Why are most of the best programmers self taught?
>>53628650
Citation needed
Because most of those who are going to do a CS degree just to "code" are doing this for the money, rather than having real passion for this. Note "most".
Programming is something you learn from experience, not by watching a professor read slides. University gives you a bunch of tools, but unless you sit down and write thousands of lines of code outside of class, your knowledge will be hard to apply.
Someone who is self-taught is more likely to have spent a lot of time coding outside of the context of class, thus has more experience in recognising problems and being productive.
>>53628700
Agree with this 100%, I started programming a little bit before I started a software engineering degree. When I started the degree I learned just enough to get me going and then began projects of my own, barely turned up to university, didn't need to and it was boring as shit trying to watch the lecturer explain basic concepts to people who seen some form of code twice a week on a projector.
What I'm saying is that even though I went through the academic route, it is brutally clear who in the class loves what they do and the others who are there because a CS type degree seemed like a good idea!
>>53628650
Because self-driven people are obviously going to be better than those who just learned it as a part in their degree.
>>53629043
>doesn't meet up to class because he is a lazy shit
>tries to excuse himself
you're a fuckwad. I bet you 100% those kids that were there daily and paying attention have better averages than you.
>>53629122
I won a fucking prize for best marks in programming class in my first and 2nd year, it's hanging on my wall in front of me faggot. I did a 1 year placement at MS and have already secured a grad job. Get fucked!
>>53628650
Depends really. I know some very good programmers who learnt in a formal setting and I know some very good programmers who stopped formal education after secondary school (UK High School).
A lot of people who "learnt to code" while at uni/college mostly did it because it was part of the course. They didn't have a big interest in programming. You might be surprised to know a lot of people doing IT field degrees don't want to be programmers.
Generally if someone WANTS to be a programmer they would have started and continued programming outside of a formal setting. That might be in their early years or maybe later in life when they were exposed to programming for the first time and "got the bug" as they say. Those people who really enjoy programming will use it for everything they can and will usually progress quickly whereas those who code just to get a mark in a course won't ever go on to be world class programmers as they just have no interest.
Obviously there are some who kind of like programming and are kinda ok at it. They are mostly people who see it as an easy way to get a stable job. Maybe web dev or CRUD business programs. These things don't require excellent programmers, just people who can turn business needs/logic into some form of runnable code. They are people who can use a framework and hack the rest together. The world runs on code written by those people.
Anyway the short answer is people who are self starters are usually prepared to put in a lot more work to become an expert at something they love.
>>53629122
>grades
>representative of skill in even the slightest degree
looks like somebody has lots of student loan debt, guys
>>53629043
Sorry, you have a good point but that "seen" drives me nuts when used that way.
>I know he was here earlier, I seen him
>>53629335
I'm in UK so my student loan debt isn't too bad, have lived at home whilst in uni and done a lot of freelance work the past 2 years so apart from 1st year I only took loan on tuition fees!
>>53628650
Interest. Self taught programmers are self taught because they are interested in the subject.
>>53629396
Agreed, apologies!
>>53629416
gratz then, i managed to finish paying mine off this month. it was very cathartic. but grades really do mean next to nothing in the application of learned skills. between two halfwits with no personal projects, higher grades are better. between a high-scoring person with no projects, and a straight-c's person with lots of published personal work, the second is always (100% of the time) better. the only other metric is how personable someone is, and high-grades vs high-project people are both equally a crapshoot
>>53629617
Agree with everything you say!
reblogged for truth
Purely self-taught programmers will generally have a lot of hands on experience tinkering with things. Lots of experience actually writing code. But not necessarily "the best".
Purely CS students will have lots of formal/theoretical knowledge. Common data structures, runtime efficiency, types of algorithms, strong math background. Also not "the best" if they don't know how to actually code.
The "best" programmers you are referring to will actually be a mixture of both. CS grads who write a shit ton of code in their free time.
>>53628700
someone who is self-taught is more likely to pick up some shit habits and never get past codemonkey status
>>53629900
not any worse than getting taught shit codemonkey habits from your CS101 Java Professor
>>53628650
Everyone who knows his/her shit is "self-taught", at least in some sense.
Some reasons for this:
- if you can learn shit on your own from books and experiment that usually means that you're not a retard and you can actually absorb complex material and understand it
- You can't expect a school to teach you everything and in a very great depth.
- Adding to the previous point , actually doing something requires doing a lot and doing it for (usually) a long time.
- When you have an interest in something and you understand it intuitively then you simply do that stuff. See first point.
