re: Software guys of the OT. Questions about coding/getting started.

I'm a product of "learn to code" and now manage 2 development teams, so I can give you some advice.

Bootcamps are not worth it IMO. They're incredibly expensive and you won't learn much more than what's on youtube. I also don't think the networking is beneficial as you'll need more demonstrated experience than what you'll do in the bootcamp to get a position worth the investment.

Some of the best SWEs I've worked with are self taught because they have put in the effort to get good at what they do in their outside time. My CS grads really only do the bare minimum to get by as its only a "job" for them. When hiring juniors, I look for someone with a broad portfolio of demonstrated work that indicates they not only know the basics of coding, but are knowledgeable of APIs, cloud services like AWS or GCP, containerization, databases, etc. Most of the "good first project" examples you see are too basic. You really need to be able to build and deploy an application to not get passed over. A good example would be a sports betting mobile app that is gathering public information, simulating matches, and giving you odds for bets on future games. Something that works with video or audio is also more beneficial than just text. A basic to-do app is seen as amateur these days. You should have an active github profile or portfolio website to showcase your work. This will be the difference in landing a 50k vs 100k job.

There is far more web development work available, so it will be easier to find a job doing that, but some people don't care for it. Changing the shape of a button on a website is pretty boring, but it's easier to get your foot in the door with frontend or fullstack work. Some notable technologies are React and Angular, which have a learning curve, but you'll likely need to be competent in one framework. Look into stacks such as MEAN and MERN and know what each of them do and how they work together.

AI/ML/Datascience is super sexy right, but it's not practical to obtain these at entry level, IMO.

IF you can get good at data structures and algorithms (ie. you can solve and explain a leetcode hard in <30 minutes), you can break into big tech with very little experience, but this will take extreme dedication because people do it competitively and have been for years.

Here is a list of companies that don't do whiteboarding style interviews

Consider start ups as they'll usually take whatever they can get and you will be thrown to the wolves but learn an awful lot in the process. It'll be a rollercoaster but if you can last a year, you'll have the experience you need to make a career out of it.

Lastly, start getting involved with open source work. If you have contributions to an active project, you'll be ahead of the other applicants. Working with production software is different - reading and understanding someone's else's code can be challenging. This is a great way to get that experience and the maintainers will gladly accept the help and mentor you along the way. Best of luck.