A Goal

Near the beginning of my upper division classes were two programming classes.  In these classes we learned to program using Java.  I was pretty happy with this as one of my goals is to move out of support and administration and into application development.  Now I have a problem.

The only way to really learn a programming language is to use it.  I am working full time and attending University of Phoenix online full-time.  I hope to get my bachelors by 30.  This means I need to stick to the class schedule and find a way to squeeze in three lower division classes to finish my requirements.  That gets me graduated right before my birthday.

The problem is in adding Java study and programming to the mix.  A dream is to be able to pass the J2SE certification by the time I graduate.  This gives me the degree, the cert, and my experience in support/admin roles to move forward with.  I would theoretically have at least one custom-built application as well.  (How else would I learn enough to pass the exam?)

I currently have three concepts I would love to turn into programs.  Two are games and one is a utility.  I have more conceptualized for the utility and will probably start on it soon.  It has the added benefit that it will do well with a built-in database of some kind and I am in database classes right now.

The time problem is simple.  I have very few hours left in the week after working and school, and by the time I get to them my brain is usually close to burnt out.  I have taken three weeks to read a chapter of “thinking in Java” for instance.  I have managed to find database software to use, and obviously know what platform I am programming on. (I may try scaling to J2ME in the future…)   The next step that I see is building the database and then building the program from the back on forward.

As I have time to move forward on this and reflect on where it is at I’ll post progress and “lessons learned.”  Hopefully, by the time I graduate I’ll have an actual shareware product available for download…