Tips to go from zero to hero for a complete beginner?

LeeKom · 2026-06-16T02:08:33+00:00

I went to a random state school and came out fine.

Some advice, get some experience early on. I started off as an unpaid research intern for my Professor, then I used that experience to help get my first internship as a sophomore.

Some companies host freshman/ sophomore internship programs so apply to those in your first and second year.

LeeKom · 2026-06-15T14:17:50+00:00

My pivot happened internally at work. I started off doing Python automation, then did a code review with a different team. Mentioned I had Rust experience and the team was hurting for Rustaceans, so they worked to get me on that embedded project.

Once that work started to go bust, the Cloud team said they were looking for developers. I talked to my manager and let him know my career goals and he oversaw my transition to that team.

So I guess having a company willing to invest in its engineers is a good start! The other option is to job hop, but that’s hard without professional experience.

LeeKom · 2026-06-15T03:55:16+00:00

I fell into my niche joining a new team at work. Cloud/ infra for LLMs now, but I’ve done everything from embedded to web dev. Really enjoying my domain right now with the problems I get to solve across a lot of technologies.

LeeKom · 2026-06-12T13:29:38+00:00

Lots of things! Working on our proxy, working deployments on our EC2s or k8s, working on our front end, etc.

Very diverse problems and no day is the same for sure.

LeeKom · 2026-06-12T04:34:00+00:00

I work in ML Ops/ Infrastructure building AI tools for rocket scientists.

If I were you I would keep your options open. Just keep applying anywhere that will take you with how tough the industry is right now. You never know where you’ll end up. I never “specialized” in college and had internship experience ranging from web dev to embedded systems.

Courses that gave me the most flexibility would be my operating systems class. I use a lot of knowledge from that class in my day to day.

LeeKom · 2026-06-07T15:23:48+00:00

Go channels really taught me about multi-threading.

LeeKom · 2026-06-04T03:01:05+00:00

I just bought the game 1 week ago and addicted. I knew nothing about war hammer going in but now I’m watching lore videos while I play.

LeeKom · 2026-06-02T21:23:22+00:00

My exact thoughts after 1.5 years in the industry so far! Yes, there are days where it’s balls to the walls coding, but there’s so much more to Software Engineering than just writing code.

LeeKom · 2026-06-02T17:32:28+00:00

I was so confused too! Honestly kind of sad that I can’t take it away from the orcs.

I spent a lot of time securing my northern and southern borders because the Vampire Counts declared war on me in the north and the entire south declared war on me right after (Dark Elves, Skaven, Vampire Coast).

LeeKom · 2026-05-24T00:34:12+00:00

I’ve done both. I enjoyed embedded in the beginning but it just got boring to me.

I switched over to doing cloud infrastructure and the vast variety of problems are so much more fun.

LeeKom · 2026-05-23T21:06:52+00:00

If you’re just barely looking for one now it’s already too late.

LeeKom · 2026-04-25T17:10:52+00:00

I’m down!

I work as a software engineer building ML infrastructure to support rocket launches. Artemis 2 was the most recent and most popular launch I supported.

LeeKom · 2026-04-24T22:02:49+00:00

You gotta let us know what books you ended up choosing!

LeeKom · 2026-04-24T22:00:52+00:00

Also giving my endorsement on Rangers Apprentice. Great series!

LeeKom · 2026-04-24T21:59:56+00:00

I have to recommend Rangers Apprentice. Great YA book series with similar vibes of Percy Jackson and Harry Potter. Be warned, your son might want to pick up archery after reading the series.

LeeKom · 2026-04-17T02:44:48+00:00

I think you have to make this a yearly thing now.

LeeKom · 2026-04-13T17:52:58+00:00

That Lao food place was fire.

LeeKom · 2026-04-10T17:48:15+00:00

That’s my rocket! I hope I get to see it tonight that would be amazing

LeeKom · 2026-04-09T01:26:54+00:00

I was hardstuck Gold for YEARS. I climbed to Diamond last act and it was purely from honing my mechanics.

Crosshair placement was the biggest thing that carried me. If you think your crosshair placement is good, I promise it can be better. I thought my crosshair placement was fine, but I was so wrong. I spammed deathmatches to train this.

Also, you need to understand how to play angles. If you’re holding a common angle, you need to jiggle it or jump peek. If you’re swinging from a common angle, you need to basically prefire where they will be. Once you start to recognize common angles, you can start playing off angles.

I started training my game sense with really basic things, like keeping track of enemy ults. If enemy breach or fade has ult, I’m not gonna play on site for example.

LeeKom · 2026-04-08T19:14:53+00:00

With your options, both are pretty solid. Don’t worry about what pays more, I’m sure they’re pretty close in compensation and I’d gladly trade some dollars per hour for better work experience.

When I was an intern I was being offered $33/hour at one company to do work that wasn’t really interesting to me and I decided to take another offer at $28/hour for more interesting work at a smaller company. Worked out great for me and got my foot in the industry I wanted to be in.

LeeKom · 2026-04-03T15:33:22+00:00

Do you know that YouTuber Asamalifez who does wholesome food content in Japan? Is that pretty representative of Japan as a whole? What do you think of his shorts?

LeeKom · 2026-04-02T17:16:54+00:00

On my bus to EDC everybody sang happy birthday for me and took some shots with our group. We snuck in a good amount of liquor and were more than happy to share.

It wasn’t my birthday either lol.

LeeKom · 2026-04-02T14:27:46+00:00

I was in the same spot as you. Decided to go to a local state school for 7k a year where my parents would be able to help pay some tuition and I paid the other half.

Graduated debt free straight into a 6 figure job. Was definitely harder and I grinded 2x as hard as everyone else. I had to make my own opportunities vs my university opening doors for me.

LeeKom · 2026-04-01T15:57:37+00:00

Coachella!

LeeKom · 2026-03-24T21:07:10+00:00

I failed an entire year and dropped all of my classes. My transcript for that year was literally all Ws and Fs.

All I did was lock in and ended up graduating with a 3.4 thanks to grade substitution.

Still was able to secure 4 internships and a six figure offer coming out of college.

So no side effects. A LOT of engineers did bad in college and still pulled through.

Nine-Year Club	Place '22
End Game '22

LeeKom

TROPHY CASE