| It's never too late to switch or alter the direction of your profession. Plus you're asking for help which means you're moving in the right direction. It sounds like you're at a bit of a crossroads. The first thing I'd suggest is to pick one thing and stick with it. Stop the learning. If you want to get into programming and develop your portfolio the following is what I'd suggest 1. Create a github account. 2. Find a project that interests you. I'd look at this thread from the other day on what OSS projects need the most help with documentation for projects https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8551624 2a. As you're looking through projects, look for ones that have maintainers who show they welcome contributions and are willing to go the extra mile with communication. The way to figure this out is to look at past pull requests and closed issues. 3. Once you've contacted the maintainer start helping. I'd suggest focusing on the documentation and issues first. Steve Klabnik had an excellent post on how to be an open source gardener http://words.steveklabnik.com/how-to-be-an-open-source-garde... 4. Start a wordpress, medium, or blogger blog. 5. Every time you learn something write about it and PUBLISH it All this advice is applicable to working on two main things 1) Figuring out if you really want a career in programming 2) working on your weakness, which is communication in English. If you have any questions or want to talk about better next steps feel free to contact me. My twitter handle is in my profile. |
Another weakness of mine is that whatever I do I want to be paid in advance. I just don't see a quick ROI from working on documentation but I may be wrong.