On Sat, Nov 14, 2015 at 11:16:22AM +0300, Mitt Green wrote:
> Thank you, Simon.
>
> I'll probably get my second degree as CS,
> I'm currently in a different (non-tech) university.
> I hope money we'll pay worth it. The good thing
> is that you don't need to pass exams one more time,
> they will only ask for an interview. And also it lasts three years
> instead of four to get the second bachelor degree.

I advise combining practical experience with studies. Each will help
you with the other.

There are several ways to go about this.

(1) Enrolling in a university that offers a co-op program. Here you
will be spending alternate terms studying and working at various
internships. The work experience will help you understand the
coursework in greater depth, and the coursework will help you with some
of the work projects. I once taught at such a university, and the
co-op students were often the best because of their practical
experience.

(2) Start programming before you go to university. This could be a job
(if you find someone to hire you) or a project of your own (yes, there
are good books for the autodidact). Those who taught themselves and
have a lively curiosity about everything related are oftern the best in
the field. Or find an open-source project that interests you and find
something to do that might help them.

You don't have to finish your first degree to start this.

My oldest son wrote a video game in high school as his personal 
project.  He was pretty well self-taught, though I did give him some 
advice as to what books he should look at.  It wasn't a great game. but 
it actually worked.  The most important    advice I gave him was to keep it 
simple.  Get something to work, and work reliably, before you introduce 
*any* complications.  In pther words, Do the simplest thing that could 
possibly work.  There's controversy about whether this is the best way 
to approach an real-world problem, but it is an excellent way to start 
learning a technology.

You might get some inspiration at opengamearg.org, which is a site that
encourages open-source games. I submitted a game to their
Liberated Pixel Cup challenge (http://opengameart.org/lpc-code-entries)
a few years ago because I wanted to learn something about OpenGL and
OCaml. I advise this not because it'll be a great resume item (but it
won't hurt) but because it will provide you with the source code for
existing games that you can study, modify, and learn from, and because
you'll likely find their forums at least fun. Not to mention that you
can play the games themselves in idle moments.

And if you havn't already started programming, may I suggest you have a
look at How To Design Programs
(http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/matthias/HtDP2e/), which goes with the
Racket implementation of Scheme. It's a language which is not the most
popular, but is good for learning the basics, and is not simplistic.
Scheme ca take you all the way from beginner's code to cutting-edge
research into computer science.

You will learn many languages as you progress in your compuuting career.
Just remember, the first one is the hardest, because you have to learn
new ways of thinking. ONce you have those, the others are relatively
easy.

>
> Thank you all,
>
> Mitt

-- You are truly welcome.

-- hendrik