Plus >>53629900 for the opposite effect. Just because excellent individuals are self-taught doesn't mean that all self-taught guys are excellent at their jobs.
Most autodidacts are actually shit tier. This experience makes people form a general opinion that autodidacts are shit.
I speak from experience as someone who taught himself a lot of stuff over the years. It all began when I was a kid and I just keep going.
>>53629914
yes, much much worse. Quit trying to justify why you never went to school and kept your NEET status through your mid/late-20's
>>53629900
[citation required]
>>53629973
bad habits are bad habits no matter where they are learned.
but bad habits taught from professors of "higher learning" raise some questions
>>53630043
exhibit A
>>53628171
exhibit B
>>53615259
now you need to give me a citation for OP's claim
>inb4 you namedrop some old fucks who were around during a time before CS classes were a thing
>>53628650
Unless they read no books about programming and never researched anything online and just figured out all this shit on their own, then they are not self taught. There is basically no such thing as a self-taught person in any field.
>>53629900
>>53629973
all skills past raw entry-level syntax ability are self taught
you think anybody actually learns anything from 2-week technology training courses?
Where are the go classes? perl, ocaml, websphere, blender, maven, webstorm, angular, etc?
self-learning is a fundamental skill in the software industry, and the people who show themselves capable of it excel.
>>53630085
OP's post says
> best programmers
Aka Individuals with above average skills and minds.
/dpt/ and /wdg/ are mostly people with (below) average skills. Probably even a CS degree wouldn't help them much.
>>53630097
self-thought usually refers to no formal education, that's what people actually mean when they use the expression. If you take it literally, it means you don't have the capability of reading between the lines and understanding casual conversations... it means you're an autist.
>>53630085
>/g/, as the rest of 4chan
>representative or proof
>self-taught
>not shit-tier bachelor graduates they actually are
>not pleb
>self driven
My friend, you must be new here. Most of them are CS101 cucks that learn their shitty habbits at university or trade school.
>>53630149
you haven't given me any names yet.
I want to see people who had no schooling, no college dropouts or people who took programming at any school who are somehow the most brilliant programmers of all time. Mathfags/engineers/physicists don't count
>>53630165
>projecting
I frequent /wdg/ and you couldn't be more wrong, as a lot of them actually work in the industry. Used as an example because there's a lot of idiots who go and ask questions on the most rudimentary shit...you know, the "self-taught" anons.
>>53628650
Because programming is art not science.
>>53628650
She was a math wizard.
>>53630218
>/wdg/
>work in the industry
>projecting
Bud, go away. We know you're trying really hard to validate your expenses on your useless CS degree.
>>53630163
Taking it literally means the same shit.It means you taught the materials to yourself. That guy is simply trolling, because self-taught never implies reinventing the wheel.
>>53630193
I can only give
>Mathfags/engineers/physicist
though because in my opinion if you only study programming then you're probably not that bright anyway. Most of the smart guys don't just study programming. Also being a programmer doesn't automatically means that you're not a physics- or mathfag
>>53630193
Not that previous guy, but the dude who created C#, TurboPascal among other things stopped his university before graduating because he knew it was pleb tier and they couldn't teach him anything.
Why the mathfags/engineers/physicists restraint, btw?
>>53630260
I am not a CS grad I study applied math. Just because you're a degenerate loser who comes on /g/ doesn't mean everyone on /g/ is a degenerate loser. Although this analogy might be getting into some basic set theory and I really don't think your feeble mind could grasp such a thing so i'll stop now.
Have a nice day anon
>>53630289
>Why the mathfags/engineers/physicists restraint, btw?
they all get taught some programming concepts in their department.
CS is for kids who couldn't handle the math
>>53630290
>basic set theory
wew lad. stop trying to impress everyone by "name droppping" your CS101 knowledge base
>>53630260
This to be desu.
Also >>53630290
>applied math
[so_called_musician_flinching_away.jpg]
>>53630308
Interested in the restraint too.
I know mathfags/physicsfags who are shit at programming. I know of engineers too who hate programming. So why are they excluded?
![512px-Lotka-Volterra.svg[1].png](https://i.imgur.com/rUfBtdy.png "512px-Lotka-Volterra.svg[1].png")
>>53630309
>>53630316
sorry if you had to look that up on wikipedia, lmao
>>53630347
>I know mathfags/physicsfags who are shit at programming.
This, and most, actually.
I know three good ones that are interested in it, but 9 bad ones with one that is your average C sperg pretender.
>>53630375
Woah... you took a course in population dynamics. Keep it up, mathfag. lol
>>53630439
Plus because you chose a different (or more diverse) degree doesn't mean you aren't a programmer at your job or by the very definition of what you do.
