Coding for Fun

Microsoft has started a new developer center at MSDN called Coding for Fun.  It’s geared toward hobbyist programmers and people wanting to start coding.  This is an interesting approach that Microsoft has taken, especially with the releasing of the “express” products (VB.Net Express, C# Express, etc) as free development environments.  There are not many articles on the site currently, but a few.  They even have a few articles that will help you start game design (working with DirectX).  I actually recommended this site to the high school kid who lives next door who wants to work in programming as a place to pick up some ideas for projects he could work on.

I’d have to say that I’m a developer today because I was a hobbyist programmer when I was younger.  Development was not my first job choice, but after my first one didn’t work out I had to find a job.  I fell back on my knowledge of computers and picked up a job that was partly development, part assistant housing coordinator for Eastern Kentucky University.  Each job after that was more development oriented and I picked up more and more skills.  Now I think back to the “choose your own adventure” programs I used to write on the Commodore 64 back when I was pretty young and laugh.

I still code for fun from time to time.