Decent cost of living wage increase, then switched jobs to higher pay on top of that. But I was never struggling to pay for food. Housing is the big one in my budget. But I have a fixed rate mortgage so inflation has not affected that.
Seems like prices have stopped increasing much lately too so I haven’t given it as much thought as a year ago.
The guy is a Norwegian comedian I think & he bet his friends that he could get a dumb song into the Billboard top 10 or something. I believe he succeeded in a few European countries.
The song is absolutely ridiculous considering he doesn’t speak Spanish, but it’s just a funny story.
First of all, congrats on pursuing a career change, many are afraid to do so, that makes me believe that any path you choose you will find a way to make it work for you!
You don’t need a degree to pursue a computer science career, it’s common practise within the field to do so, and most companies/teams/interviewers don’t really care. I don’t want to imply that a degree or higher education has no value, on the contrary it can be a great opportunity to focus on the fundamentals and experiment with many different subjects. However, that depends on you, the field is ever changing and most colleges/universities aren’t doing a great job keeping up. That’s why, if you want to go that route, you need to not be afraid to lay off the path laid by the program and specialize on your interests.
I would suggest AI if you like data science, it’s a broad subject ranging from working numbers on excel day in day out, to producing complex mathematical formulas to explain how a model is able to predict something considered impossible for humans. Don’t be discouraged because it’s a buzzword, it’s true; everyone is doing it and most are selling snake oil or worse, but there are still some really interesting/fascinating real world applications.
Application development is a far broader subject, but the vast majority of it is pretty limited and standsrdized. It’s the domain of most developers out there and it can range from really interesting to soul crashing boredom. If you change jobs often enough and keep learning, it can be a really rewarding path, you can make decent money (100k-300k) and you will never lose interest. Each application you work on has a domain, and you will learn a tonne about it. For me, it has been fish farming, betting, and program analysis.
Keep in mind that choosing a track is not restricting for your career, you can make changes in little to no time. Sometimes you accept a new job that seems a little out of your area of comfort, or you start helping out a colleague and slowly switch to a new role, or you just read an article and decide you want to do that.
Last but not least, the specific technologies are not important, but the time you finish they will be obsolete anyway. However, the skills you will gain while learning them, will be highly transferable. Once you learn your 3rd language there is no language you can learn within a few days.
PS if you are in it for the money, just go do a JavaScript 6month bootcamp and get a six figure salary.
I’d lean towards the Software Development track, partly because that’s my background, and partially because it sounds like it would offer a better foundation in development fundamentals. I suspect AI is going to change significantly over the next couple of decades, so I suspect it would be less future proof.
Am I crazy for doing this later in life?
No. The best time to plant a tree is fifty years ago, the second best time is now.
When you get into development shops, you should discover that you’re promoted based on merit (if not, run). If that’s the case, use your maturity, and you’ll hopefully be able to progress quickly.
By using your maturity, I mean: have empathy for the user, focus on the most important parts of your project first, and speak up when you encounter problems. When I was a fresh dev, I focused on what was technically feasible, did the easy parts first, and tried to fight through problems on my own.
It sounds like you’re going to school with much more of a professional interest than an academic interest in software. In other words, you belong more in Software Engineering classes than Computer Science classes.
I got a BS in CS with an AI specialization about 10 years ago and the AI part resulted in absolutely nothing professionally, even though I applied to just as many AI jobs as non-AI. I don’t regret it though, because the classes interested me deeply on an academic level and going to college wasn’t solely about career prep for me.
Python … seems to be something that is not used as a standard backbone language for more enterprise level businesses
This is just flat out incorrect. Sure, very few enterprise programs are built entirely with Python, but many have components written in Python (especially in web), and Python is also a popular choice for build scripts and other internal software development tools. Python makes the process of going from idea to working program faster than any other language, which the bean counters like, so trust me, you will see Python everywhere in the industry.
One last thing, we are 110% approaching another AI winter because businessmen oversold each other on what language models are capable of and now they’re all getting super pessimistic about AI. So unless it’s something you’re passionate about, maybe look elsewhere…
I am a huge fan of black metal so often I have to filter out the ones with white supremacists members. But one I can’t help myself going back to is Burzum. What he brought to the atmospherical BM scene is huge and I hate that I love his early records so much…
Yeah I love black metal but it has some problematic people. “The Somberlain” by Dissection is a great album but I genuinely can’t enjoy it because of the person behind it…
I know what you mean. Personnally I prefer Storm of the Light’s Bane, but I feel less bad about listening to Dissection cause the guy’s dead so not like he gets any money from me lol
Oh goddamnit, are dissection fuckwads too? I absolutely love their stuff and it took me a good while to stop listening to burzum after I found out he was a shitbag u. u
Basically, Jon Nödtveidt, the lead guitarist/singer, was convicted for the killing of a gay algerian man. Two years after his release from prison he killed himself in a satanic ritual.
Tom Cruise. I don’t know what weird pathways cross in a brain to get that deep into Scientology without realizing what bullshit it is, but he is an amazing actor. He understands the craft, he is not shy about poking fun of himself, and by all accounts he is a consummate professional and treats the film crew well and has given gifts/thrown parties for them, etc.
I want to hate him so badly. But he is so good. I remember when he was cast as the vampire and I was pissed, having read the books it made no sense that Mr. Top Gun Fast Times at Ridgemont High as an undead vampire.
Saw the movie and had to eat my words, he had become a gaunt undead vampire. What the actual fuck. He was fantastic. Ever since that, I kind of trust he will be good in anything.
Oh God you are right I am just conflating all those movies I avoided so successfully. I just mean until then he played characters so straight and gung ho and active and shiny. No way I could have cast him, whoever did saw something that nobody else did and they were right.
I still want to hate him. But do think he’s a gifted actor.
asklemmy
Active
This magazine is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.