[caymanjim]

I've had a 30-year career as a sysadmin and developer, and I don't have a CS degree (or even a highschool diploma). Most of the people I've worked with at Fortune 500 companies don't have CS degrees. If you think you know enough to do a job, apply for it and be honest. Don't lie about your credentials. If you have no related job experience, you can build an online portfolio by contributing to open source projects, or highlighting your own solo endeavors. Get a GitHub presence, start a tech blog, make a portfolio site to showcase what you can do.

The quick and easy way to get a job is to go to an immersive code school crash-course. I have a lot of misgivings about the quality of candidates they tend to produce, but I've seen enough good people come out of them that I don't dismiss them. I've hired plenty of people with no other CS background and no related job experience. They're expensive, but the payoff is huge if it gets you a job. Some of them are free until you start working. App Academy specifically operates this way, and produces strong candidates (they have a competitive application/vetting process).

[personalpicture]

I have a Github but it's mostly web dev projects. In your career, what projects have you seen that would impress semiconductor companies?

And as far as immersive code schools go, I haven't seen any bootcamps that focus on low-level programming.