Passed JavaRush twice. The second time - already working as a programmer

Dossier

• Who: Mikhail Zherdev
• Worked as: system administrator, technical support engineer
• Place of residence: Tula, Russia
• Age at start of Java training: 27
• First job as a programmer: a year after starting training
• Original success story

Background

I dreamed of becoming a programmer back in school. I wanted to enter the faculty of cybernetics at a local university, but in the end I applied to other faculties: I was afraid that I would not pass the selection. Later, I figured that I would actually pass, and I bit my elbows for a long time about this... In the end, I studied to become an engineer ( graduated from university in 2010 ) and got a job as a system administrator at Enikey, in technical support. So four years flew by.

“And all these four years the thought of learning to be a programmer did not leave me. Moreover, I wanted to study Java: it was influenced by its popularity and cross-platform, although the presentation language itself was not discussed for several years.”

At one time I wanted to go abroad and get a programming education there. I lived with this idea all the years of work, saving and putting it aside. Of course, there were attempts to study on my own, but studying from books did not work out. I always put off the next chapter until “ maybe someday .” So I lived until 2014 . Attempts to enter foreign universities ended in failure. In addition, at this time my girlfriend returned from studying abroad. So I thought that if I want to become a programmer, then I need to start teaching myself, here and now, because it will be more difficult later.

Studies

I started with HTML , CSS and JavaScript . I learned PHP for about a month and completed almost all the courses on Codecademy . At the beginning of 2015 I started learning Java .

“I read Shildt’s book on Java 7, it was difficult, I had no idea about future work. I decided to look for some more modern way of studying than reading books, since it’s the 21st century. I searched, googled, found it. JavaRush."

From the beginning of February to the end of April I worked on the site ( there was a monthly subscription, I stopped after reaching level 20 to improve the theory and analyze solved/unsolved problems ), since April I got acquainted with the Tomcat server , jUnit , JSP , Spring , Hibernate , SQL ( all technologies are superficial, only the very basics and why they are needed ). At the same time, I was brushing up on my Java Core theory and posted my resume at the beginning of May 2015 .

Work and... study again

One company responded. Actually, that’s where I work now. At the interview, they asked about Java Core and a list of technologies that I modestly added to my resume ( see the list above, in the previous paragraph ). I immediately admitted that I know these technologies superficially, and I plan to study them in the future. As a result, they hired me for the position of Junior Developer , explaining their choice by the fact that I have solid knowledge of Java Core ( thanks to Java Rush !).

“Since I completed the JavaRush course quickly and was a bit lazy (often sitting on forums looking for an answer), I lacked confidence in myself as a specialist. Therefore, already in December, I decided to go through JavaRush one more time.”

So that everything would be fair, to solve all the problems, to take part in a real project... Moreover, during my absence here, many new problems appeared, and I wanted to solve them, I was especially interested in mini-projects. And I liked the site itself, despite small disadvantages, such as not the most “ understanding ” validator ( the validator was completely redesigned in Java Rush 2.0 and became very understanding, editor’s note) . Actually, I completed the course and took part in a real project (I just finished it). I'm happy with the result!

First year

I've been working as a programmer for almost a year now. Java Rush helped me a lot in learning, developing and shaping myself as a specialist. At the company, I first worked on a web application, learning the required technologies along the way. Later I switched to mobile development, studied Android ( I studied for a month or two, then moved into development with parallel learning ) and since March - iOS . This is not a success story for me as a programmer. It's about how JavaRush helped me fulfill my dream of becoming a programmer. There is still a lot to learn, relearn, remember what has already been forgotten, but there is a goal - to become a good developer, there is room to grow.

Two years later

At the request of the Java Rush administration , I am publishing a continuation of my story. 2 years have passed since I started training in JavaRush and 1.5 years after I became a junior developer. I worked at my first job for 1.5 years . Participated in several projects, at the beginning ( June-October 2015 ) 4 months on Enterprise development ( JSP stack - JSF + Primefaces - JPA ) . Then I spent about a year developing mobile applications for Android and iOS . I studied several popular frameworks for these platforms ( Realm , Retrofit , a little Rx ). I wrote an application in kotlin for Android, having studied it + Objective C & Swift for iOS . In September 2016, we switched to an internal existing Enterprise project for a month. There it was necessary to improve the current functionality, introduce Elasticsearch ; I stayed on it for a month, studied the code, but then they decided to do it not through Java, but through the database, and I was transferred back to mobile development (it happens, sir...). At the end of August 2016, I passed the Google Android certification on the Udacity website at the request of my manager. I received the coveted Google Android Associate Developer badge only in November due to all sorts of bureaucratic things ( or they simply didn’t notice my exam ). Since the new year I wanted to change the stack to a modern Enterprise from mobile Spring , Hibernate , some db . But it turned out that I myself was “ found ” with the help of a former colleague. At the end of the year, I literally changed my job this week. Bank. Not the top 10 or even the top 100 , but I was interested in the project, which was one of the defining moments. The stack is Enterprise , exactly what I wanted to gain experience in commercial development. There are also a few web services, which is also a plus (I don’t know them very well, but I planned to learn more in depth in the coming year) and a lot of Groovy+Grails . The salary asked for more than at the current position, and my request was granted. All that remains is to meet expectations at a new place of work and gain new valuable experience :)). While working at my first job, I was constantly learning about technology, both at work and at home. Not every day, of course, but I devoted time to the best of my ability. I inflated my GitHub a little , wrote several test tasks found on the Internet. At the end of December I passed the certification from Oracle 1z0 - 808 (certification confirming basic knowledge of Java). Next year I plan to take the OCP ( Oracle Certified Associate ), which seems to be more significant, because... There is no education in computer technology, but certifications may come in handy someday. But the main thing is not the certificate itself ( although it is very, very nice to be its owner! ), but the subtleties of the language and the gaps that are filled in when preparing for certification. These are the successes so far over the past period. A little less than I wanted, but I can’t say that it’s bad. At the moment I understand that there are still things that need to be studied, taught and learned, but this does not scare me. After all, the best and most interesting things are yet to come!