I am curious as to how many web-based startup projects have got off the ground by people whose software development/programming skills were either self-taught or were perhaps spun out of a hobby project.<p>I am never short of ideas, but I would imagine that as a self-taught programmer myself, there must be certain implementation practices that would be obvious to a professional, but not so much to an amateur like me.<p>What are your thoughts?
Many coders start out self-taught like you. I did, and then studied for an IT degree and got professional work.<p>Here's a few things that I wasn't exposed to until I studied /turned professional - maybe some of these are the practices you are talking about?<p>- Version Control (Git, CVS, Subversion, etc.)<p>- Database design<p>- Performance optimization<p>- Caching<p>- Design Patterns<p>- Object oriented design<p>- Unit testing<p>Maybe you know these things already, but not knowing these things isn't going to stop you, none of those are worth losing sleep over, you'll pick up what you need on the way.<p>However, if I had to pick one thing out of that list that I wish I'd encountered sooner it would be version control.
I'm self-taught -- bought Frontpage in 1998 and a PHP/MySQL book from Sitepoint a couple years later and did all the examples. Building a successful web business has very little to do with how well you know the newest languages, fanciest design patterns, or fastest algorithms. Those considerations are way, way far behind 1) does it work 2) is it usable and 3) did I ship it?<p>Things that were non-obvious to me in the beginning: version control, database normalization, query optimization, and the importance of reliable infrastructure and testing your backups.
My advice is to read the literature; that's what I did when I quickly realized the limitations of my initial high school programming class (punched card FORTRAN IV on an IBM 1130 in 1977).<p>That plus mentoring by the more experienced for a few years got me to at journeyman level in less than a decade. More reading, thinking and developing got me to master about two decades after I started.
Wow, I did not read this, I just started a thread very similar to this one. I am a self-taught coder myself, and since I dont live in Sillicon valley, I really wonder how is the attitude to non-tech founder in valley? From what I read in HN it seems that PG hates them with passion; how bout other early stage investors/VCs?