I have decided to learn other technologies during my job search. I applied to Code Academy here in Chicago. It is a 12-week program that teaches Ruby on Rails and entrepreneurship. I am also interested in Clojure and Android, but I decided that I needed to sign up for some training to give myself some focus.
The only Clojure training that I could find was only a week. I did not look for Android training. Code Academy is three months, and a lot of people in the Chicago technology and startup communities are involved to provide mentors, equipment and advice. I think that getting training of longer duration will be better because there is more time to absorb the material. Plus there are a LOT of people involved. I will still be jumping off a cliff at the end, but I think that the chance of success is a lot higher.
The current class is the second class to go through.
The original intent was to teach web technologies to entrepreneurs since a lot of startups fail since most founders do not know technology and do not always communicate well with their developers. Plus a lot of developers do not know much about being on the other side of the desk. I plan on staying a software developer, but I would like to know more about what makes founders, investors and VCs tick. A few people have suggested that I go freelance, but then I would have to deal with sales, and paperwork, and all the things that software developers do not like. What is the difference between an S-Corporation and an LLC? These will be covered in addition to Ruby on Rails.
There were also some people in the first class who were software developers who wanted to transition to Ruby on Rails. After speaking to a couple of them, I decided to apply. When I had the interview I also spoke to another developer transitioning to Ruby on Rails.
I will still be posting about Java. I am finally getting around to some posts about things that I have been thinking about for a while.
Lastly, to use some pseudo-Java notation, “Code Academy” != “CodeCademy“.
Image from Code Academy, assumed allowed under Fair Use.