我成为软件工程师的原因和经历
软件工程师
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1989 年乌干达首都，坎帕拉。


我明智的父母决定与其将我留在家里添麻烦，不如把我送到叔叔的办公室学学电脑。几天后，我和另外六、七个小孩，还有一台放置在课桌上的崭新电脑，一起置身于 21 层楼的一间狭小房屋中。很明显我们还不够格去碰那家伙。在长达三周无趣的 DOS 命令学习后，美好时光来到，终于轮到我来输 **copy doc.txt d:** 啦。


那将文件写入五英寸软盘的奇怪的声音，听起来却像音乐般美妙。那段时间，这块软盘简直成为了我的至宝。我把所有可以拷贝的东西都放在上面了。然而，1989 年的乌干达，人们的生活十分“正统”，相比较而言，捣鼓电脑、拷贝文件还有格式化磁盘就称不上“正统”。于是我不得不专注于自己接受的教育，远离计算机科学，走入建筑工程学。


之后几年里，我和同龄人一样，干过很多份工作也学到了许多技能。我教过幼儿园的小朋友，也教过大人如何使用软件，在服装店工作过，还在教堂中担任过引座员。在我获取堪萨斯大学的学位时，我正在技术管理员的手下做技术助理，听上去比较神气，其实也就是搞搞学生数据库而已。


当我 2007 年毕业时，计算机技术已经变得不可或缺。建筑工程学的方方面面都与计算机科学深深的交织在一起，所以我们不经意间学了些简单的编程知识。我对于这方面一直很着迷，但我不得不成为一位“正统”的工程师，由此我发展了一项秘密的私人爱好：写科幻小说。


在我的故事中，我以我笔下的女主角的形式存在。她们都是编程能力出众的科学家，总是卷入冒险，并用自己的技术发明战胜那些渣渣们，有时甚至要在现场发明新方法。我提到的这些“新技术”，有的是基于真实世界中的发明，也有些是从科幻小说中读到的。这就意味着我需要了解这些技术的原理，而且我的研究使我关注了许多有趣的 reddit 版块和电子杂志。


### 开源：巨大的宝库


那几周在 DOS 命令上花费的经历对我影响巨大，我在一些非专业的项目上耗费心血，并占据了宝贵的学习时间。Geocities 刚向所有 Yahoo! 用户开放时，我就创建了一个网站，用于发布一些用小型数码相机拍摄的个人图片。我建立多个免费网站，帮助家人和朋友解决一些他们所遇到的电脑问题，还为教堂搭建了一个图书馆数据库。


这意味着，我需要一直研究并尝试获取更多的信息，使它们变得更棒。互联网上帝保佑我，让开源进入我的视野。突然之间，30 天试用期和 license 限制对我而言就变成了过去式。我可以完全不受这些限制，继续使用 GIMP、Inkscape 和 OpenOffice。


### 是正经做些事情的时候了


我很幸运，有商业伙伴喜欢我的经历。她也是个想象力丰富的人，期待更高效、更便捷的互联世界。我们根据我们以往成功道路中经历的弱点制定了解决方案，但执行却成了一个问题。我们都缺乏给产品带来活力的能力，每当我们试图将想法带到投资人面前时，这表现的尤为突出。


我们需要学习编程。于是 2015 年夏末，我们来到 Holberton 学校。那是一所座落于旧金山，由社区推进，基于项目教学的学校。


一天早晨我的商业伙伴来找我，以她独有的方式（每当她有疯狂想法想要拉我入伙时），进行一场对话。


**Zee**: Gloria，我想和你说点事，在你说“不”前能先听我说完吗？


**Me**: 不行。


**Zee**: 为做全栈工程师，咱们申请上一所学校吧。


**Me**: 什么？


**Zee**: 就是这，看！就是这所学校，我们要申请这所学校来学习编程。


**Me**: 我不明白。我们不是正在网上学 Python 和…


**Zee**: 这不一样。相信我。


**Me**: 那…


**Zee**: 这就是不信任我了。


**Me**: 好吧 … 给我看看。


### 抛开偏见


我读到的和我们在网上看的的似乎很相似。这简直太棒了，以至于让人觉得不太真实，但我们还是决定尝试一下，全力以赴，看看结果如何。


要成为学生，我们需要经历四步选择，不过选择的依据仅仅是天赋和动机，而不是学历和编程经历。筛选便是课程的开始，通过它我们开始学习与合作。


根据我和我伙伴的经验， Holberton 学校的申请流程比其他的申请流程有趣太多了，就像场游戏。如果你完成了一项挑战，就能通往下一关，在那里有别的有趣的挑战正等着你。我们创建了 Twitter 账号，在 Medium 上写博客，为创建网站而学习 HTML 和 CSS， 打造了一个充满活力的在线社区，虽然在此之前我们并不知晓有谁会来。


