Stepping Outside My Comfort Zone

Hi, everyone! Thanks for taking a moment to read my first ever blog post, ever. Shout-out to Fireship and his latest video for encouraging me to start documenting my journey as a self-taught developer. As the title of this post states, blogging is well outside comfort zone but I believe it is a necessary step to take in my journey. Not just because it could prove beneficial from a career perspective but also because I need to challenge myself and do things that make me uncomfortable. Through these challenges am I able to grow. I hope to see you around as I continue to learn.

About Me:

My name is Donald Fry. I'm 30 years old, have an Associate's in Computer Science, and I'm a husband and father to a one year old. I currently work as a Product Engineering Manager at a company that manufacturers wiring harnesses. In my spare time I enjoy making things that make my day-to-day work tasks easier or potentially make manufacturers processes more efficient.

I was introduced to programming around the age of 14 through a game called RuneScape. There existed some middleman software that players used that had an integrated IRC chat. Through this chat I learned about mIRC, its scripting language called mSL, and began creating what was essentially the same as Discord bots or Twitch chat bots today. You would think that starting to program at the age of 14 would have lead me straight into a career as a developer but this was not the case. Fast forward through quite a few turn of both fortunate and unfortunate events, which maybe I could explore in another post, I ended up working where I currently am.

What To Expect:

I'll be using dev.to as a way to post progress on my current projects, share my struggles as I stumble across roadblocks (which happens frequently), how I plan to tackle those struggles, and also as a way to keep myself motivated and hold myself responsible.

Thank you!

Thank you for taking the time to read this post. I'm nervous and excited to see what lies ahead. I'll see you in the next one.

Kind regards,
Don