Taking risks in life

[Lolkrayd]

So I had one of those moments I like to call "Philosophical moments"
and I always thought about these ideas that sounds like its so amazing.
These usually occurs when I sit down with a couple of friends when they are as high as the empire state building.

For example (I guess this is fairly close to the facebook story but to a lesser degree )
I always thought about being a free lancer for programming since tons of companies are heading towards the online route. Meaning they need web designers HTML coders and whatnot. Sounds great right? Assuming I can self teach myself this which is quite possible now when the vast amount of information floating around the internet.

Of course these are just a few of the ideas that came into our minds when we were having these moments.
I had a silly idea of redesigning a laptop and making the 18+inch models having a 200mm fans built inside and a few other things to have better airflow/cooling

I am currently a Computer Engineering student at a local 4year university. Of course I've been thinking of switching to Comp Sci since I am losing interest in the hardware part. Just dislike a lot of things and coding makes more sense to me in away.

I am currently having those moments where I doubt if I can even finish college just because classes seem to be getting full so quick and having a bunch of discouragements.

I spend a lot of my time looking up jobs on craiglists and day after day I see job posts for WEB developers/java programmers etc. If it matters I live in Southern California about an hour away from LA.



What risk am I thinking of taking? I was planning on going to school part time for 1 year and spending most of my time teaching myself how to do HTML coding and going deeper into Java since its the new big thing and teaching myself C++ along the way.

When I mean part time I mean taking about 4-6courses for the whole year. Doing so will set me back an addition year. Right now I am going to school full time but I am in the part where Comp Eng/Sci diverges taking less programming classes and more electronic classes.

Both those fields are prospering as they always need more of both. At least this is what was told. Comp Eng going towards micro devices and Comp Sci just progressing more into the coding field.

I understand this isn't a super big risk but I rather not spend additional time in school because this didn't end up well. Of course I probably won't being my own boss unless I suddenly have a team all of a sudden.

[Disobedient]

How long have you been studying? Are you on your first or second year?

[Lolkrayd]

i am actually on my 3rd year currently on the 5 year roadmap plan but might have to take the 6 year just because I couldn't get into several core classes

[Disobedient]

Hmm okay I see, but if you're still going for the 6 years, then you'll have plenty of time to study what you want on your "free time" no? Because you can't have too much if you drag it out can you?

[Lolkrayd]

I guess what I am trying to do is self learn these and pick up the small jobs/internships
switching from Cengineer to Cscience might set me back another year which is really close to the university new rule they put in. After 8-10years they remove you if you haven't completed the undergrad program. I still have sometime but I was thinking of dropping to part time. So I don't feel stressed with classes.

What I am trying to ask I guess is dropping to part time and picking up part time jobs as a web developer or something along the line of that.

[Disobedient]

Well all I can say is, If I were you, I would switch to Cscience if you feel it's right, but I would'nt drop to part time, I'd complete my studies as fast as I can first and then move on after I'd have gotten the degree. But this is just my personal opinion, I really think you should do what feels right for you.

If you can find good jobs/internships on part time then yeah sure, I don't think that's a bad idea if that's what you wanna do, experience in the field you want to work in is always the best way to get jobs in the same fields later.