Are you really missing something as a self taught developer?
What self taught programmers are better at
They 💙</>
Certainly, there are a lot of things that the self taught programmers are really good at. One of them is coding and problem solving. Many self taught programmer simply have done it for so long that they learned how to code and solve problems without a help from anyone else.
They are determined and talented 😎
The fact that they didn’t need help and went through a really hard process of learning a programming language from scratch, also puts them ahead of the game. Why? because they are either talented and passionate or very determined, either being very good.
They remember things for longer
I also found that when you learn something new yourself, you’re more likely to remember it for longer, as it stick in your mind, so if you’re self taught you might lack the theory, but you will remember your stuff for longer.
What do self taught programmers suck at? 📒
Code organisation and conventions📁
Their code is often messy, however as they gain more experience they also start to look for organisation tips, as when even the files and code is messy, they would often remake the whole program instead of going back to the previous version.
Theoretical knowledge
Most self taught programmers follow this learning pattern:
- Find some interesting code, eg on github.
- google it
- implement it.
This lacks the following step:
- Find out some technical info about it as well
Meaning that although these programmers are completely able to use most features of programming languages, they lack the theory, which in my opinion is a disadvantage only in some cases.
Conclusion
No matter which type of a programmer you are, we need both in teams. Someone has to organise the team and code, and someone has to be the coding genius**. Self taught programmers don’t suck, neither do educated programmers.** However, everyone knows that the talented ones are almost always self taught 😎.
In addition everything comes with experience. You can’t be a talented self taught or educated programmer if you don’t practice a lot.
🐒 -> 🕴️👔
Nearly 40% of us programmers, are self taught, we need more, so start learning. Now. What are you doing here? O yeah, you already know how to code, you are viewing this article.
Are you also self taught? Share your story in the comments.
Also, feel free to recommend this article 💙 and share it with others. I am personally as self taught as it gets. I never bought any boot camp courses, never tried any, I always just coded, and coded, and coded. I do admit I struggled on the way, but it was absolutely worth it.