在线社区最吸引人的就是大家有多种多样的使用电脑的经验，而背景和性别不是社区创始人（我们私下里称他们为“The Trinity”）做出选择的因素。大家只是喜欢聚在一块儿交流。我们都行进在通过学习编程来提升自己计算机技术的旅途上。


相较于其他的的申请流程，我们不需要泄露很多的身份信息。就像我的伙伴，她的名字里看不出她的性别和种族。直到最后一个步骤，在视频聊天的时候， The Trinity 才知道她是一位有色人种女性。迄今为止，促使她达到这个级别的只是她的热情和才华。肤色和性别并没有妨碍或者帮助到她。还有比这更酷的吗？


获得录取通知书的晚上，我们知道生活将向我们的梦想转变。2016 年 1 月 22 日，我们来到巴特瑞大街 98 号，去见我们的同学们 [Hippokampoiers](https://twitter.com/hippokampoiers)，这是我们的初次见面。很明显，在见面之前，“The Trinity”已经做了很多工作，聚集了一批形形色色的人，他们充满激情与热情，致力于成长为全栈工程师。


这所学校有种与众不同的体验。每天都是向某一方面编程的一次竭力的冲锋。交给我们的工程，并不会有很多指导，我们需要使用一切可以使用的资源找出解决方案。[Holberton 学校](https://www.holbertonschool.com/) 认为信息来源相较于以前已经大大丰富了。MOOC（大型开放式课程）、教程、可用的开源软件和项目，以及线上社区等等，为我们完成项目提供了足够的知识。加之宝贵的导师团队来指导我们制定解决方案，这所学校变得并不仅仅是一所学校；我们已经成为了求学者的团体。任何对软件工程感兴趣并对这种学习方法感兴趣的人，我都强烈推荐这所学校。在这里的经历会让人有些悲喜交加，但是绝对值得。


### 开源问题


我最早使用的开源系统是 [Fedora](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fedora_(operating_system))，一个 [Red Hat](https://www.redhat.com/) 赞助的项目。与 一名IRC 成员交流时，她推荐了这款免费的操作系统。 虽然在此之前，我还未独自安装过操作系统，但是这激起了我对开源的兴趣和日常使用计算机时对开源软件的依赖性。我们提倡为开源贡献代码，创造并使用开源的项目。我们的项目就在 Github 上，任何人都可以使用或是向它贡献出自己的力量。我们也会使用或以自己的方式为一些既存的开源项目做出贡献。在学校里，我们使用的大部分工具是开源的，例如 Fedora、[Vagrant](https://www.vagrantup.com/)、[VirtualBox](https://www.virtualbox.org/)、[GCC](https://gcc.gnu.org/) 和 [Discourse](https://www.discourse.org/)，仅举几例。


在向软件工程师行进的路上，我始终憧憬着有朝一日能为开源社区做出一份贡献，能与他人分享我所掌握的知识。


### 多样性问题


站在教室里，和 29 位求学者交流心得，真是令人陶醉。学员中 40% 是女性， 44% 是有色人种。当你是一位有色人种且为女性，并身处于这个以缺乏多样性而著名的领域时，这些数字就变得非常重要了。这是高科技圣地麦加上的绿洲，我到达了。


想要成为一个全栈工程师是十分困难的，你甚至很难了解这意味着什么。这是一条充满挑战但又有丰富回报的旅途。科技推动着未来飞速发展，而你也是美好未来很重要的一部分。虽然媒体在持续的关注解决科技公司的多样化的问题，但是如果能认清自己，清楚自己的背景，知道自己为什么想成为一名全栈工程师，你便能在某一方面迅速成长。


