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Comment by igotajob | Hacker News Reader

I’ve been trying to do this as someone who doesn’t have a CS career. I have a good full time job but wanted to learn something different and keep my brain engaged. So I learned iOS development, again no CS degree, made an app and got it into the App Store. The goal is to get going on a second app and get that in the store as well.

The issue for me is that, since I’m not in the development world, I don’t have any mentors or people to talk to and bounce ideas off of. I’ve been looking into getting an internship at a software company but those are rare for evening time remote work since that’s all I would be able to lend my self to because of my full time job.

I think I’m heading the right way but there’s just hurdles that need to be jumped over.

All that to say, try a different field than software development? A reverse of what I’m doing?

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Funny you say that, I actually started learning iOS/MacOS development recently, my goal was to release some apps on the App Store.

I don't have problems with learning and building the apps, my problem is how to come up with an app idea that people would actually use, and I could monetize it somehow.

This is the problem 99.9% of software people have though? Most could write the software for a wordle, flappy bird or Twitter clone.

But coming up with that idea, executing it correctly and having a whole lot of luck is out of reach for the majority.

Yeah, facts. So how to overcome this?

The million dollar question, I'll let you know if I find the answer!

I wouldn't underestimate the luck part though even if you do come up with a brilliant well executed idea.

I've acquaintances who spent years trying to commercialise side projects that have eventually come to nothing. A lot of disappointment but I guess you've got to put the hours in and try something to even have a chance.

Personally always thought the idea of something low key with a continuous income stream sounded the most realistic, as others in this thread allude to. But you still need the idea, the execution and the luck.

There is no quick fix besides working in an industry that's valuable and has lots of broken problems to solve. As I alluded to in a comment I made elsewhere on this thread, it might be valuable to use this to think about your next role. Is your current role in an industry that doesn't expose you to these problems, and would you rather get more exposure?

For me, I got a lot of exposure to these problems in the time I spent working at startups using technology to solve big problems in large industries that aren't conventionally "tech" but this is a long term play; it took me a decade of doing this to start to develop a perspective on where my previous companies, as great of a job as they did, still left certain problems unsolved, problems I would go on to solve at my own company. This isn't a quick solution to your problem but it does work.

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