I'm in my fourties now, started programming when I my parents finally relented and bought me a Commodore at age 10. My point is, when I was 14, things were quit

I'm in my fourties now, started programming when I my parents finally relented and bought me a Commodore at age 10. My point is, when I was 14, things were quite different - mainly because information was hard to come by and it all depended a lot on what the people in your vicinity could teach you. However, I found one similarity to modern programmers starting out: I wish I had known more about what was actually going on behind the scenes as my code executes. In my time, I knew my knowledge was lacking, but being poor and relatively isolated I had few options. Today, factors conspire to leave new programmers largely unaware there might be problems in the first place. Nowadays, we have way better tutorials that teach people how to use effective programming methods, but we're still failing when it comes to imparting the understanding necessary for programmers to make mindful decisions about trade-offs. I also wish I knew more about persistence and communicating what I'm working on, it's something I'm still trying to improve. When I was just starting out, I was working on a text editor, but gave up because I thought it was superfluous. When I was about 16, I had made a pretty good game (in hindsight), but gave up on it because I thought it wasn't good enough. My life might have turned out differently if I hadn't been so shy and uncommunicative at certain points.