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I had practically zero programming experience when I got to college as a Computer Science major. It was pretty much all brand new to me.
The United States invariably does the right thing, after having exhausted every other alternative. -Winston Churchill
America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between. -Oscar Wilde
Wow, even the French showed a little more spine than that before they got their sh*t pushed in.[^] -Colin Mullikin
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He went to uni and doesn't know this? Yikes!!! My kids learned this for their O levels.
We're philosophical about power outages here. A.C. come, A.C. go.
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I suppose that it is just barely possible that in some godforsaken corner of the Earth where they still think that digital wristwatches are a new idea there is a CS course that only teaches abstractions such as algorithms, data structures, and complexity theory.
...Naaaah!
If you have an important point to make, don't try to be subtle or clever. Use a pile driver. Hit the point once. Then come back and hit it again. Then hit it a third time - a tremendous whack.
--Winston Churchill
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Don't forget the three courses on communication skills and the five on outdated project-management methods.
Add that to your "all about abstraction because none of the lecturers knows a tinker's cuss about programming" courses. and you're left with maybe a week-and-a-half of actual programming, distributed an hour at a time over the four years.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
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I don't know how it is in other parts of the world but here in the US, a really large chunk of the colleges and universities have shifted into diploma-mills where competence in the subject matter is less important then butts-in-seats. As the federal government rampped up their student loan programs, the states have been cutting their contributions to state higher education. With stable income, the universities have been forced to rely on student aid to fund their operations. It was no small leap from the attitude of promoting education to the, "hey, we can make money here" mindset. Quality education no longer matters, it's all about how many students they can keep in those classrooms from semester to semester and the student aid they bring.
if (Object.DividedByZero == true) { Universe.Implode(); }
Meus ratio ex fortis machina. Simplicitatis de formae ac munus. -Foothill, 2016
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Definitely entry level; he's probably marketable as a government IT employee at best. There's a preconception that if you get a degree, then there will be a job waiting for you after graduation; I thought that! After being punched in the face a couple hundred times, I realized I had to fight, as well as study hard, to get established and have a decent career.
In the western world, you can no longer depend on the degree or the school on that degree. You need to prove that you can do the work before you get there, be it a website, portfolio, or I cringe to say certs.
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First of all, quality of education now a days is in serious question here and then the self Interest in the topic really matters. Have seen so many people who have learned programming without even going to a technical univeristy.
___@sHubHa
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Suvendu Shekhar Giri wrote: Have seen so many people who have learned programming without even going to a technical univeristy.
But sadly, they won't always get the same job or the same salary as one with the degree, even one so incompetent as the one quoted. 
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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True 
___@sHubHa
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It helps a lot to have a good science type degree, especially in some kind of engineering, physics, or chemistry. I got my chemistry degree and worked 13 years in the lab, but always programmed on my own as a hobby. Got into programming professionally when the job market bottomed out for chemists in the 90's. All of the companies that I interviewed for had the mindset of "Oh, you have a chemistry degree. You must be smart enough to do this job." I still had to code in the interviews, but much better than not having a degree at all.
When you are dead, you won't even know that you are dead. It's a pain only felt by others.
Same thing when you are stupid.
modified 19-Nov-21 21:01pm.
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Yes, seriously. Also not an incident, and prolly payed a lot to learn "all that". If degrees were so reliable then we wouldn't need a coding-challenge during an interview.
So if I can get a degree I'll politely decline again.
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
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I feel the OP feelings are correct.
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I have only three times hired developers straight from university, and all three times I bitterly regretted it.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
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I studied computer science but it was so fast paced it was hard to learn ins and outs of any programming languages being taught. I had to do 8 subjects per semester and there were lot of non programming subjects from civil engineering , electrical engineering , mathematics etc. I had to go through 4 written exams in 6 month semester and there is no break between each subject exam.
When I finished my degree I hardly had any experience that I can use in real world. I had to teach myself most of what I know. University helped me understand the fact that there is no option to hard work and there is always solution you just have to think like an engineer.
Zen and the art of software maintenance : rm -rf *
Maths is like love : a simple idea but it can get complicated.
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Maybe you wasted your time then.
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Hey, in my CS class at the university, the professor was proud of teaching timeless knowledge instead of fads. His words. At the end, we've spent 4 pages writing an algorithm for a fictional register machine which I've written as half a page real assembly. That dude was really stuck in the idea that it's impossible to transfer assembly knowledge from one architecture to another so we needed to learn the most theoretical machine possible because only theoretical knowledge is transferable.
