I would like to code for a living and to contribute to open source projects and things, but my coding skills are absolute shit after taking online courses and watching video tutorials. How can I learn to code for real?
What I would like to learn is algorithms, web development (“full stack”), how layouts work (both in like kotlin compose and HTML) and how to read other peoples code. Maybe thats more than I can chew, but its probably good for me to try out many things before getting settled on one.
Now I have been coding for a while already (~ 4 years), but I kind of feel like I need more guidance to be able to actually create code that works as intended intentionally, and not through trial and error / stack overflow. As for what level i am at, CS50 is probably my only qualification, I have played around with APIs (I.E. making discord bots), and made some html “apps” (horribly made, but things like the “genius” game and a calculator) and “prototype” react websites (as in, really bare bones, barely working).
I do plan on taking CS or something similar, but i’m not yet in college, and I would like to have a good head start before getting there.
Sorry for my bad English, and any help is appreciated.
Here’s what I look for with software engineers II hire.
Pragmatism: pick the right solution for the right problem. And your work should create minimal work for others.
Thirst to learn: there is always something new and exciting and there’s always a better way to do it. Look for that. It also means being open to feedback.
Collaboration instead of execution: I need my team to challenge me. For that, they need to get as much of the bigger picture as they can. That means always being able to answer “why” you do things. It also means that I expect healthy conflict with my teams. If you go from being taught to teaching me, you immediately get a bump in my list of top teammates.
No excuse: we acknowledge problems and deal with them together. (Requires a good work environment though).
As you can see, nothing I wrote is purely code related. Only thing I ask tech wise is: know your shit, where to find it, who to ask.
Also, my top resource to get people started with what it means to become a software engineer is solidbook.io.