Off topic but where would one start learning?
I hate my job currently (I work in a literal slaughter house) but the money is ok.
I have no degree, no tech experience, but I’m interested.
Any suggestions would be appreciated!
Current tech market makes it really hard to get into without a degree.
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It’s a bit harder yeah.
My brother started with running and pulling cable on marine ships traveling around. 5 years later he is working at a large firm doing helpdesk like work. He didn’t have a degree. I started pre degree working doing fiber runs and then as a datacenter tech. It’s been over a decade and I have a degree now but I’m a senior security engineer (networking sme)
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Same with the field I’m currently working in. Never held me back so far.
But to begin learning to see if maybe I want to go back to school, where is a good place to start?
I’ll also note lots of movement for all these copilot and ai models to get federal
Approvals. It’s all coming 6 months to a year.
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Yeah, my comments only apply to the private sector. I see those concerns from the Defense sector. The government will probably need to create its own “secure” version of AI much like they did with AWS. They will, however, need to compartmentalized. Suggestions based on missile-code would not be useful for State Department evaluations.
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I havent used it as a software dev but my trust for copilot and chatgpt is a bit low.
Using it for school work copilot would literally add up numbers wrong. Chatgpt is helpful to get examples and such but actual code I often have to tinker so much to get it to work that I might as well have put in the time to do it myself.
You can get a foot in with a simple cert a comptia network + cert can get you some baseline knowledge and a cert that gets you in the door for some entry it work
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Yeah that better not even be in the same zone but I get what you’re saying.
Cybersecurity is also looking at it as our offensive counterparts are using these tools we have to use them too to ramp up the defensive or we will be left behind and at risk of serious breaches in the near future.
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What do you want to do? Software development? Security Analysis? DevOps?
That is where I would start. Figure out what interests you and what you have time for.
If you are interested in solving constant, frustrating problems, getting endless interference from business, having to constantly fight inane process; and spending long nights alone in the dark; tech is for you 
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Absolutely. In addition to the US, Israel, China and Russia will already be in this game too. It is definitely a bit of an arms race. This time; it is silicon.
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There’s also infrastructure like networking, virtualization, storage, systems, endpoint, and cybersecurity and so many niche within every discipline
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lol sounds a lot like my current job tbh except I’m also constantly dealing with government oversight. I’m gonna have to look into it.
I’m debating on whether to enroll in some coursera courses
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Yeah that’s a term that’s being used cyber arms race. Somewhat to drive fed spending but it’s true as well
Coursera can get you in a headspace to know some specific information but I will say try to research what discipline you want to shoot for and dig into that space. Too much to learn otherwise. There is value in being a jack of all trades but do so some focus otherwise you’ll be what is referred to as a paper dragon you look good on paper but the moment your poked you give way or fold.
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I took the Cryptography I course many years ago and it was awesome. The content was interesting. The programming exercises were fun. The quizzes gave you instant feedback and you could retake them (with slightly different questions). It does, however, require some programming knowledge.
Other Coursera courses I’ve attempted weren’t as good. I find that instant feedback from quizzes is necessary. I can’t wait 1-2 weeks to find out that I misunderstand something fundamental.
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I will say that software is one area where the need for degrees are getting blurry.I hired some young guys out of a local coding academy to develop them as react engineers when they were hard to come by a few years ago. They all turned out great. They just needed a good environment to learn and they were key contributors to our success. They are now working for other, higher-paying employers.
Start with free online learning tools for technologies that interest you. If you want to learn how to code; I would start learning Javascript. It is less reliant on computer-science concepts and has a free development environment with Chrome and VSCode. MDN has free courses and online documentation.
If you are smart and want to learn; anything is possible in the computer industry.
BTW; your online name is borderline creepy 
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The infrastructure end pays a bit less but also usually doesn’t need a degree until you get to an intermediate level.
I’m into the mgmt and governance side of things and I’m now looking at a masters to move forward.
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I highly recommend any free Python course you can find online. Python is excellent language for people who are new to programming. There are many modules that can be imported to do things you might want to do and the Python interpreter makes it really easy to see what the code is doing.
Python interpreter example
$ python
Python 3.8.10 (default, Nov 22 2023, 10:22:35)
[GCC 9.4.0] on linux
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import random
>>> for idx in range(5):
... result = random.randint(0,1)
... if result:
... print("Heads I win")
... else:
... print("Tails you lose")
...
Tails you lose
Heads I win
Heads I win
Heads I win
Tails you lose
>>>
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Python is also a great language to learn. Lots of FREE online tools and courses too.
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