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Richard MacCutchan wrote: -knowledge on how to make variables
-knows how to make different loops
I was ~12 years old and using my brothers C64 whenever he was not at home for some time to somehow discover what variables and loops are. When finally understanding those fundamentals, my mind was blown in front of the vastness of possibilities they offer. I am sure I muttered the words aloud at the time, with my helium-voice; "the possibilities are limitless!"
Rest of my life has been just a case of exploring the limitless possibilities of my childhood discovery. Learning of other things has been merely a byproduct.
In my life I've been trough few different levels of education in which there has been programming classes, in which the reoccurring phenomenon was "some" other students succeeding with good grades trough them without achieving/unlocking the mind-awe experience of "truly" understanding the possibilities offered by use of variables.
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Schools (at least good ones) don't teach how to work on a specific language.
Their job is to give you notions of what's out there and abilities you can apply on basically any language.
Richard MacCutchan wrote: My main programming language is Java, Here is an example of what im kind of trying to find out:
-knowledge on how to make variables
-understands OOP
-knows how to make different loops
If the problem is just translating to Java, it's just a matter of googling it.
Java is but a means to an end. If you don't have the ability/desire to create the algorithm, your probably better of searching for a new line of work.
I hate when people associate programming with a language (almost as much as I hate Java  )
Paulo Gomes
Measuring programming progress by lines of code is like measuring aircraft building progress by weight.
—Bill Gates
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May be he did a couple Excel WorkSheets to get graduated 
Patrice
“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.” Albert Einstein
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To the original post...
I'm so sorry to hear your dilemma, I've never gone to college or even taken a course on programming other than the SAMS "Learn Java in 21 days" book. I can highly recommend this book, from that base starting point I've gone on to learn C#, SQL, VB, js and many other tools.
Learning to program is basically learning to think logically, nothing more. Language and syntax are tools, but they do you no good unless you can break down a problem into logical steps. Once you know the steps you can find the syntax.
I will also say understand why you want to write programs, in my case my hobby is art and graphics (3D), but I wanted to do things that the applications available couldn't do, or wouldn't let me do. So I started writing my own programs, when I was finally able to do the things I wanted... I was hooked!
My career took a completely different path, I became a machinist, then tool maker, got into CAD, then 3D CAD, started designing machines and processes, then became a manufacturing engineer. Along the way, as I needed to solve problems or analyze data, and the available tools (software) wouldn't do what I needed, guess what.... I made my own.
I give you all of this because "why program" is a bigger question than how. Find a problem to solve, then figure it out.
"Figure it out" is a matter of patience and tenacity more than knowledge or skill.
Start small and simple then expand on that a little at a time.
I'll be happy to help explain variables, OOP, and loops, and anything else you may need if you decide you really want to learn programming, but you first have to answer the question of "Why program" for yourself.
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Wow…
6 months ago I couldn't even spell engineer now I are one.
New version: WinHeist Version 2.2.2 Beta I told my psychiatrist that I was hearing voices in my head. He said you don't have a psychiatrist!
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Your spelling has not improved, it's injunear. 
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I sit corrected.
New version: WinHeist Version 2.2.2 Beta I told my psychiatrist that I was hearing voices in my head. He said you don't have a psychiatrist!
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You can lead a programmer through source code,
but you can't make them think!
I have seen this time and again. University Seniors who I failed, explaining to me that they ACED their C++ class last semester, how can they fail Java. So, I asked them some C++ related questions, they could NOT ANSWER one of them. I explained that he ACED a water downed C class, that used a C++ compiler! And if I taught that class, he would have had a chance in my class!
When I was graduating from Michigan State, I saw one of the worst programmers so proud to get his degree with a 2.0 GPA (boosted by non computer and non engineering classes). I felt like giving my degree back! What value does it have, if you can just "grind" through it without understanding?
ON the UP SIDE. I encourage his openness as to where he really is. Be wrong out loud. You learn faster. But also. Pick up a book, and READ IT. Find source code, and read it. Get it to compile, and break it. And fix it, and break it. Until you have a clue!
Or go into Support 
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Don't laugh. Sometime back I was told that having a DEGREE in I.T. meant that you could build a spreadsheet or know how to populate a database (Access, etc.)
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