#160 She taught herself coding in her 30s for zero dollars
The freeCodeCamp Podcast
Quincy Larson
5.0 • 549 Ratings
🗓️ 15 February 2025
⏱️ 68 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On this week's episode of the podcast, freeCodeCamp founder Quincy Larson interviews Julia Undeutsch who is a self-taught software engineer and accessibility specialist. She works at a big European company making software more accessible for people with disabilities. She taught herself to code in her 30s using freeCodeCamp.
Support for this podcast comes from a grant from Wix Studio. Wix Studio provides developers tools to rapidly build websites with everything out-of-the-box, then extend, replace, and break boundaries with code. Learn more at https://wixstudio.com.
Support also comes from the 11,043 kind folks who support freeCodeCamp through a monthly donation. Join these kind folks and help our mission by going to https://www.freecodecamp.org/donate
We talk about:
- Julia's coding journey from poker dealer to self-taught software engineer
- How she creates tutorials in Japanese
- Her passion for making software easier to use for everyone
- Working remotely at a big European software consultancy
Links we talk about during our conversation:
- Julia's website: https://www.juliaundeutsch.com/
- Movie trailer for the 1999 Clive Owen movie "Croupier" that Quincy mentions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDWzeq5QGiA
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Think about that you have to still work at least 30 to 40 years and you only work 10 years. |
| 0:06.2 | So you can still do everything you want, just to coding. |
| 0:09.2 | And then I started to learn how to code. |
| 0:12.4 | And I opened FreeCode Camp because it's online. |
| 0:15.2 | You can, no one sees what I'm doing and I started on HTML and CSS and JavaScript. |
| 0:19.6 | Welcome back to the FreeCode Camp podcast, |
| 0:22.3 | your source for raw, unedited interviews with developers. |
| 0:25.9 | This week we're talking with Yulia Undoich. |
| 0:29.7 | She's a self-taught developer and accessibility specialist. |
| 0:33.8 | She works at a massive European company, |
| 0:36.0 | making software more accessible for people with disabilities. |
| 0:39.7 | Yulia taught herself how to code in her 30s using free code camp. |
| 0:44.5 | Support for this podcast comes from a grant from Wix Studio. |
| 0:48.4 | Wix Studio provides developers tools to rapidly build websites with everything out of the box, |
| 0:56.0 | then extend, replace, and break boundaries with code. Learn more at wickstudio.com. Support also comes from the 11,223 kind folks |
| 1:05.0 | who support FreeCote Camp through a monthly donation. Join these kind folks and help our mission |
| 1:10.5 | by going to |
| 1:11.5 | freecocamp.org |
| 1:12.8 | slash donate. |
| 1:13.9 | For this week's musical intro |
| 1:15.3 | with yours truly |
| 1:16.2 | on the drums, |
... |
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