So that restraint looks like a bit inverted thinking.
>>53630484
i'm sure you had to look that up on wikipedia as well, lmao
>according to /g/, you don't need to go to school to be a great programmer
>according to /g/, you don't need to have a job or work in the industry or academia (or work at all) to be a good programmer
>according to /g/, you'll be a good programmer so long as you read SICP and CLRS
yeah maybe you should stop taking /g/'s advice
>>53630776
>you don't need to go to school to be a great programmer
you might want to check your reading comprehension
cuz their brain just werkz like computer (tm)
>>53629900
Probably the most correct post in this entire thread.
Most self taught """programmers""" I've interviewed couldn't even do simple shit like Fizzbuzz or sum up all the elements in an array. I feel bad for falling for the /g/ meme that these people can be good. Now I just tell HR to trash any candidates without a STEM degree. Idiots still get through, but at a much lower rate than before, so I waste less time on interviews.
>>53633339
Only if one is a real tool.
Judging from the posts above I'm not sure what your definition of selftaught is, but:
If someone really is committed it wouldn't pick the first solution but do some research and refresh its knowledge from time to time, how is it that hard to get.
>>53628700
My engineering program just gutted the intro to programming class taking out Python and matlab and making it a 12 week excel class because so many students complained that it was too hard. Our midterm was "write a for loop with an embedded if statement in MATLAB". It was in the slides and slides were allowed on the exam.
tl;dr: most students, even engineering, are there to regurgitate PowerPoints and party, not actually learn and apply skills that make them better in the workforce.
>mfw my $1500 class is now an excel scatter plot tutorial
>>53633468
>What kind of pokemon is this?
>>53633468
engineering got flooded with retards after all the clickbait articles claiming that engineering bachelors will make you the most money.
people just cheat their way through and don't understand dick. they suck others' cocks to get jobs and their ride on the backs of others because they are too incompetent to do their work.
>>53628650
Simply having the extra brainpower needed to be able to teach yourself puts you a miles ahead of normies like pic related who mindlessly absorb what they are taught and who lack the ability to think for themselves.
>>53633466
I'm speaking in a general case here. I'm not saying all self taught people suck nor am I saying all university taught are good.
I'm saying in general the university student will have more experience with algorithms, data structures, complexity etc. Which are things that separate an engineer from a code monkey.
I doubt most self taught coders are going to pick up an old algorithm book and read it for fun. They're more likely to research methods to get something done, which while making them in general more productive leaves them crippled due to their lacking foundation of the actual science.
A university student, weather he decides to apply himself or not, will be forced into these literature. Giving him greater exposure to topics that are needed to accel past the code monkey job.
Just my observations, I've been and interviewer at many software companies over my career.
>>53629693
Nice try tumblr
>>53630308
Is programming really math base? I always here conflicting ideas on that shit.
>>53633965
More so logic based. And discrete math. Rarely do you use hard math.
>>53629900
>actually believing this
self taught programmers are smart enough to google best practices
i taught myself programming before I started uni
>>53633979
That doesn't even sound fucking bad. I don't get why my CS friend was bitching about Calc and math in general.
>>53634064
>2016
>hating on Calculus
Tell your friend to quit being a little bitch and embrace the superior mathematics
>>53628650
ITT: self taught programmers with a superiority complex.
>>53634064
because your friend is a retard
>>53634316
>butthurt CS 101 faggot
>>53628650
because the K-12 system is dead and worthless
>>53628650
Self taught people are generally better at most things.
Programming and foreign language being the most prominent. Unless something requires years worth of knowledge and involves a bunch of laws, then there isn't much benefit in formal education.
>>53634529
>everyone should just learn math their entire lives
I know some kids who could keep up with that, but what's the point, really?
>>53634635
To understand the world
>>53634635
Math helps build critical thinking skills, and is honestly the best thing you can know in life.
>>53628650
Sounds like someone who desperately wants to convince himself that he can be lazy and not go to school.
>>53634771
knowing how to please a women is the best thing to know in life desu
>>53634877
>Implying he didn't already know that
>implying math plays no role in sex
>implying he isn't currently using trig functions to figure out the exact angle to jackhammer ur gf and hit her G spot full force
Fucking cuck
>>53629198
You're taking 4chan too seriously man
>>53629122
>tfw always went to class and paid attention and studied outside of class
>tfw my grades were always worse than those who didn't come to class most of the time
>tfw they are all making $100k+ salaries after graduating now while I'm not even making half of that
why am I such a retarded piece of shit
