How hard is programming as a career?

[Sauron]

Depends on what kind of "programmer" you want to be. It's easy to get hired as a programmer, but not for a job that pays well and isn't highly repetitive or frustrating. For those you need either a college education or a lot of experience.

[Franck]

12 hours ago, Goofy G. Goof said:

I just want to learn programming to work as a freelancer currently I'm doing CAD design but I personally don't see a future for it because developers are making it very easy that even kids now can do CAD and do 3D printing. The language that I'm interested in is Python and based on the research I've done I see a better future!

You can do both. Programming and CAD daily in the right industry. Note that this is a bad choice for Python as business industry that need powerful 3D will mainly be C# or C++ unless you don't work on the Engine itself.

[Tosa]

Speaking for myself, I sometimes do some programming on my spare time, just for fun. I only like doing it sometimes, and there's no way I'd apply for a job doing it full time.

You'll just have to get into it, and see how you like it. Get a Raspberry Pi and a PiHAT, maybe, and play around with the sensors in Python.

[camjocotem]

(Based on jobs I've had in the U.K.)

From my experience it can be hard but that depends on management of the company you'd be working for.

I've seen people get programming jobs with no degree who are entirely self-taught

I've seen one person get a programming job who had a degree in physics with extremely little programming knowledge but was willing to learn.

 

 

Everyone faces code-related issues and it's important to know that;

 

My first programming job had me in a team by myself reporting directly to the CEO of a small company, programming in a different language to what I was used to. He said I could come to him for programming help if I needed it when he wasn't busy (of course since he was the CEO, Senior Dev, Team Leader e.t.c. he was always busy and got angry when I had question.   This was a bad company to work for)

 

My second programming job had me in a team of three, in our standups and casual conversation I found they would run into code-related struggles too and this was a huge relief to me. Saying "I'm struggling with <topic here>" or "I've not written in <language here> before" would be fine because that was actually okay. I was given training on the areas I didn't know and was supported in the areas I struggled with.

 

The majority of people I've met have at least some personal interest in programming, I personally consider this to be a requirement seeing as you'll ideally be continually learning new things.