Mar 20, 2021
A four year Journey of my Engineering to becoming a Software Development Engineer
Engineering is not as straightforward as it seems. It has its ups and downs and trust me unless and until you have experienced it you haven’t seen it! Secured 98.3 percentile in 12th MH-CET and it was a difficult choice for me, which branch should I take up for Engineering. A lot of my seniors, teachers and professionals suggested I should take up a core branch such as Electronics, Electronics and Telecommunication, etc over Computer with also an added advantage to get into more better colleges, Computer being the branch of highest cut off.
From a small age I had an inclination towards computers. I first time saw a computer in my Father’s office and a bunch of questions used to pop up in my mind whose answers I used to discuss curiously with my Dad(civil engineer himself). So I knew Computer was one for me and I gave preference to branch of my choice over college. It was a big risk at that time, but it certainly did pay off!
I landed in Pune Vidyarthi Griha’s College of Engineering and Technology(PVG) with Computer Engineering as my branch. For those who don’t know it is one of the oldest Engineering college in Pune, Maharashtra and well know when it comes to quality of education. PVG gave me a lot of opportunities to learn and explore more than just a bookish knowledge. For computer department it has student clubs like ACES, Google Developer students club (DSCPVGCOET), Hackathons, Internship opportunities, Seminars, workshops, Virtual labs IIT Bombay, coding competitions.
First Year : The one where it all started!
First year started with making new friends, attending classes, practical sessions and submissions. This year was like about getting acquainted with semester pattern of Engineering under SPPU. I was zero in programming and was introduced to coding subjects in First year. When I was a newbie I used to find coding very difficult. After some days I heard from my seniors regarding ‘Let Us C’ book by Yashavant Kanetkar. I picked up the book and started reading it with the aim of understanding basic fundamentals of Programming language and C. Believe me I read the book for 2–3 times! After getting cleared with programming concepts I started coding simple Problems in C language. So till the end of First year I was familiar with basic concepts of Programming and could code by applying logic in C language. Also managed passing FE common subjects with good grades at end of the year. Here are we folks!!
Second year : The one where actual Engineering starts!
In second year I was introduced to some important subjects like Data structures & Algorithms, OOP, Discrete Mathematics, Graphics on which I focused more. There were also other interesting subjects like COA, digital electronics, microprocessor but that’s okay we have to study few days before exams and all get good marks. This was the year were I got introduced to the world of competitive coding. I started spending some time everyday on HackerRank, Leetcode to improve my problem solving skills and logic building. Shortly I got so addicted to competitive coding that I earned 5 star gold badge on HackerRank , solved good number of problems on Leetcode by the end of the year and hence got a good grasp in Data structures, Algorithms, programming fundamentals and OOP concepts.
Third Year : The one where you learn many skills
Third year was important because it encouraged me to learn many new skills like web development, Android development, Machine learning. This year I started focusing on researching and building self projects. I was familiar with Java and developed a web app with my teammates, in process acquired many skills like HTML,CSS, JavaScript, Bootstrap, Servlet, JSP, J2EE. Later I started building android apps with the help of courses on YouTube, Udacity. In 6th semester was introduced to the world of Machine learning and delivered a seminar on it, by the end of the year also developed a ML web app which gave me a broader view of why ML and how to use ML models.
Final year: The one where all good things happened
In the beginning of the final year, people make groups for their final year engineering project and so did we and started working on our project. Meanwhile, I appeared for college placements and was placed at ‘Ellicium’ at the end of 7th semester. But due to Covid19 situation my joining got delayed later too much and everything seem to be uncertain(a blessing in disguise). I say this because I landed a better offer in my last semester off campus. Few highlights of my final semester were:
- Received sponsorship for project and worked in health care domain.
- Completed my internship from good startups where I was working as a software developer in Python.
- Got selected for Google interviews(Yay!)
- Developed and published my application(Portfolio Website)
- Getting placed at ‘Tech Prescient’ where I got an opportunity to work on US project with US clients ‘Measured’ as a ‘Backend Full Stack Software Engineer’. Here’s a snapshot of my virtual onboarding!
Its been almost 6 months till now since I joined the company and got a chance to work on technologies like NodeJS, Typescript , Express JS, API development, Cloud Computing (AWS) , Jenkins(CI/CD), Postman, Git, MySQL, Data Analytics, Dbeaver in my ongoing Project at Tech Prescient.
Moving on further I would also be exploring Frontend JavaScript Technologies and aspiring to be a ‘Full Stack Product Engineer’.
Happy Coding!
