My name is Isaac, and I’ve been passionate about programming, software and computers since I was 10. My older brother and his friends became infatuated with building custom computers. One day, one of his friends donated his old PC to our family. It was through this that I discovered a love for programming at a young age through watching YouTube documentaries on video game development. Whenever I had projects in middle school, I would create small games that showcased something about the subject, such as Math or English, using Scratch (scratch.mit.edu). Through Scratch’s incredibly intuitive proprietary programming language, I learned how to solve problems using code, and how to write simple and effective code. My assets, such as the characters and backgrounds, were dubious at best, but I eventually moved on to using the Unity game engine, as well as Blender. As my thirst for knowledge and creation grew, I would feverishly bookmark documentation pages on other programming languages such as C#, C++ and Python. I would spend time during class getting assignments done early so I could use my school-given laptop to continue my research (they were some of the only sites that weren’t blocked.)
Eventually, however, I ran out of motivation to continue making games. I started to hit brick walls in my projects, and I lost all my momentum. Suffering the effects of burnout, I took a short hiatus from programming around the time I was 13 or 14. However, my Father introduced me to a website called The Odin Project a short time later. It’s a free, self-paced curriculum that teaches the ins-and-outs of front-end web development. I became eager at the prospect of being able to write code as a career. And as a side note, I still get very excited just at the thought of writing code. Sometimes, I even dream about writing code. But back to the story, after finishing about 50% of the course, I began to feel burnt out writing HTML and CSS. I took a break from programming for awhile. Throughout the rest of my teenage years and after I graduated high school, I knew that I wanted to work with code in some way. It wasn’t until about a year ago that my passion was renewed after finding Boot.dev, a course that focuses on backend web development. This course has showed me the main reason I fell in love with programming: I love solving problems with code. Programming is really magical. Andy Gavin, the lead programmer behind Naughty Dog’s early games, said on his blog: “Being a programmer is like being a wizard.” Once you’re writing http requests in Go, writing efficient hash maps, or sketching out binary trees, you really start to feel the computer bending to your whim. This passion carries me throughout my projects. Whenever I feel overwhelmed by complex problems, and whenever I start learning new programming languages or technologies (something I’ll probably never stop doing, honestly), I remind myself of why I became obsessed with programming to begin with: I love it.
This simple website is being kept alive mainly because I like owning my own domain! But if you'd like to see some of my projects, please take a look at my GitHub page (github.com/isaacjstriker)