From Amazon delivery driver to deploying my Full-Stack app in 6 months

Half a year ago I was an Amazon driver in rural Germany, it was not at all fulfilling. I was working long hours and had no time to myself. One day I had to take a few weeks off from work to do some documents, and that's when I realized I did not want to go back to this job. So I turned to programming.

I have always regretted not getting a CS degree when I had the chance earlier in my life, but I was at a make-it-break-it point because I did not want to be a delivery driver anymore. I went back to work but every morning I would get up early and do a free coding course which I finished in three weeks. After that, I went into another one which I also ended up finishing in three weeks. Now I had a solid foundation and basic understanding of web apps due to learning Django, but along with all of that, I was also introduced to React.

React was very interesting to me so I decided to go in a direction where React would be a priority. So I found a MERN focused course and ended up almost finishing it fully. I did encounter a learning burnout (I had been studying daily for close to 6 months now…), it was due to be already being skilled enough to make my own projects and I was tired of learning.

Now that I had a solid foundation I teamed up with my best friend to work on one of his projects, he tasked me with making the front end for this web app. After completion, I now had enough experience that I felt confident enough to try making my own full-stack web app.

During Christmas, my mother visited and we talked about AI, she is a producer and during that time she was working on a movie about AI. From that, I got the idea of making a script-reading AI, since producers often get offered many scripts that they do not have time to read so they outsource that to script readers. So why not kill two birds with one stone and make AI do it? It will save time and money.

So I ended up building AIScriptReader in a month using NextJS which I had to learn as I went because it seemed like an awesome tool to know. I also ended up running into issues with NextJS but I was too time invested in it so I had to make a Django microservice that uses Celery to deal with async functionality. Also, I ended up learning Docker and Caprover specifically to make this all work and allow for smooth and simple CI/CD.

Now looking back on my journey I am amazed with what I have achieved in the short amount of time that I have spent, from where I was half a year ago to today. I think I was able to do it because I knew what I did not want to do, and I knew that I liked building things with computers.

The point is, just do it. I did it all for free, thanks to the various online courses which I found online and even offer certificates. Do it a little at a time because the snowball will start rolling and you will be in a better place day by day.