Ask HN: Should I study CS or Law?

Re:Ask HN: Should I study CS or Law? by mettamage on Thursday October 21, 2021 @03:35PM (#28949787)

Research if you can get rich in your country with cs. In The Netherlands you can’t, unless you’re top of the 1% in the HFT space.

I did cs for the money. I was also mildly interested in it. A few things I have noticed.

1. CS is not math, I suck at math but am ok at CS, including datastructures and algorithms

2. It’s a lot of step by step thinking. I didn’t know that beforehand and I like step by step thinking.

3. It’s also wrapping your head around a “world”. Example: I had a lot of difficulty understanding what servers were. In part, it’s because I am Dutch and “server” sounds like “waiter” and I would then ask why a computer needs to be a waiter. The better you are at English, the easier it is. And god forbid that I understood what caches are. I am so thankful I learned about geocaching (a game) on HN. It made it a lot more clear.

4. Following HN while learning cs makes it a lot more fun

5. Hacking is not cs. Try it, you might like it. Also, reverse engineering feels really different to other forms of hacking

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Re:Ask HN: Should I study CS or Law? by ironmagma on Thursday October 21, 2021 @06:11PM (#28951446)

For all intents and purposes, CS is a kind of math, it's just a different flavor than, say, differential equations. The amount you need to know to get a job is just pretty low compared to the depth available for study.

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Re:Ask HN: Should I study CS or Law? by Max_Ehrlich on Friday October 22, 2021 @10:00PM (#28964971)

If the amount I need to know to get a job is not as that available for study, then that is a great relief. Thanks

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Re:Ask HN: Should I study CS or Law? by ironmagma on Friday October 22, 2021 @11:38PM (#28965476)

Yes. I’ve been working in SV for 6 years. I’m more formally educated than your average coder, and still, when I open most CS whitepapers I just see hieroglyphics.

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Re:Ask HN: Should I study CS or Law? by Max_Ehrlich on Friday October 22, 2021 @10:03PM (#28964988)

Thanks a lot for your advice. Interesting that you can't get rich with cs in all countries, but I think that in the USA at least I should be able to launch a business or something.

Thanks for the reassurance and sharing that you did it for the money and were only mildly interested like how I am right now. Hell, from what you've described it even sounds like I might enjoy it o.O

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Re:Ask HN: Should I study CS or Law? by satvikpendem on Thursday October 21, 2021 @11:03PM (#28953293)

Regarding 3, server means waiter in English as well. It's so named because both are similar; much as you would ask a restaurant server to bring you stuff, so too do you ask the computing server to bring you stuff, and it does.

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