[byoung2]

I'm an English major turned programmer. Just a heads-up, from what I've seen in people I've interviewed for programming jobs, college teaches you very few programming skills (lots of theory, though) that are useful in the real world (of hacking). I'm self-taught (C++, Perl, PHP, Javascript, SQL), and the best hackers I've worked with were too.

[brightscreamer]

How long did it take you to learn all of that? Was your English major worth the investment?

[byoung2]

I have been teaching myself programming over the past 10 years. I started doing freelance web design while in college and it's been a steady income ever since. I had a profitable internet business in college as well (a comparison shopping site with affiliate links that predated mysimon.com!).

The most valuable part of college was the experience, the people I met, and the T1 connection in the dorms. Studying English taught me how to quote Shakespeare and write sentences like the last one with parallel structure. Occasionally I wax poetic about the similarities between sonnet form and object-oriented PHP.