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Ask Slashdot: Becoming a Programmer At 40?
New submitter fjsalcedo writes "I've read many times, here at Slashdot and elsewhere, that programming, especially learning how to program professionally, is a matter for young people. That programmers after 35 or so begin to decline and even lose their jobs, or at least part of their wages. Well, my story is quite the contrary. I've never made it after undergraduate level in Computer Science because I had to begin working. I've always worked 24x4 in IT environments, but all that stopped abruptly one and a half years ago when I was diagnosed with a form of epilepsy and my neurologist forbade me from working shifts and, above all, nights. Fortunately enough, my company didn't fire me; instead they gave me the opportunity to learn and work as a web programmer. Since then, in less than a year, I've had to learn Java, JavaScript, JSTL, EL, JSP, regular expressions, Spring, Hibernate, SQL, etc. And, you know what? I did. I'm not an expert, of course, but I'm really interested in continuing to learn. Is my new-born career a dead end, or do I have a chance of becoming good at programming?"
Wal-Mart has a job for you. Best to let the Young Bucks do the heavy lifting of this thing you call "programming". Nobody wants to be your fellow brogrammer, go work in a book store.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
There is always a chance. if....
you never get hit with the non-existent age bias in the tech industry
you like the smell of curry and noodles
you don't mind ramping up on a skill set and then seeing your job get outsourced
you hit the lottery
you work AT the office
you can hide your grey hair (or if you have no hair, keep the dome waxed)
Life may suck, but if you enjoy what you do, you will always have something to fall back on, even if that something doesn't pay the bills.
Toil is Stupid. Don't be Stupid.