[kinofcain]

A masters will be a faster, more expensive path.

Without a CS degree of some sort you're going to need to prove you can code. Dabbling helps but you'll need to show work experience.

Getting work experience without a CS degree likely means taking jobs that aren't otherwise appealing.

Contracting or freelance can be a way to get that experience since the bar for proof is often lower, especially when working in non-technical industries.

But those are jobs, and they pay money.

If you have the financial means and can attend a reputable school, I'd recommend getting the masters, or even a bachelors.

Having that degree, and learning what they teach you in a CS program, will help you get a much better job and will help you perform in that job earlier than learning as you go.

You're going to need to make the call if you can afford the short term financial hit/investment.

[g00gler]

So, if I'm a full stack developer without a CS degree, would you say it's worth it to take a shitty software development role @ a Uni to go back and get a CS degree?

I say it's shitty because they don't follow best practices and just focus on pushing out workflow apps as quickly as possible. No docs, old tooling, etc. Really a mess.

That's the situation I'm in now, first full time job. I majored in business [first economics, then MIS], big mistake. Now I'm working for the uni with plans to get a second bachelor's in CS beginning in the Fall (for free).

People always ask me why I majored in business. I've had recruiters say to me "Have you considered a minor in CS", etc. despite a very nice portfolio and 2 years worth of clients.

So, since I must deal with HR and would like to be taken seriously as an engineer, I'm going against the advice of the great Charles Manson and going out of my way to prove something to the phonies.

Plus, I wanna learn my maths much better but can't bring myself to go it alone so I figure it's worth it in that regard.

[jakecraige]

> I say it's shitty because they don't follow best practices and just focus on pushing out workflow apps as quickly as possible. No docs, old tooling, etc. Really a mess.

I doubt schooling would fix this. It tends to be more about theory and algorithms than building "real world"(depending on what you're doing) apps.

Also, those are problems you can fix by reading a few books on best practices, learning from your team, keeping up to date on tools and just doing it (docs). If anything, the school would likely be behind on things like tooling and many best practices related to the modern frameworks.

It's not all bad, you'll learn things that from time to time come in handy, but getting a CS degree won't turn someone into a good programmer. That's a skill you'll develop over time from doing it and learning from others.

This repo is pretty cool and links to lots of free courses that show the kind of things you'd learn at Uni: https://github.com/open-source-society/computer-science

[g00gler]

I'm already well aware of best practices and I was really surprised that they didn't have any documentation or anything.

I meant, is going to school for CS worth working at a place like that.

They really aren't willing to make changes, as I said the goal is to push out apps as quickly as possible.

Coming from my previous job, where I was the only developer, I have full jsdocs/phpdocs, quite a few tests and high level user manuals. They have nothing resembling that.

[wikibob]

I would say it depends entirely on your goal.

Is the CS program high quality? If yes, then the job you work in order to attend that program is merely a means to an end. Think of it as waiting tables, just slightly more related to what you're interested in.

You could take the opportunity (not too quickly, be mindful of politics) to make a case study out of it and attempt to apply some best practices, it sounds like it could turn into a thesis about software development in the real world.