Becoming a self-taught back-end developer : Possible?

Hi guys . If i have no formal degree and teach myself a back end language such as C# , Java or Php , etc , can i get a job at a company ?

1 Like

Yes!! you can get a job.

I’ve actually heard the story of so many, who got jobs without any formal degree in computer science.
You can watch this interview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXro5iqc_u4

1 Like

@iamprinx thank you .

1 Like

I was attending college for programming back in the day (late 1980s, to be specific), and dropped out. The curriculum was out-of-date then. Mainframe languages from the '60s and '70s.

What did I do after that? Got a degree from clown college. Yup.

But I found that I truly enjoyed coding, just not on punch cards. So I found a job at a graphic design house, then rolled into maintaining the hybrid network, then got a different job as tech support for graphic design houses with hybrid networks, then got to write an early app for those hybrid networks (server-side was perl then PHP, client side was AppleScript then browser-based).

In pursuit of all that, I taught myself graphic design software, Windows NT Server, SQL Server, and then perl, PHP, AppleScript, early Javascript and HTML.

Fortunately, the story didn’t end there, as the web development world has moved along nicely. But I taught myself nearly two dozen languages, for both hobby and professional use. I still use maybe eight of them (let’s face it, LOLCODE will never be a serious language).

So yes. Absolutely. In many ways, the self-taught developer will have some advantages, in my opinion.

2 Likes

This is how most people nowadays are becoming frontend/backend devs; by attending bootcamps or learning at their own pace at home with paid or free resources (they go well together). I think the hardest part is breaking away from that stigma that companies only hire people with degrees; while I think it’s a big factor in some companies… most of the current startups and tech companies are starting to schedule interviews with people that have a GitHub account or a portfolio to show. Basically all you need is to have a bit of networking and faith.

You also need some learning validation by building some stuff for yourself or others that can really showcase what you can do.

1 Like

Well, I will not get a university degree, my only title will be the freeCodeCamp when I finish the course and I have heard from several programmers who already work in this area that is not necessary and several of them do not have a title, they even comment that their Bosses have no title either, so I think that should not be an impediment to get a job, my idea is to have a strong portfolio as a title.

By the way, when I have the question of whether I can do it, I read this post


and it helps me a lot to recover the mood.

good luck on this trip

2 Likes

You and Steve O from MTV’s Jackass have something in common! :slight_smile:

@snowmonkey @luishendrix92 @PabloHernandez thank you guys

good luck, this travel is amazing.

Hi @Vinh,

You can definitely achieve your goal if you learn the good tools. As mentioned above, for most of tech companies a CS degree would help but is not at all mandatory. Believe in your skills, continue learning and it will happen.

3 Likes