不过可能最重要的是，告诉大家，女性在计算机的发展史上扮演过多么重要的角色，以帮助更多的女性回归到科技界，而且在给予就业机会时，不会因性别等因素而感到犹豫。女性的才能将会共同影响科技的未来，以及整个世界的未来。




---


via: <https://opensource.com/life/16/4/my-open-source-story-gloria-bwandungi>


作者：[Gloria Bwandungi](https://opensource.com/users/nappybrain) 译者：[martin2011qi](https://github.com/martin2011qi) 校对：[jasminepeng](https://github.com/jasminepeng)


本文由 [LCTT](https://github.com/LCTT/TranslateProject) 原创翻译，[Linux中国](https://linux.cn/) 荣誉推出


OK
The year was 1989. The city was Kampala, Uganda.

In their infinite wisdom, my parents decided that instead of all the troublemaking I was getting into at home, they would send me off to my uncle's office to learn how to use a computer. A few days later, I found myself on the 21st floor in a cramped room with six or seven other teens and a brand new computer on a desk perpendicular to the teacher's desk. It was made abundantly clear that we were not skilled enough to touch it. After three frustrating weeks of writing and perfecting DOS commands, the magic moment happened. It was my turn to type **copy doc.txt d:**.

The alien scratching noises that etched a simple text file onto the five-inch floppy sounded like beautiful music. For a while, that floppy disk was my most prized possession. I copied everything I could onto it. However, in 1989, Ugandans tended to take life pretty seriously, and messing around with computers, copying files, and formatting disks did not count as serious. I had to focus on my education, which led me away from computer science and into architectural engineering.

Like any young person of my generation, a multitude of job titles and skills acquisition filled the years in between. I taught kindergarten, taught adults how to use software, worked in a clothing store, and served as a paid usher in a church. While I earned my degree at the University of Kansas, I worked as a tech assistant to the technical administrator, which is really just a fancy title for someone who messes around with the student database.

By the time I graduated in 2007, technology had become inescapable. Every aspect of architectural engineering was deeply intertwined with computer science, so we all inadvertently learned simple programming skills. For me, that part was always more fascinating. But because I had to be a serious engineer, I developed a secret hobby: writing science fiction.

In my stories, I lived vicariously through the lives of my heroines. They were scientists with amazing programming skills who were always getting embroiled in adventures and fighting tech scallywags with technology they invented, sometimes inventing them on the spot. Sometimes the new tech I came up with was based on real-world inventions. Other times it was the stuff I read about or saw in the science fiction I consumed. This meant that I had to understand how the tech worked and my research led me to some interesting subreddits and e-zines.

## Open source: The ultimate goldmine

Throughout my experiences, the fascinating weeks I'd spent writing out DOS commands remained a prominent influence, bleeding into little side projects and occupying valuable study time. As soon as Geocities became available to all Yahoo! Users, I created a website where I published blurry pictures that I'd taken on a tiny digital camera. I created websites for free, helped friends and family fix issues they had with their computers, and created a library database for a church.

This meant that I was always researching and trying to find more information about how things could be made better. The Internet gods blessed me and open source fell into my lap. Suddenly, 30-day trials and restrictive licenses became a ghost of computing past. I could continue to create using GIMP, Inkscape, and OpenOffice.

## Time to get serious

I was fortunate to have a business partner who saw the magic in my stories. She too is a dreamer and visionary who imagines a better connected world that functions efficiently and conveniently. Together, we came up with several solutions to pain points we experienced in the journey to success, but implementation had been a problem. We both lacked the skills to make our products come to life, something that was made evident every time we approached investors with our ideas.

We needed to learn to program. So, at the end of the summer in 2015, we embarked on a journey that would lead us right to the front steps of [Holberton School](https://www.holbertonschool.com/), a community-driven, project-based school in San Francisco.

My business partner came to me one morning and started a conversation the way she does when she has a new crazy idea that I'm about to get sucked into.

**Zee:** Gloria, I'm going to tell you something and I want you to listen first before you say no.

**Me:** No.

**Zee:** We're going to be applying to go to a school for full-stack engineers.

**Me:** What?

**Zee:** Here, look! We're going to learn how to program by applying to this school.

**Me:** I don't understand. We're doing online courses in Python and...

**Zee:** This is different. Trust me.

**Me:** What about the...

**Zee:** That's not trusting me.

**Me:** Fine. Show me.

## Removing the bias

What I read sounded similar to something we had seen online. It was too good to be true, but we decided to give it a try, jump in with both feet, and see what would come out of it.

