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What do you have to do become a programmer?

When I read the job postings you guys get no respect like it always short term contacts 6 months or something or you got to relocate or work for long hours or even on the weekends.

how do you make a living as a freelance programmer where is the stablitiy? Like right now I work for the city I don’t make a hell of a lot of money but It is a stable job.

Is there a civil service title for programmers that you can get without a bullshit college degree? Like if I get zend certified and do some freelance work will I be able to find a permanent position somewhere with out having a bs degree from a money | college > dev/null.

What I mean by that is your money gets piped into college and then you go through college you return a value and it gets redirected into dev/null other wise known as the black hole.

I like studying programming for fun it’s more of a hobby then a job but back to my question how stable is the field and how permanent is the work and can you get a good job just by getting zend certified and having a few references to your work?

yeah its 4:20

Well, i’m working by myself, and is stable, believe me!!

but honestly? i do this for fun! is a thing that not takes much time, is easy and fun (for me). when a short time, i’ll get out this and open a pub with my friends (no joke :coolsmirk: )

the money that i get today i can pay my dues (not all), reserve some to maried (less than necessary), drink and dance (more than i can), make some adds in my car and travel once a year (not a too long travel).

i would like to know actionscript 3 / flex and web video! I think that gives more money than php. maybe in the end of the year i try to get an adobe certification.

but in my country (i’m not a amerikan neither european), is not soo dificult to live with php. and there is some amazing programming guys here!!! and a lot of jobs!!!

As a freelancer, on top of my job in the US Air Force, I can double my take=home pay each month (double the amount I would be making if I wasn’t freelancing) and as long as you have the skills, work ethic, and time - the work never stops coming in. I’ve had to turn down a few offers the past 2 weeks and pass them on to others.

Wow, what am I going wrong?

I don’t know I love coding and reading and studying but I don’t think I like the business end of the field

Right now I am studying shell scripting after that I want to learn apple script after that I want to learn ruby but it’s just a hobby to me not a job. Sometimes I dream in code like codes will go through my head like I can be sleeping but programming something in my sleep.

apple script is going to be fun but first I want to learn shell scripting so I can echo out the apple script commands into the shell

So what your saying is that you really don’t need a college degree all you need are skills in the field and how to put into practice what you know.

That’s good cause I can’t afford to spend $40,000 on college

Raymond -

First of all, get to know your language(s) in and out.  Let there be nothing that you cannot do with it.

I would suggest trying to pick up a couple of freelance jobs to start.  There are a ton of PHP freelance boards out there… so find one that suits your needs.  Scour through the job postings and try and find some smaller projects and place bids on those you can easily tackle.  Do NOT get discouraged when nobody picks you or even contacts you on your bid.  Just keep bidding and be persistent.  Communication is key—what I like to do is send the service buyer a message when I bid - a *SHORT* message about myself and affirm to the buyer that I can handle the job for them with efficiency and ease.

Once you pick up a job or two, you’ll get a feel for how it works.  Hope this helps.

Here in the US, programming jobs can range from $30k/year - $130k/year and the employment can be very “stable”. There is also plenty of freelance work out there.

When I read the job postings you guys get no respect like it always short term contacts 6 months or something or you got to relocate or work for long hours or even on the weekends.

You were most likely looking at posts for contract jobs which usually have those kind of terms. They are usually short in length, but average much higher in pay. There are many positions to be had at good companies that would be as “stable” as your current jobs.

how do you make a living as a freelance programmer where is the stablitiy? Like right now I work for the city I don’t make a hell of a lot of money but It is a stable job.

“Stability” at a company completely depends on that company staying in business and your position there always being needed. Since you work for the city now, the “company” isn’t going anywhere, but what if city counsel were to vote next week to cut the budget for your department and you’re stuck without a job. In my case, my whole team was let go during a big merger, after having been there six years. By freelancing, YOU are in control of your fate. It can be difficult to get started, but once you are, I would make the argument that that you are more “stable” than being employed at a company.

Is there a civil service title for programmers that you can get without a bullshit college degree? Like if I get zend certified and do some freelance work will I be able to find a permanent position somewhere with out having a bs degree from a money | college > dev/null.

