Thats what it feels like to be a female programmer. only, when you ask for help you hear things like "that's okay, your a girl" or "why would you need to know that?". So you stop asking your stupid questions, and your self esteem is ruined forever.
The industry is full of ego. And I've have to learn to code alone to avoid working with assholes.
As to Erin Brokovich, she's an excellent example of confidence without ego. It's been difficult for me to cultivate confidence in the presence of others - I was never actually encouraged as a child (sometimes passively discouraged- "why would you want to do that? plenty of other people are doing that.") And apparently it's not common practice to encourage each other as adults.
You have likely heard of "Imposter Syndrome". Excess competence might be part of your problem.
That said, my areas of knowledge are in HTML, CSS, JavaScript and PHP. What I know in PHP could probably be translated to a lot of other languages. If you have any questions, you can certainly throw'em my way. Here are a bunch of ways to find me: http://fredhq.com/contact
And that goes for anyone reading this. I'm not always available (obviously), and I may not have the answer, but I can bounce ideas back and forth which sometimes is just what is needed.
However, I have found asking for specific advice is less useful than defining the problem, how your approaching it, and what's not working. Some times what might seem like a stupid idea is the best compromise available, but you need to get people past the ick factor before they will help solve the problem.
To you, catastrophallie, on behalf of male developers who happen to think women–ESPECIALLY women who program–are totally awesome, I'm sorry. I'm still confused on how being a woman has anything to do with writing code, and think people who pre-judge your ability do so on unfounded misconceptions.
... how being a woman has anything to do with writing code...
I agree with you in spirit, but, logically I think you have a fallacy here.