Gottcha! But seriously, there is still this misconception that programming is easy and that anyone can do it. Although, I do believe that anyone can become a programmer it certainly is not easy.

Get rich quick

"You're a programmer? Oh boy, you must be rich!"

I hear this far too often, though it is true that programming jobs pay well, this is not always the case and most of the time not for those that are starting their journey or in junior positions. This does, of course, depend on where and as a what you work as but the majority of the time it is, unfortunately, the latter.

I was interviewing graduates for a grad placement in the company I work for. 4/10 of the graduates asked me what my salary is, albeit it is because I am around the same age as them and I don't see anything wrong with this as it can be an incentive to sign up with us but, its the idea behind it that was evident from their follow up questions.

You can get rich from programming, but probably wont. If this is your only incentive to start or continue, I suggest you look at other career choices.

You need a certain mindset

I would argue that this is very much the case, you do need a certain mindset for this. There are several nights and days that I have spent staring at my monitor thinking 'It looks fine.. why are you not working!!?' Only to find a typo, improperly called variable or an unset property. This is frustrating beyond belief and can and will most certainly make you doubt yourself and your skills but you must keep pushing through and not give up. I am guilty of such crimes and have given up on many of my earlier projects because I've just become frustrated and did not enjoy what I was doing anymore.

Programming is problem-solving. Before you even type a single line of code you are solving a problem, your idea or your work has stemmed from an identified problem regardless of what it is.

Times have changed

Many languages are becoming more and more beginner-friendly and this is a good thing! but is it a great thing? The problem with simplifying things is that you lose the ability to do certain things. Take C++ and C#. In my opinion extremely different; C# supports garbage collection and automatically handles memory allocation (to mention a few) while C++ does not do either meaning you need to code the 'low-level' stuff.

It is getting easier and faster to do things, but by speeding down the highway you lose control over a few things... Sometimes important things. Take this as you will.

A few points I'd love to discuss in the comments;

• Is knowing one language enough?
• What would your response be to the title?

Still no gin,

Rus