Ask HN: How to Move into Robotics Field? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How to Move into Robotics Field?

3 pointseren_y3 comments

I am a full-stack developer with four years of experience, and I am very interested in robotics. I have no experience in that field, so I’m wondering how to get into robotics and how to prepare for it while working my day job. Here are a few options I’ve been considering:

1. Move to a robotics company as an SDE and then gradually transition into a robotics-focused role. 2. Move into a role related to AI. 3. Move into a junior robotics position with a significant pay cut.

For options 2 and 3, I currently have no experience, so I need to prepare for them now. I need some advice on how to navigate this career shift.

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Definitely 1! As I commented before here, https://www.linkedin.com/advice/0/heres-how-you-can-stay-ahe...:

Many roboticists overlook the need for JavaScript in their skill set and tech stack. This is because of the evolution of robotics projects and companies: first you build a prototype and only then do you deploy and scale your fleet. The first part is hard and doesn't require any JS. But the second part is even harder and requires a ton of JS, because without web-tooling you won't be able to operate efficiently. This offers a great opportunity for roboticists to distinguish themselves from others be mastering JS for both the backend (rosnodejs, rclnodejs) and the front-end (React, Transitive Robotics). This sets you apart from both "regular" roboticists and from "pure" web developers.

What I'm trying to say: robotics is a very broad field and your current skills are needed just as well. And while working on those aspects of the robotics stack you can learn about the rest if you want. But you don't even have to to progress in your career in the robotics industry.

You can get a nanodegree from udacity:

https://www.udacity.com/course/robotics-software-engineer--n...

Or a graduate certificate from Stanford:

https://online.stanford.edu/programs/robotics-and-autonomous...

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