I don’t have have a college degree and have worked long term at several companies over the past 8 years. You don’t need any certification, but you will need experience so starting out freelancing while still at your current job will be a good way to get experience and build a portfolio.

I like studying programming for fun it’s more of a hobby then a job but back to my question how stable is the field and how permanent is the work and can you get a good job just by getting zend certified and having a few references to your work?

The field is very stable, there are plenty of jobs at good companies that can be acquired with no college and a good portfolio. After some years working for “the man”, I would recommend spreading your wings and going out on your own full-time. I did it about 7 months ago and it’s great. I have more work right now than I can handle and I feel more stable than I ever did working for someone else.

OT :

Wow, joeles. back from the dead.

Welcome back, man.

(For those who don’t know joeles, I remember him for shooting up a record number of posts in a very short time. with mosts of his posts being very valid contributions to the user community.)

Thanks for the props, Crafter. My above mentioned venture into business for myself is at the root of my sudden disappearance from the forums. I had to cut out all my favorite distraction for a while until I got things under control and the CI forums were number one on that list. haha

it depends greatly on cost of living ... ie => where you live

also experience of course.

I think 30-130k is a good salary range from a starting programmer living in a cheaper place to live ... to an experienced programmer living in san franciso working at digg or google .. something like that.

The key is to be flexible. Willing and able to learn new things. Use the right tool for the job. Codeigniter is not always the right tool. Some clients will want pure PHP or pure Java.

Wow, Joeles is back in his full colours!!!
Nice to see you again, old friend… hope you’re here to stay 😊

Apropos, this salary survey came out recently:
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/2007surveyresults

And the Digg discussion:
http://digg.com/tech_news/Findings_From_the_Web_Design_Survey_A_List_Apart

According to the survey, about a 1/4 of self-identifying “web professionals” are freelance and another 1/4 work for small web firms.  The median salary range seems to be in the $40-60K area.  But a LOT of people are making under $20K, presumably kids and newbies.

High-level designers (Information Architects, Usability Engineers, Art Directors, etc) makes the most.  Designers make the least.  Developers are somewhere in the middle.

Hope that answers your question!

Good break-down, ricklee. I would agree those numbers.

Who wants to be a code monkey?  Trading dollars for hours is for slaves.  I like coding but I also want to have a life.

My advice, keep your day job.  Work on your own sites that make you money rather than on sites that make other people money.  If you spend 12+ hours per working for other people then you don’t have enough time left over to figure this out.  Hopefully a regular job will give you enough time left over in your day to work on your own stuff.

When you start making money on your own sites (or applications) then put it right back into the biz and keep repeating what works.  Diversify your revenue streams.  Make sure you have a solid plan.  Make sure that you are running it like a real biz and that you are putting money aside for taxes and an accountant. 

When you are making enough money that you can continue growing up and out and still have enough money left over then start pocketing some of that left over cash.  When the money you are able to pocket surpasses what you are making at your day job then you can think about getting rid of the ball and chain.  Then you will have more free time to focus on your business.

In any scenario, you need to learn how to run a business.  A successful freelancer is a better business manager than a developer.  Even someone who knows nothing about coding can still run a successful business by outsourcing everything.  Any monkey can write code but far fewer can run a business.  Even smarter business people know that nobody has ever become rich from working hourly (or even by project.)

The problem is that I can’t tell you how to make money on the web from your own sites, you have to figure this out for yourself.  😉

Yeah like my friend at work sells shoes on the side and he is dying for a website. He sells women’s shoes on the street on Saturdays and he wants a site but can’t put one together cause he don’t know how. He wants me to make him a site for like free.

It is a lot of work to make a site you got the database, user management, shopping cart, payments, calender, graphics, JavaScript, design

I kinda told him I would so we are going to meet at the bar for lunch tomorrow after work and build the database and get a schema for the data

but my question is this when you are first starting out to build your portfolio should you do a freebie here. I told him all I want for payment is like 10% of sales don’t know if that is good or not.

should you do a freebie here and there to build your portfolio?