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Do you participate in this hobby without a formal IT education or a career in a similar field? (piefed.blahaj.zone)
submitted 21 hours ago by blight@piefed.blahaj.zone to c/selfhosted@lemmy.world
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Does anyone else here participate in the selfhosting hobby without a formal IT related education or a career in a similar field? I've only had one or two programming courses as part of my university education, but it was only very basic Python and C. I've never formally learned how to use containers, version control or anything else. Sometimes I regret not pursuing an education in IT/programming because there are so many things I'd like to accomplish but can't (for example if there's a feature missing in some project, or to feel safe in my abilities to harden my servers and my network in order to expose services to the open internet).

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[-] irmadlad@lemmy.world 17 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

Well, I've had a computer in front of me since the 70s. Don't conflate longevity with knowledge tho. I've had no formal training, even tho I 'ran' the IT dept for a small construction company in another life. One of my jobs was to train old head construction workers on how to use a lap top, a digital camera, how to interface with our servers to upload data from the field. That was wild.

But, no formal training here. Most of what I know I learned by: Reading, screwing it up, doing it again, ad nauseam. And then when something worked, write that shit down.

[-] BurgerBaron@quokk.au 3 points 16 hours ago

Basically same here except Millennial timelines. I only really know what I use myself.

[-] irmadlad@lemmy.world 2 points 15 hours ago

I only really know what I use myself.

That's basically how I know just about anything. Hands on failure until it works. And when you think about it, success is merely a string of failures. Given that, I'm succeeding like a mofo. lol

[-] watson387@sopuli.xyz 6 points 20 hours ago

Great post. For those who don't know, breaking shit is a good way to learn.

this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2026
139 points (99.3% liked)

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