in side all day can be boring when i love to be outside and make things. Most jobs are boring when you do it day in day out. But i do have my high moments when i know i’ve done something well or solved some piece of logic.

best of luck

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Funny enough, my boss is a lawyer. He didn’t work as such much but that what he studied. Out of the blue, there was a job in a IT company doing some technical support and… he got the job. And that’s how he started.

I agree with what has been said. The only thing is that I’d learn as much as possible but wait a few months before making that change. It is not only a financial thing, it is also to see if your enthusiam survives and even thrives :slight_smile:

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Check this article: http://www.vikingcodeschool.com/posts/why-learning-to-code-is-so-damn-hard

Seeing the comments, some people agree and some disagree based on their experience. Of course everyone is different, but it can give you an idea of what it could maybe be like.

I’m just starting to learn programming myself :wink:

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Don’t quit it right now. Keep doing what you do and keep coding. You’ll get to a point when you’ll need to jump and that will be the right moment to quit your job.

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The big problem I found when starting out what the companies and customers wanting someone with experience, but where do you get the experience?

I actually made something for use at work, a simple database program that help with tracking information for myself and those around me. The design was really bad, and it did things I would never do now, but it was a real project I could show people and could discuss the reason why it worked the way it did etc.

This also helped me to make friends along the way, asking people for advice and even helping others. My employers at the time liked it so much that I got the opportunity to do the back end bits for them. There I had an advantage over some people as I had also been the other side of the software desk.

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In a nutshell, here’s what I did:

  • 1 year just messing about with personal projects, from which I got good enough to apply for a junior developer’s job. (You can probably do this much quicker since you’ve already started learning, plus I had no experience with computers at all before I got into web development, so there was an additional learning curve)
  • 2 years as a junior web developer working for a company (not a web agency, just a normal company with two people looking after their site)
  • Then I went freelance
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I felt the same way when I was teaching myself how to code after leaving law. I don’t think you have to quit, but if you’re at the end of the rope at your current job, you’ll need to find something transitory while you’re still learning. By the way, I was also 30 when I first learned how to code - now I’m an iOS developer.

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