Who wants to give me a job?

[Noel_V]

Hello Hackernews,

I'm rather good with HTML and CSS, I can implement Javascript and Jquery elements wherever I've tried. I'm getting better and better with PHP and am about to start the second year of Higher certificate of web technologies. Really however, I'm pretty much self taught without any commercial web design experience.

I've been working at my personal business site for about six months which you can find at www.wildhives.co.uk

Its taught me a great deal about SEO, google analytics, PHP and basic things such as HTML and CSS. I've recently gotten interested in bootstrap.

Its pretty much running itself now however and I'ld like to take a step into a different river, that of web design and development.

You can find a few further details about me here www.noelvock.com

You can question me further here.

Currently I'ld be interested in small roles, large projects, big roles and small projects.

Is there anyone who would be happy to have an apprentice under wing?

[EnderMB]

Higher Certificate? Perhaps my knowledge of this is dated, but after you finish your second year can you not go onto the final-year of a university course? That was the case for HND's a while back.

If you can move on, and get a degree within the next two years then I'd probably stick with the course you're on, and to continue freelancing.

From what I've read, you seem capable, but your tool set seems rather dated, something I've noticed a lot from students that study for web-related certifications. Sadly, the mere mention of Dreamweaver is usually enough to scare people away from you, despite the actual knowledge you need to use any IDE.

[Noel_V]

The degree course I could continue to do has some modules of questionable value and I could learn at a faster more specific rate alone. I used to be somewhat anti dreamweaver, and I still never use it in design view for instance, I use it as a text editor, but as was suggested in another reply to this post I've downloaded netbeans and I'm starting to use that. First impressions, netbeans seems very nice.

[EnderMB]

I know the feeling all too well. In my opinion, a lot of degree courses are not fit for purpose. I studied at an ex-poly that had over 15 different Computing related courses and the only ones of real value were Computer Science and Software Engineering.

I know for a fact that some universities will consider a transfer for your final year to another course. One guy I worked with was on a HND course in Computing and he managed to get into the second year of Computer Science at Bristol University, and one managed to get into the final year at an ex-poly, again in Computer Science. It might be worth considering if you think your grades will be up to scratch.

However, to be fair, most people on here will agree that your skills show far more than what degree you have. Frankly, the value in the degree isn't necessarily the knowledge you attain, but the whole experience, as well as working on projects of a certain scale and complexity. Once you've got a job behind you, the degree is nothing more than a slip of paper.

In regards to IDE's, as long as you're using something used in industry and are using something you are comfortable in there's no need to worry. When I was a student I worked a ton of internships and picked up C# and .NET that way, so my career went down the .NET route, although I've dabbled a bit in PHP and Python where I could. If you're itching to work, then I'd highly recommend sticking with the course, and working over the summer. There are always schemes out there for students, and the experience is invaluable later on.

[Morphling]

A quick question what kind of IDE do you use when developing?

Couple things about the sites, you might be - as you said - good with HTML and CSS, but you don't have very good design sense. The pages you've linked don't look visually appealing, at least to me.

Also you say on your page that your websites are "coded to W3C XHTML strict guidelines.", but noelvock.com uses HTML5 doctype (as everything should imo) and wildhives nets almost 30 validation errors.

It's a good start and at least you are putting yourself out there, but these would be the things you'd get burned for from my experience.

[Noel_V]

I've had some good feedback about the Wild Hives site with regards design, but hey, preferences like that are largely subjective.

My portfolio site definitely needs some updating and with regards the validation errors, I could fix them, but its low in my list of things to do.

The ide I use is Dreamweaver. I'm also familiar with Photoshop and Fireworks.

Thanks for the feedback, its very welcome and hoping for further suggestions..

[Noel_V]

Here's something I whipped together in 45 minutes

http://www.noelvock.com/sgto

[pknerd]

Dreamweaver will exploit your skills. Don't go for so called _WYSIWYG_ editors. Try Netbeans, textmare or even notepad++

[Noel_V]

Have started using netbeans, as of today, can see why you would suggest it, it seems, at first impression much better

[gus_massa]

There is an official "Who is hiring?"/"Freelance?" monthly post the first day of each month. They usually get to the first page. You should post there. Wait until September 1st.

To get an idea of how it works, see the August editions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6139927 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6139937

[Noel_V]

Wasn't aware of that, thanks.