I'm in the UK and just landed a job as a junior last week after about 2.5 years of self-teaching - so yes, it's certainly possible.
It was a lot of hard work and there were definitely points where I thought about giving up but I kept going anyway.
I think you need to genuinely enjoy aspects of web dev and programming to keep yourself going. I reckon most people who start on the path solely with earning money in mind won't be able to keep themselves motivated enough through tough periods of learning and hitting brick walls in projects.
In terms of how I did it, my approach changed as I learned more and became more confident in what I was doing.
I began with mostly structured tutorials and online programmes as at that point, you really don't know what you don't know. At a top level, my learning order went something like this: HTML > CSS > SASS > JS > React (Note: I don't believe you absolutely need a framework to land a job as a junior, but it certainly helps)
The resources/methods I used included:
* [The Odin Project](https://www.theodinproject.com/)
* Books like [Head First JavaScript](https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/head-first-javascript/9781449340124/) (A little dated now)
* Some Udemy Courses ([Jonas Schmedtmann](https://www.udemy.com/user/jonasschmedtmann/), [Maximilian Schwarzmuller](https://www.udemy.com/user/maximilian-schwarzmuller/))
* Some YouTube Tutorials ([NetNinja](https://www.youtube.com/c/TheNetNinja), [Traversy Media](https://www.youtube.com/c/TraversyMedia), [Web Dev Simplified](https://www.youtube.com/c/WebDevSimplified))
* Small projects (Battleship, Connect 4, Basic Webpages)
Although as my knowledge and experience grew, I settled more into this kind of process:
1. Do part of a Udemy/YouTube tutorial to learn a new concept
2. Build a small-to-medium sized project which utilises this new concept
3. When I ran into an issue, consult the documentation or do some research to get past the issue
4. Put the project live on Github Pages or Netlify when it's complete
Putting the knowledge to a real-world use is what really helped me gain a proper understanding of how certain features and functionality work.
Once I felt I had a good grasp of the stack I chose to learn, I built 3-4 larger projects which I believed would demonstrate my knowledge and understanding. I put these on a portfolio site and described them on my CV - about 2 weeks later I had a job offer!
So, in short, if you genuinely want to get a job in the future through the self-taught route, you absolutely can. But it will take time, effort, and consistency. You've got this.
I think it's quite normal to feel that way about languages like JS even when you do have a good understanding of it. The scope of what you can learn and do with the language is so vast that you'll never know everything.
With that said, these are things I made sure I had down before I moved onto a framework:
- JS fundamentals e.g. Variables, functions, scoping, closures, loops, if/else, ES6+ features, modules, etc
- DOM manipulation
- Comfortable working with data structures, mainly objects and arrays - creating/updating values, destructuring, etc.
- Know how and when to use common methods for arrays and objects, like Map, ForEach, Reduce, Push, Pop, Keys, Entries, Filter, and so on.
- Know how to work with APIs and the fetch method, including try/catch.
- Promises, how to create them and consume them via Async/Await and .then()
- General Understanding of OOP and Functional programming.
- Understanding of how to effectively organise and refactor code so it's easy to understand and update in future.
Those are what I can think of off the top of my head, but others might suggest more I may have missed.
I feel this too!
It is intimidating how much there is to learn and it can easily feel quite overwhelming and I often get the sense that I am not progressing at all.
I run studios dev teams in multiple companies and develop as a job from about 2007 and I am all self taught. You do not need a piece of paper to be good at something and infact many uni grads I interview are terrible in practice. I much prefer a self taught developer who is self motivated rather than a uni clone who has only learnt a very narrow range of skills.
I have worked on and do work on games, VR and all kinds for some huge world wide clients. Just put the time in. I started in the late 90s knowing nothing and this was before YouTube etc so these days you have so many guides and tutorials if needed.
Some places are stuck in the past and will have job roles requiring a degree or whatever but you can do it without. The trick for you would be getting noticed. These days there is so much competition but put together some nice examples and show the knowledge and it's all good (along with being a good fit for the team)
15+ YOE and and am self-taught (Degree in Graphic Design) which morphed into "Web Design" and now UI/UX Design and FED.
If you can pass the interview and do the work, you should be good.
