Software engineer (video games). Likes dogs, DJing + EDM, running, electronics and loud bangs in Reservoir.
C/C++ still has a huge place in firmware, microcontrollers, operating systems, drivers, application development, video games, real-time systems and so on. It’s a totally different space of programming to webdev, which might explain the surprise.
Sometimes the real value of a project isn’t its proposed worth, but the schadenfreude it offers instead. I’ve backed a few failed Kickstarters that I absolutely got my money’s worth on.
It sounds like you’re in the right area by focusing on C. Have you got a GitHub profile? I’d start looking for open source projects in that space and get involved. Many of them have beginner bugs and tasks. Some projects are better than others at welcoming juniors, so check their readme to see if they have any advice.
If you’re interested in low-level languages like C and C++, I would take a look at Rust. It’s another performance-focused language that complies to assembler like C, but includes some clever design principles to prevent a lot of common C/C++ bugs from being possible at all. Even if you don’t end up using it much, it’s quite interesting to see a different way of thinking about things to achieve a similar output.
Beyond that, I’d say you need to think about the job opportunities you’re interested in and learn what tech they use.
If you’re concerned about privacy I don’t know why you’d use Tailscale over Wireguard directly. The latter is slightly more fiddly to configure, but you only do it once and there’s no cloud middleman involved, just your devices talking directly to each other.
Clearly we’re going to need regulations around personal vehicle size limits on the road. If you legitimately need a big truck for your business, get a licence for it.
I’d recommend setting up a GitHub profile and developing some personal projects on there, and try to get some experience contributing to other projects (even if they’re just simple first PRs). Make sure you include this on your resume, it’s a great talking point for juniors to show you’re passionate and have concrete examples of your code in the wild.
Also set up a LinkedIn profile (fleshed out as best you can) and start adding people at companies you’re interested in. DM them asking for advice, most people are lovely and want to help. While LinkedIn is horrible and needs to die, it’s still used heavily by the tech industry and you’ll find every tech company and recruiters on there.
You know it’s bad when we’re having to invent new words like ‘polycrisis’ to succinctly describe what’s happening.
… or worked in a large team with juniors and members coming and going over a long period of time.
To take up a career in programming is to be professionally confused on a day-to-day basis. It’s normal to feel overwhelmed at times, but this is the advice I give younger engineers: accept that confusion, and try to channel it into curiosity instead of letting it fester into stress and anxiety.
I’d rather drink a verification can every 30 minutes.
Good to see Reddit Island getting a revisit. I look forward to the Netflix disaster documentary.
Smells like something IDF unit 8200 might have been involved with.
It’s the same for people who don’t understand basic electronics or mechanics. Any problem just becomes “it’s broken” and the only solution is to take it to an expert and pay for their time, or toss it and buy a new one. It’s expensive to be ignorant.
I see this at my local supermarket chains after they received pressure to reduce plastic usage. The exact same plastic bags are in use, except now they have printed on them “REUSABLE PLASTIC BAG”. Such a predictable outcome.
Another vote for Mikrotik, but only if you’re technical-minded and want to learn how routers work. One of the things I like the most about it is the ability to import/export the router config as plain text. That makes it very easy to do things like bulk-editing (I have a lot of IOT devices I need to configure), storing your config in version control for safe-keeping etc.
… until you finally track down who wrote this mess, and it was you 5 years ago.
Everyone loves the free market until it works against them.
The accompanying photo is on brand.
Janitor.