[logical42]

I was on track to attend law school (accepted into a top5 US law school) before I detoured into programming. I consider it one of the wisest decisions of my life but, to be honest, the engineering landscape was quite different in 2011 (no such things as coding boot camps and such). Not sure how things would fare if the same decision were made today. Getting a degree sounds wise, since it would differentiate you from all of the other people trying to get into the field through boot camps and the like. If you can get into a school with good career fairs (and outreach internship programs) then that's probably your best bet.

Though I did not personally pursue a CS degree, I would still recommend it since it's quite difficult to learn algorithms, data structures, and lower level stuff (compilers, assembly, etc) without being in a program that forces you to learn it. All that stuff is necessary (but not sufficient) to land a gig at one of the top tech companies.

Also, if you opt out of the school route, it helps to try landing a gig at a crappier company so that you can basically get paid to learn stuff (but you should probably leave once you stop learning things, otherwise you may stagnate).

[jimmierock]

Can I ask what you are doing instead and how you picked up programming skills? I have tried doing algorithm and data structures myself in depth. It honestly feels hopeless at times. And did you ever think about detouring into law again?

[logical42]

I did not get a CS degree because it turned out that I didn't need to (I am a software engineer at one of the 'big' Silicon Valley companies and have upward trajectory in my career). However, learning algorithms/data structures is not easy (as you mentioned) and if you aren't the type who can sit down with a bunch of textbooks over the weekend and bulldoze through them, then a structured setting which forces you to do exactly that may benefit you. And getting formally schooled will help you from having 'gaps' in your CS education which can (and probably will) happen if you opt not to get a degree (getting a CS degree doesn't mean you won't have gaps either, actually).

And no.. I don't think about going back into law. That field is horrible.. you get saddled with debt and then you make mediocre money (even at big law firms) with insane hours. It makes me sad that people feel desperate enough to even consider it. The only type of law that is probably economically worth pursuing is patent law (in terms of work life balance) but that's really some scum of the earth type stuff, especially with software patents..