Can Late Starters in Programming Still Catch Up and Land Software Jobs?

Yes.

Your very first full-time job now is to get a job in the field. Take a look at MIT's "Missing Semester". It'll expose you to a panoply of tools that will get you "semi-operational". This will not make you "stand out", but it is much better when new hires are already familiar with common tools of the trade.

Be humble, courteous, curious, helpful, reliable, diligent, patient, grateful, industrious and you'll progress fast.

When you get the job, here are a few pointers that will help you ramp up fast:

Understanding codebases:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19924100

Testing pipelines, scaffolding, issue templates:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26591067

Making the most out of meetings and leveraging your presence:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22873103

Product development:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22827841

Giving a damn:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20356222

If I disappear, what will happen:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25008223

Consulting, understanding the problem your "client", who can be your manager, has:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24972611

On taking notes. When you're told something, or receive a remark, make sure to make a note and learn from it whether it's a mistake, or a colleague showing you something useful, or a task you must accomplish.. don't be told things twice or worse. Be on the ball and reliable:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24209518

Product, architecture, and impact on the team:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24503365

Onboarding new hires to a codebase, what if it were you, improve code:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22860716

Tips to learn from videos:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22710623

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22723586

Communication with the team:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21598632

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21614372

Reduce information asymmetry, template for taking minutes of meetings to dispatch to the team:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21427886

More meeting notes. Reply to a person who had trouble talking in corporate meetings:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20323660

Communication, alignment:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24177646

Useful things for the team and product that add leverage:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21808439

Management involvement as a spectrum:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22715971

Researching topics:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25922120

Keeping up with a firehose of information:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26147502

Fractal Communication: communication that can penetrate several layers of management and be relevant to people with different profiles and skillsets:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26123017

Remote work, use existing tooling and build our own. Jitsi videos, record everything, give access to everyone so they can reference them and go back to them, meetings once a week or two weeks to align:

-https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26179539

Write better. Always.