Question

Can anyone help me giving an answer of the question"What is the most efficient way to become a software engineer?"

Answer 1

Hoot! You just asked your first question! Hang tight while I find people to answer it for you. You can thank people who give you good answers by clicking the 'Good Answer' button on the right!

Answer 2

Ok I will do it if I get any good answer.

Answer 3

The guy I used to work for just wrote a program and kept expanding it until he could sell out for millions and then do something else. So start coding...

Answer 4

Joking aside, becoming a software engineer can be done in two major ways:

1. Go to school for computer science. This will prepare you to work in most companies, and if you understand the material, you'll be doing well for yourself.

2. Learn to program on your own. Read programming blogs and websites ( http://www.reddit.com/programming, for instance), find out what languages you like, dislike, and start forming opinions. Then, start writing code: maybe shell scripts to make every day tasks easier, or maybe you have an idea for an application and you'd like to try writing it. Do it. Ask for help on the various forums and IRC channels (also, become familiar with IRC). Slowly, you'll learn.

Path 1 leads to moderate success and security. Path 2 leads to madness, passion, and, possibly, if you're really lucky and work really hard, riches. Also, it's more satisfying. Here's something else to keep you going—or crush your dreams, depending on the kind of person you are:

http://norvig.com/21-days.html

Answer 5

Stick to one thing...and succeed at it. That's all I can say. After that you'll be able to learn pretty much everything else out there. I would suggest to choose something like C and C# or C and Java, or C and C++, etc. For some it takes time to assimilate what they are reading, etc. There is no perfect answer for your situation, at least that you have to think of what you want to do (what type of things do you like the most?, if you can answer that question, then you'll be able to figure out what things you might have to take on)...

Answer 6

Start coding, and never stop learning. I started with C++, picked up ASP VBScript on the side a year later, PHP two months later, more VBScript and PHP in parallel after that, Java after that, Ruby after that, some Python and Lisp and Smalltalk here and there and in classes, and JS when I did web stuff, ActionScript when I did Flash stuff, etc.

Basically, never stop challenging yourself, and don't stop because you know a language. Learn more languages. Learn more ways to approach problems. Try different problems.

But most importantly, code code code. Nothing beats practice -- not for learning math, programming, or any other subject.