Where to gain experience

Question

I'm looking for to gain experience that I can show on a resume. I know java and c++. I am currently working in a loose knit team on a hl2 mod http://www.sourcefortsmod.com/ However, I can't really link to that on a resume.

I have only completed two CS classes through my local community college, and am currently a junior in High School. By the time I graduate I want to be able to get an entry level job or internship.

What would be the best way for me to go about doing this?

Thank you for your time and effort,

Joseph

Answer 1

You don't need much if any professional experience to get a job out of college. That wouldn't really make much sense. I think that the projects you're involved with would be great on a resume to demonstrate that you spend a lot of time coding.

If you meant that you want to get a job straight out of high-school... well... I dunno, I think you'll have to be pretty darn lucky.

Answer 2

It's great that you're so interested in CS and programming while still in high school, and you'll have a huge advantage when you get to college.

That being said, there's no rush for you to get real work experience in industry right away. I'd recommend that you keep coding on your own time as a hobby and learn as much as possible. If you want to really get into CS, see if you can find any professors who could use some help in their research or whatnot. This will expand your mind much more than work in industry. You'll have to work eventually anyway, so spend this time learning and contributing to whatever open-source programs interest you.

If you still REALLY want to get into industry right away, network with your friends/relatives/neighbors and find someone in a nearby tech company and let them know how interested you are and that you'd like to volunteer at the company and get some experience. If all goes well, they'll soon give you an internship or part time job or whatever.

Answer 3

Mod experience looks very very good on a resume for an entry-level game programmer. Keep doing that, and maybe code a couple simple hobby games in your spare time for a sort of "demo reel". It can be very tough to get into game programming without a CS degree, but if you can demonstrate knowledge and initiative through stuff you've done in your spare time, it will go a long way.

Answer 4

You should look at the job market in your area. Look at the roles you think you might get and the skills they are asking for.

You may find that there are a lot for fully qualified IT people with 5 - 20 years of experience out of work at the moment so you may have difficulty getting an interview. What you may have is either low salary expectations or luck on your side.

Answer 5

Why can't you put that on a resume?

As long as you are passionate about it, and have done enough coding on it to describe in detail what in fact, you did do for it, it would be a great addition to a resume. You don't necessarily have to actually put the link there, but maybe something like "Did XXX coding tasks for a major game".

Answer 6

A couple things:

(1) Internships.

When you are in college, look for internships at job fairs that your school puts on (or nearby schools). Internships for the summer, etc. These are great learning experiences.

I did two internships during the summers of my junior and senior years. Before I graduated, the company where I had done my internships offered me a job. And so did another company...

(2) Part time work.

A lot of campuses have computer jobs for students. Programming, working on campus systems, etc. Don't be afraid to take these jobs. They will expand your knowledge and can work as valuable (people) networking tools.

(3) Open Source & Personal Projects.

Don't be afraid to work on open source projects (if you find something you are interested it). Don't be afraid to work on your own projects. And don't be afraid to put those on a resume; they show employers that you're a self-starter and generally interested in your craft.

When I was an undergraduate I wrote a clone of the Diablo engine in DirectX 6 because I wanted to know how DirectX worked and I wanted to know how an isometric 2D engine worked. I put that on resumes and brought that up at job interviews. Employers thought that was pretty cool

Answer 7

Websites like RentACoder. You can bid for projects and build a good rep for yourself.

Answer 8

You're definitely heading in the right direction, though I would also recommend branching out from just game development. There's nothing wrong with working on mods (like Dan Olson said, it looks great for a game programmer), but variety in experience/exposure can also be a great boon to your resume. Many local jobs might not have opportunities for game development, but they may desire networking (or other) skills.

Also, investigate good programming practices and keep refining and extending your programming skills. Local user groups can be great for finding experienced coders who can help provide a level of mentorship.

Answer 9

The first job I got in the Industry was through dumb luck, and back in the Dark Ages, but there may still be a lesson in it. I wound up with a job that needed more of a dirt cheap coding monkey than it needed a real developer. It was more important to my employer to get someone willing to do mindless work half-way well, after the real developers had left for the day, and for less than 1/4 of the price they'd have had to pay a "real" programmer.

That didn't stop me from getting that experience onto my resume, or from working for that same (cheap) employer for another two years, making me enough money to pay my way back to college after I ran out.

The job, BTW, involved translating COBOL programs from one dialect to another, and making them run on a machine like the new hardware the company had on order. It was mostly a matter of learning to understand what the compiler errors meant than of learning to program properly. While this specific sort of job probably no longer exists, the need for cheap labor has increased, if anything.

Answer 10

If you're really interested in getting into Computer Science and Software Development there's one piece of advice I can give you as you're still fairly young.

Do well in School!

I'm sure you're aware of the best universities for Computer Science in your country. That's where your future lies if you want to become successful in CS. Sure, you could spend the bulk of your time learning how to be a phenomenal programmer, but if you've flunked school because you were too busy writing a calendar in Prolog then what good is that? A lot of the best programmers are self-taught and don't hold degrees, but with the knowledge they've amassed they've got far more than a degree could ever teach. They've put ten times more work into becoming great programmers than 99% of graduates have and if they were to walk into a classroom they'd probably do extremely well, even at the best universities. In the real world most people have to work hard to succeed, and you're going to need to get the best grades you possibly can.

As many have already said you can easily get part-time or seasonal work as a developer. If you get the chance definitely go for it! You can build experience in your own time as well and if you perform well enough then who knows, you may get offered a recurring position every summer. Either way, university is the way to go and good grades is something every employer can get behind.