WHOIS?
Where to begin...
This is just a little bit about me and how I started discovering the joy of programming, buckle up, it is quite a story starting way, way back.
The Start...
When I used a computer for the first time, it was the best thing ever.
When I saw that Packard bell Pentium 1 with the speakers attached on the sides of the monitor, it was like a whole new world opened up. This is way before cell phones were so popular or even on the market for the average consumer. (Yes, yes I know I am giving away my age at this moment).
I sat in front of that computer night and day trying to figure out its secrets. Creating my own login profile on windows, changing the sound configurations to play different sounds instead of the default and so on, you get the point.
Fast forward a couple of years, and there I am doing the basic hardware upgrades and changes, building pc's and so on.
Programming...
It is at this point I talk to people doing basic Pascal programming in school to find out more about programming. Based on their description, I got the perception that it is all 1's and 0's. I was stuck with the notion that to display a simple "Hello world" output, it would require to write multiple lines of 1's and 0's.
Skip forward another year or two. A friend of mine and myself were bored of playing Lan games and he came up with an idea... "Let's download Pascal and do some programming" since he also learned it at school.
I thought to myself "well why not, that way I can see what the whole programming thing is all about".
We downloaded Pascal and he showed me how to write a basic "Hello World" program and run it in Dos.
I was dumbstruck, it was way easier than I thought. It's not binary, it is just basic language commands arranged in such a way that a computer (compiler) can understand.
Two days in, and I was writing "if else" statements, creating simple yet functional programs to amuse myself.
Hacking...
After that, I got intrigued by the hacking side of the internet. Learning what it was and how to do it. Everyone said that learning a programming language is crucial. With all the forums and learning I met a guy that went by the handle MacHaven. We met IRL (in real life) and that's when he gave me a CD with Apache and PHP.
" Those were the days with php3 when the file extensions were still php3 instead of the now default php. "
It took allot of research to set up seeing as my knowledge
was limited. But I got it up and running and my first script as you would guess
was ..."Hello World". I was so excited at the possibilities and what
can be done. It was short lived though because there was so much to learn
before I can actually do anything meaningful with it.
I was discouraged, how
would I be able to learn all that vast amounts of functions to be able to
program. (At this point it is necessary to mention, I don't do well with
"parrot learning").
The first program...
It is then I had an idea, without knowing the whole
language and only knowing the basic structure
I can learn in a different way. I decided I am going to create a CMS (Content Management System).
I
started with a plan to work from point A to B to C and so on until my CMS is
done and that is exactly what I did. Page for page I wrote a CMS, when I got
stuck, I just used the internet to find a solution and fix the problem.
It was with that "Horribly coded" CMS that I got my first job at a company to program as a Junior developer using php. Learning something new each day and growing in my skills.
Closing...
That was then and this is now, 10 years later.
To sum up the whole story, here are some quick notes with regards to some of the things I learned
over the years and what you can expect in future blog posts:
-Don't let anyone tell you what you can or can't do. If you want to do something, focus on it, work hard and you can achieve your goal.
-You will never know everything, so learn where you can, and that counts for everyone. You can learn from people and they can learn from you, no matter the level of experience.
-Be confident but not arrogant
I will talking (Writing) about these points and allot of other points in future blogs. Things that I learned over the years and still learn to this day. So keep an eye out for the next one.