#147 From Stealing Cars to Self-Taught Software Engineer with Dorian Develops

The freeCodeCamp Podcast

Quincy Larson

Education, Technology

5.0 • 549 Ratings

🗓️ 25 October 2024

⏱️ 172 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On this week's episode of the podcast, freeCodeCamp founder Quincy Larson interviews Dorian Develops. He's a software engineer and prolific YouTube creator.

Dorian grew up in the Little Havana neighborhood of Miami. He's the child of a single mother that arrived as a refugee from Cuba. After a rough childhood and dropping out of high school in 9th grade, Dorian eventually made a living as a valet car parker in Las Vegas. It was here that he realized he needed to make changes for the sake of his family's future.

Dorian taught himself to code using freeCodeCamp and other free learning resources, and has since gotten several 6-figure jobs as a web developer.

We talk about:

- How Dorian survived his 20s by waiting tables and parking cars in Las Vegas

- How he taught himself to code using free learning resources and built his network through months of attending local developer meetups

- How he's worked as a remote developer so he and his kids can travel the world

- And how he's 1 year into his recovery from a lifetime of drug and alcohol addiction

Can you guess what song I'm playing in the intro?

Also, I want to thank the 10,993 kind people who support our charity each month, and who make this podcast possible. You can join them and support our mission at: https://www.freecodecamp.org/donate

Links we talk about during our conversation:

- Vagabonding book by Rolf Potts: https://rolfpotts.com/books/vagabonding/

- A documentary on "Advantaged Play" in Blackjack that Quincy mentions. [Note: I don't gamble and I don't condone gambling. Still, this is still an excellent video that developers interested in information security should consider watching]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nO6aPOkCt84

- A recent HTML tutorial by Dorian: https://youtu.be/sWYdumJckMw?si=nB8j5d9WQR5u5_Mb

- Dorian's video about his journey to sobriety: https://youtu.be/pGoeG5aY3S0?si=aanGEowSfWd-runm

- Dorian's video about his love of Brazillian Jujitsu but how it's left him with permanent injuries: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAHPG66H000

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	It's very easy to fall into the trap of thinking that you have to pay to be successful as someone who's learning how to code.
0:08.9	And, you know, we have that idea that if we pay for something, it has more value than something that's free.
0:14.8	But there are some amazing free things out there.
0:16.7	And I usually try to recommend things that are free or affordable. Welcome back. Welcome back to the FreeCote Camp podcast.
1:00.4	I'm Quincy Larson, teacher and founder of FreakokeCamp.org.
1:04.1	Each week, we're bringing you insight from developers, founders, and ambitious people getting into tech.
1:09.2	This week, we're talking with Dorian Develops.
1:11.9	He's a software engineer and prolific YouTube creator.
1:15.6	Dorian grew up in Little Havana as a child of a single mother refugee from Cuba.
1:20.9	After a rough childhood and dropping out of high school in ninth grade,
1:25.5	Dorian eventually found himself as a valet car parker in Las Vegas.
1:31.2	It was here that Dorian realized he needed to make changes for the sake of his family.
1:37.2	He taught himself to code using free code camp and other free open learning resources,
1:42.7	and he has since gotten six figure jobs as a web developer
1:45.6	and created a popular YouTube channel. Dorian, welcome to the Free Code Camp podcast.
1:52.1	Hey, thanks for having me. I'm really excited to be here. Yeah, man. Like, you're somebody I've followed
1:57.0	for, I don't know, like four years or so. Like, like, I've, I've watched a ton of your videos over the years and kind of followed
2:04.9	your career progression and your many, uh, popular videos on like just learning more about
2:10.1	you.
2:10.2	It's like learning about Dorian is like peeling back different layers of an onion and, and exposing
2:15.3	new kind of like levels of Dorianism.
2:20.3	I'm like Shrek.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Quincy Larson, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Quincy Larson and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.