Getting a degree isn't a prerequisite; and its possible to learn enough on your own to get a great job in the industry. I have at least a few people on my team at fortune 100 company without degrees and making comfortably six figures.

You can read about some non-degree holders in the industry here: https://www.nocsdegree.com/

I'm not saying it's easy. There's a vast amount to know and master, and it will require a lot of practice building things to get the skills required. Not to mention study to get through the hiring hoops of algorithmic problems candidates are expected to solve at major companies during interviews.

What are these coding boot camps exactly? It seems like the material they cover is stuff someone who knows how to write code would already understand. Is it actually valuable?

Stay well clear of them, they're garbage.

I'd suggest getting your son a personal tutor, even someone he can just talk with over skype/zoom whatever. He probably just needs a mentor/friend to help him get through stuff.

He'll do great at uni, and although a degree isn't a requisite, it will make his path a lot easier and if he's in a position to get one, he absolutely should. Despite what people say, it is basically invaluable.

And kudos to you for looking out for your son, the world needs more fathers like you.

In this context, prints mean "original prints" which doesn't translate to junk or reproductions. Some original prints are worth in excess of half a million dollars.

That's true. I don't know enough to know what the prints they're lending out are worth.

I’m quickly approaching 50, and work as a tech lead/developer at one of the top few companies in the world earning well.

Age may make it more difficult, but in the end what you’re able to do matters most.

Articles like this do a disservice to everyone. For starters: a Stack Overflow survey is not a random sample of all programmers - it's a sample of people who are on Stack Overflow.

A better source might be the Bureau of Labor Statistics - https://www.bls.gov/cps/demographics.htm#age - which shows

  * 68% of "Computer Programmers" older than age 35,
  * 45% of "Computer Programmers" above age 45. 
  * 29% of "Web Developers" above age 45

Most of this article doesn't hold up, but the agist part is the most egregious.

And here's the problem. People don't agree what's hard/easy. If I ask you to find duplicate values in a nested data structure (arrays of arrays) ... that calls for recursion. I think that's easy.

So I'm curious how they define hard/easy.

Personally a bit frustrated to see desktop applications go to subscription models where years can now go by without upgrades but I'm forced to continue to pay to use the app.

If I'm unsure on how long before there will be a worthwhile upgrade, am I paying $80 for this app, or $400? Its a bit like being told that you can buy an item but won't know its real cost upfront.

I understand subscription models where they offer something that's ongoing (remove disk, sync, whatever) but I find this model annoying and its forced me to change software I use quite a bit in the last few years (most recently moving off 1password).

Charge me more if you have to, but stop this "keep paying forever" madness.

I can't talk to you about my team's current problems, and neither should anyone else. If I do and you offer up a solution I'm in real trouble ... because that's a lawsuit waiting to happen.

Try to remember, this is the country where a range check function resulted in a lawsuit:

    private static void rangeCheck(int arrayLen, int fromIndex, int toIndex {
         if (fromIndex > toIndex)
              throw new IllegalArgumentException("fromIndex(" + fromIndex +
                   ") > toIndex(" + toIndex+")");
         if (fromIndex < 0) 
              throw new ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException(fromIndex);
         if (toIndex > arrayLen) 
              throw new ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException(toIndex);
    }

> Only a few rarified corporate people and independent consultants can pull down pay in the 200s.

I'm not sure that's true. I've lost track of the number of software engineers I know who are in at least the low 200's Total Comp (in Texas).

Common? Probably not. Rarified? Not as much as you think. There's two just on my current team.

This is a big one: its a browser they don't have to pay to have google made the default search engine: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/14/google-paying-apple-3-billio...

It lets them use it as a jumping off point for some hardware: https://www.google.com/chromebook/find/?utm_source=en-ha-na-...

And it appears they now have an enterprise version: https://www.blog.google/topics/connected-workspaces/introduc...

I'm sure there's more, but I imagine, financially, I could have stopped after the first one.