Let's take a break from coding to talk about the field of coding and being a programmer as a whole. I think it adds a nice set of perspective to know what you're getting in to both as a hobbyist and what the professional world day-to-day is like.

Just know that to learn all this you don't have to want to go into programming to have it as a job! I think it's a great career for people who enjoy doing it but that doesn't mean it's right for you. Some people just like to do it in their spare time and that's totally fine. Even some electrical engineers like to learn it to help them make better robots or circuit board components, and that's fine too! Learning to code doesn't mean you're committing to code. It's a skill like anything else. If you just want to learn to sew so you can fix your clothes when they rip, that doesn't mean you have to be a professional clothes-maker does it?

Just like it would be in the case of repairing your own clothes, you can use coding for things you want to use yourself:

• Maybe you need a website for your own portfolio you want to show off and you want to make it yourself since the online website templates weren't fitting with what you had in mind.

• Maybe you want to make a really cool game that you had the idea for.

• Maybe you want a certain app on your phone that no one has made and you want to learn how you can make it for yourself.

• Maybe you want to understand code so you can understand computers better and how they work. Maybe you want to do this to be an incredibly powerful hacker 😂

As a hobbyist you get to work at your own pace and you can be as clean and elegant in your code as you want or have the skill for, since you probably won't be working with too many other people. It's fun, rewarding, and doesn't involve tons of stress if you stay patient at it.

Now, let's talk being a professional programmer!

This environment is very different here, but I'll give you the best rundown of what the workflow is like.

At big companies like the ones I've worked for many years now, you will receive tickets of what work you need to do. When I say ticket all that means is that it's a little note on a webpage that says "Hey, please go write this small little thing". It's broken down into a small chunk of work for you to do, and you take the ticket and go off and write the code to do it. Until you get higher up, people are making the tickets and giving them to you and you don't have to think much about it. You just get your work and do it.

Work is done in two week intervals usually. So, at the start of every two weeks someone will give you a bunch of things to do over those two weeks and you go off and do them. Usually you will have a daily meeting where you say what you did the day before to everyone and what you'll do the next day. It's really casual and you usually aren't micromanaged at all throughout the day.

Life as a coder at most places is usually pretty low stress. You have work to do and a set amount of time to do it and you're really flexible in how you spend your time in that window, depending on what company you are working for. Yes, there are horror stories of gaming companies working nights and weekends towards the release of a game but that's not common so don't think that'll be your life from now on at all.

You'll be working with other people, so other people will get to look at your code and critique it. You'll learn a ton this way and it's a good way to grow fast at your coding skills by having experienced people offer suggestions at how you can make your code better. It's definitely something to get used to coming from a hobby background where you did it all how you wanted!

The pay is good. It's a relatively stable position. It's in really high demand all over the world. It's relatively low stress. It's very autonomous. Coding in a lot of ways is a dream job once you get in the field, especially since you can work on some really fun apps or games or sites that you get to be a part of and feel proud of when they are released to the public. The work I did for Intel or Nike or eBay or other companies still makes me smile when I see others use it or see it out in the world.

Also, working from a laptop is easy! In this modern age some places will still want you in the office but many will give you the freedom to work from wherever you want. This is a huge benefit that's often taken for granted but when you need to use it you'll be so happy you can.

In the next section we will go over what you'd need to learn to be a programmer!