"I'm self-taught and started at 11. I'll start college next year. Would you be so kind as to provide some advice to someone who is in a similar position to you a few years ago?
It all started out as a center of interest among others, but grown into a passion, and today I know that I will work on software development. I've gained some experience along the way - worked on real-world, revenue-generating projects for relatives, read through a lot of technical books, and learned varying amounts of Python, Ruby, C, C++, JavaScript (client- and server-side), and Rust. As well as some HTML and CSS. I learned how to use the command line, how to administrate a UNIX system, the basics of information security (just enough not to make overly stupid mistakes as a developer), among (many) other less important things.
Python was my first 'real' programming experience. I 'know' C, but I wouldn't trust myself to write production software in C without a lot more experience. I can read C code, but writing a sizable amount of _correct_ C is not an easy endeavor. I wrote a few production utilities in Ruby and recently started to dabble in Rails. I got interested in game development and read a lot on the matter, so I just _had_ to learn C++. I did for about four months before learning JavaScript seriously. I learned to use JS client-side, and server-side with Node.js, which I used to sell Steam trading bots for peanuts. More recently, I learned Rust, which has been my most pleasant experience so far (static type checking, memory safety, close to the hardware with C-level performance? Sign me in!), and the language in which I've invested the most. I contribute to open-source projects whenever I can, hung out a lot on the #rust IRC channel and on the /r/rust subreddit for some time, and used the language to write a few small production utilities (a few kLOC).
I like to think that this is a great track record for a 16-year-old. However, my perception of my own skill level is what I'd describe as unstable. Sometimes I'll read through some particularly technical HN threads and feel like a pretentious idiot who knows no more than the bare basics. At other times I'll read stories about college graduates and 'professional' programmers with 5 years of experience who cannot seem _much_ less skilled than me, and I'll feel like I don't even need to go to college.
So I turn to you. Enlighten me. What new things will college teach me? How should I approach it?
Here's my GitHub profile in case you want to take a look: https://github.com/yberreby/ "