To become students, we had to go through a four-step selection process based solely on talent and motivation, not on the basis of educational degree or programming experience. The selection process is the beginning of the curriculum, so we started learning and collaborating through it.

It has been my experience—and that of my business partner—that the process of applying for anything was an utter bore compared to the application process Holberton School created. It was like a game. If you completed a challenge, you got to go to the next level, where another fascinating challenge awaited. We created Twitter accounts, blogged on Medium, learned HTML and CSS in order to create a website, and created a vibrant community online even before we knew who was going to get to go.

The most striking thing about the online community was how varied our experience with computers was, and how our background and gender did not factor into the choices that were being made by the founders (who we secretly called "The Trinity"). We just enjoyed being together and talking to each other. We were all smart people on a journey to increasing our nerd cred by learning how to code.

For much of the application process, our identities were not very evident. For example, my business partner's name does not indicate her gender or race. It was during the final step, a video chat, that The Trinity even knew she was a woman of color. Thus far, only her enthusiasm and talent had propelled her through the levels. The color of her skin and her gender did not hinder nor help her. How cool is that?

The night we got our acceptance letters, we knew our lives were about to change in ways we had only dreamt of. On the 22nd of January 2016, we walked into 98 Battery Street to meet our fellow [Hippokampoiers](https://twitter.com/hippokampoiers) for the first time. It was evident then, as it had been before, that the Trinity had started something amazing. They had assembled a truly diverse collection of passionate and enthusiastic people who had dedicated themselves to become full-stack engineers.

The school is an experience like no other. Every day is an intense foray into some facet of programming. We're handed a project and, with a little guidance, we use every resource available to us to find the solution. The premise that Holberton School is built upon is that information is available to us in more places than we've ever had before. MOOCs, tutorials, the availability of open source software and projects, and online communities are all bursting at the seams with knowledge that shakes up some of the projects we have to complete. And with the support of the invaluable team of mentors to guide us to solutions, the school becomes more than just a school; we've become a community of learners. I would highly recommend this school for anyone who is interested in software engineering and is also interested in the learning style. The next class is in October 2016 and is accepting new [applications](https://www.holbertonschool.com/). It's both terrifying and exhilarating, but so worth it.

## Open source matters

My earliest experience with an open source operating system was [Fedora](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fedora_(operating_system)), a [Red Hat](https://www.redhat.com/)-sponsored project. During a panicked conversation with an IRC member, she recommended this free OS. I had never installed my own OS before, but it sparked my interest in open source and my dependence on open source software for my computing needs. We are advocates for open source contribution, creation, and use. Our projects are on GitHub where anyone can use or contribute to them. We also have the opportunity to access existing open source projects to use or contribute to in our own way. Many of the tools that we use at school are open source, such as Fedora, [Vagrant](https://www.vagrantup.com/), [VirtualBox](https://www.virtualbox.org/), [GCC](https://gcc.gnu.org/), and [Discourse](https://www.discourse.org/), to name a few.

As I continue on my journey to becoming a software engineer, I still dream of a time when I will be able to contribute to the open source community and be able to share my knowledge with others.

## Diversity Matters

Standing in the room and talking to 29 other bright-eyed learners was intoxicating. 40% of the people there were women and 44% were people of color. These numbers become very important when you are a woman of color in a field that has been famously known for its lack of diversity. It was an oasis in the tech Mecca of the world. I knew I had arrived.

The notion of becoming a full-stack engineer is daunting, and you may even struggle to know what that means. It is a challenging road to travel with immeasurable rewards to reap. The future is run by technology, and you are an important part of that bright future. While the media continues to trip over handling the issue of diversity in tech companies, know that whoever you are, whatever your background is, whatever your reasons might be for becoming a full-stack engineer, you can find a place to thrive.

But perhaps most importantly, a strong reminder of the role of women in the history of computing can help more women return to the tech world, and they can be fully engaged without hesitation due to their gender or their capabilities as women. Their talents will help shape the future not just of tech, but of the world.

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