Welcome! I am autistic as well and I am currently a desktop support engineer but I have held roles as a system admin before. I am currently taking a free online web development class called The Odin Project so I can leave the desktop support realm. At my age, I just cannot do desktop support anymore because it is overstimulating. I admire your ability to program and I hope I have what it takes to gain that skill set.
At home I use only Linux, FreeBSD, and OpenBSD. I hate Windows with a passion. So I am comfortable with the command line and shell scripting. Web development though looks like a whole new animal.
Open source operating systems and software have put the joy back in computing for me. They’ve given me something to do that requires continuous learning which thereby helps stave off the major depressive and generalized anxiety disorders that I currently suffer from. Just being able to tinker is kind of like my stim.
Just being able to tinker is kind of like my stim.
100% agreed. My main computer is a beast of a Linux system that is in a state of continual improvement. If I’m stressed, I just make little fixes here and there… try new things, create new little tools. It’s extremely relaxing to have something to dump one’s tinker energy into!
I want to take a moment to wish you luck! I’ve always believed anyone can program, even if not everyone can program everything. Modern web development can be very profitable, but very overwhelming. It is a constantly-shifting landscape of new standards and practices and tools. It has rebuffed many people due to this, who often become dejected by its complexity and dynamism.
If this is not you, then that’s excellent! However, if you feel this way, you should know that a different, slower, more stable version of web development still exists, which more closely mirrors conventional software development and even the shell scripting you have experience with: older style monolithic web applications are everywhere, and more continue to appear. Written in PHP, C#, ASP, even Perl (old!), these older web applications tend to have fairly stable ecosystems and documentation. You rarely find the biggest industry names like Microsoft and Apple and Netflix touting its engineers as having expert level knowledge in these languages and ecosystems, because they’re seen as somewhat old-hat, but they have a massive industry presence nonetheless… and fewer and fewer competent programmers exist to maintain and improve these systems.
Facebook is still largely comprised of PHP code, I believe - though they use a different runtime. WordPress is still a staggeringly massive presence on the Internet for anything from business sites to e-commerce shops, and it has a huge (and profitable, if you find a niche!) ecosystem of plug-ins written in PHP and Javascript/CSS/HTML. The new fediverse software (kbin) I am writing this post on is written in PHP! It is still easily possible to make a comfortable living doing nothing but quality PHP, especially if you can find a nice niche. It has a (relatively) undeserved bad reputation amongst modern programmers.
Welcome! I am autistic as well and I am currently a desktop support engineer but I have held roles as a system admin before. I am currently taking a free online web development class called The Odin Project so I can leave the desktop support realm. At my age, I just cannot do desktop support anymore because it is overstimulating. I admire your ability to program and I hope I have what it takes to gain that skill set.
At home I use only Linux, FreeBSD, and OpenBSD. I hate Windows with a passion. So I am comfortable with the command line and shell scripting. Web development though looks like a whole new animal.
Hell yeah on that linux!
Open source operating systems and software have put the joy back in computing for me. They’ve given me something to do that requires continuous learning which thereby helps stave off the major depressive and generalized anxiety disorders that I currently suffer from. Just being able to tinker is kind of like my stim.
100% agreed. My main computer is a beast of a Linux system that is in a state of continual improvement. If I’m stressed, I just make little fixes here and there… try new things, create new little tools. It’s extremely relaxing to have something to dump one’s tinker energy into!
Yea i can relate much, its alot of fun.
I want to take a moment to wish you luck! I’ve always believed anyone can program, even if not everyone can program everything. Modern web development can be very profitable, but very overwhelming. It is a constantly-shifting landscape of new standards and practices and tools. It has rebuffed many people due to this, who often become dejected by its complexity and dynamism.
If this is not you, then that’s excellent! However, if you feel this way, you should know that a different, slower, more stable version of web development still exists, which more closely mirrors conventional software development and even the shell scripting you have experience with: older style monolithic web applications are everywhere, and more continue to appear. Written in PHP, C#, ASP, even Perl (old!), these older web applications tend to have fairly stable ecosystems and documentation. You rarely find the biggest industry names like Microsoft and Apple and Netflix touting its engineers as having expert level knowledge in these languages and ecosystems, because they’re seen as somewhat old-hat, but they have a massive industry presence nonetheless… and fewer and fewer competent programmers exist to maintain and improve these systems.
Facebook is still largely comprised of PHP code, I believe - though they use a different runtime. WordPress is still a staggeringly massive presence on the Internet for anything from business sites to e-commerce shops, and it has a huge (and profitable, if you find a niche!) ecosystem of plug-ins written in PHP and Javascript/CSS/HTML. The new fediverse software (kbin) I am writing this post on is written in PHP! It is still easily possible to make a comfortable living doing nothing but quality PHP, especially if you can find a nice niche. It has a (relatively) undeserved bad reputation amongst modern programmers.
Anyway, thought to mention this. Good luck!