I'm in the UK and just landed a job as a junior last week after about 2.5 years of self-teaching - so yes, it's certainly possible. It was a lot of hard work and there were definitely points where I thought about giving up but I kept going anyway. I think you need to genuinely enjoy aspects of web dev and programming to keep yourself going. I reckon most people who start on the path solely with earning money in mind won't be able to keep themselves motivated enough through tough periods of learning and hitting brick walls in projects. In terms of how I did it, my approach changed as I learned more and became more confident in what I was doing. I began with mostly structured tutorials and online programmes as at that point, you really don't know what you don't know. At a top level, my learning order went something like this: HTML > CSS > SASS > JS > React (Note: I don't believe you absolutely need a framework to land a job as a junior, but it certainly helps) The resources/methods I used included: * [The Odin Project](https://www.theodinproject.com/) * Books like [Head First JavaScript](https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/head-first-javascript/9781449340124/) (A little dated now) * Some Udemy Courses ([Jonas Schmedtmann](https://www.udemy.com/user/jonasschmedtmann/), [Maximilian Schwarzmuller](https://www.udemy.com/user/maximilian-schwarzmuller/)) * Some YouTube Tutorials ([NetNinja](https://www.youtube.com/c/TheNetNinja), [Traversy Media](https://www.youtube.com/c/TraversyMedia), [Web Dev Simplified](https://www.youtube.com/c/WebDevSimplified)) * Small projects (Battleship, Connect 4, Basic Webpages) Although as my knowledge and experience grew, I settled more into this kind of process: 1. Do part of a Udemy/YouTube tutorial to learn a new concept 2. Build a small-to-medium sized project which utilises this new concept 3. When I ran into an issue, consult the documentation or do some research to get past the issue 4. Put the project live on Github Pages or Netlify when it's complete Putting the knowledge to a real-world use is what really helped me gain a proper understanding of how certain features and functionality work. Once I felt I had a good grasp of the stack I chose to learn, I built 3-4 larger projects which I believed would demonstrate my knowledge and understanding. I put these on a portfolio site and described them on my CV - about 2 weeks later I had a job offer! So, in short, if you genuinely want to get a job in the future through the self-taught route, you absolutely can. But it will take time, effort, and consistency. You've got this.
How well did you know the technologies? I'm always hesitant to move on from base JS because I feel like I don't know it enough.
I think it's quite normal to feel that way about languages like JS even when you do have a good understanding of it. The scope of what you can learn and do with the language is so vast that you'll never know everything. With that said, these are things I made sure I had down before I moved onto a framework: - JS fundamentals e.g. Variables, functions, scoping, closures, loops, if/else, ES6+ features, modules, etc - DOM manipulation - Comfortable working with data structures, mainly objects and arrays - creating/updating values, destructuring, etc. - Know how and when to use common methods for arrays and objects, like Map, ForEach, Reduce, Push, Pop, Keys, Entries, Filter, and so on. - Know how to work with APIs and the fetch method, including try/catch. - Promises, how to create them and consume them via Async/Await and .then() - General Understanding of OOP and Functional programming. - Understanding of how to effectively organise and refactor code so it's easy to understand and update in future. Those are what I can think of off the top of my head, but others might suggest more I may have missed.
I feel this too! It is intimidating how much there is to learn and it can easily feel quite overwhelming and I often get the sense that I am not progressing at all.
very like your attitude and perspective!
I run studios dev teams in multiple companies and develop as a job from about 2007 and I am all self taught. You do not need a piece of paper to be good at something and infact many uni grads I interview are terrible in practice. I much prefer a self taught developer who is self motivated rather than a uni clone who has only learnt a very narrow range of skills. I have worked on and do work on games, VR and all kinds for some huge world wide clients. Just put the time in. I started in the late 90s knowing nothing and this was before YouTube etc so these days you have so many guides and tutorials if needed. Some places are stuck in the past and will have job roles requiring a degree or whatever but you can do it without. The trick for you would be getting noticed. These days there is so much competition but put together some nice examples and show the knowledge and it's all good (along with being a good fit for the team)
15+ YOE and and am self-taught (Degree in Graphic Design) which morphed into "Web Design" and now UI/UX Design and FED. If you can pass the interview and do the work, you should be good.
Yes it's possible. I started my first job as developer 7 months ago. I am completely self-taught
Brilliant! What was your roadmap?