As the person who taught OP to code, I can assure you your comment is misplaced and frankly uncalled for. Try being encouraging, rather than arrogant and deflating.
"Web development is easy".
Not when it involves working with other people. People are hard, code is easy.
"His accomplishments don't stand out as impressive." How can you know this, let alone conclude this?
He memorized 500 digits of pi in a week and wrote it out on a whiteboard in front of an audience.
He built amazing command line tools and importers to automate migrating and testing large eCommerce systems.
He built a fully functional piano in the browser from scratch, in a few days, before I'd taught him JavaScript.
He built a custom 3D rendering engine from scratch shortly after learning JavaScript, allowing one to simply export any model from Blender and render it in the browser.
He built incredibly complex mapping, routing, and geometry algorithms for delivery systems within a year of learning HTML and before turning 18.
Lastly, one of the most humble people I know.
Please don't continue to detract other new developers from the profession because they run into people like you. Especially when they open up and ask for honest help, wisdom, and feedback.
Literally none of that stands out. These are basic programs whose core anyone can find on stackoverflow. The reason most people don't have these on their github is because they move on to harder, long-term accomplishments like college and internships.
The only factor that stands out is the age he achieved this in but then again I was making C++ aimbots for counter strike at 14.
Building a piano for web browser, 3D rendering engine, mapping, routing and geometry algorithms stand out pretty well IMO.
I have never really seen the core of a piano or 3D rendering engine on stackoverflow. Even if there is one I am sure that is not how people learn writing a piano software or 3D rendering engine for themselves.
Funny you say college and internships as examples of long-term accomplishments. I find getting your hands dirty and building things (like piano or 3D rendering engine) as long term accomplishments because what you create, you understand and what you understand, truly understand, is going to stick in your brain for years much longer than what you learn in college.
I get it that OP's projects do not stand out in your eyes. They do stand out in my eyes! They are impressive to me! I don't have to find something impressive by your standards just as you don't have to find something impressive by my standards. Good day to you too!
I would argue that if you measure it by everyone standards on average, the OPs achievements aren't a huge deal. Nothing even close to "one of the greatest programmers". This is the standard that truly matters.
I mean, sure you can adjust your own standards to help you prove your point... but nobody really cares for arguments of that nature as literally any piece of reality becomes malleable through force of your own opinion. I could say, "In my opinion, everything you said is completely wrong.." and it would be a pointless statement.
He used tutorials, obviously. There's tons of tutorials on the internet. Especially ones that will teach you to write a 3D engine in javascript. It's not that impressive to follow a tutorial.
Rather than the OP coming off as arrogant. This thread is instead making you look pretty arrogant. Having a goal is not arrogance. Tearing someone down for having that goal certainly does come off as arrogant though.
I'm coming off as highly negative. I completely admit that. But arrogant? I'm not arrogant.
In order for me to be arrogant, I would have to advertise and over blow my own abilities. Which I haven't. You should look up the word before you use it incorrectly.
Also, you have to realize OP is not a kid. If a young kid was saying this stuff, I'd be encouraging. But he's basically an adult. And I'm not tearing him down, I'm telling him he'll turn out average.
Additionally the OP is bragging about his accomplishments. It's literally the definition of arrogant.
How people perceive you is not dictated by a precise definition of the word. You seem to be aware that people are perceiving you in a particular way but rather than adjusting your communication you are trying to argue with them about their interpretation instead. I don't know you and it's perfectly possible that if we were having beers I would think you were a perfectly reasonable person. But be aware that in text this:
You should look up the word before you use it incorrectly.
comes across as arrogant whether you intended it to or not. And continuing to use your current style of phrasing is gong to continue to make people think you are arrogant regardless of whether you actually are or not.
>How people perceive you is not dictated by a precise definition of the word.
So? Is my objective centered around perception? No.
>You seem to be aware that people are perceiving you in a particular way but rather than adjusting your communication you are trying to argue with them about their interpretation instead.
No, I'm correcting a person about wrong usage of a particular vocabulary word.
>... comes across as arrogant
I think that's a reasonable response given that someone called me arrogant. You think you can go around calling someone arrogant and not have a little retaliation in the response? Are you yourself not aware of your own words? I'm perfectly aware of the subtleties my response entails.
I was trying to help you understand why you were getting the responses you were getting. Since it appears that you intend for this perception to exist I guess we are done.
I understand why, and I expected it. There's a greater lesson to be learned from your end, that perception != everything. That truth is hidden in the messages poorly received.
You would do well to learn that rather then attempting to always teach other people obvious things, sometimes you yourself is the person that is acting immature and needs to learn something less obvious. Think about what I said to this person and whether the OP will end up as one of the greatest programmers or just average. In probability, who told him the truth.
Are you even aware that attempting to teach someone something by calling them "arrogant" will lead to nothing? That's another lesson for you. To teach is not to insult, but to respect another persons opinion while providing your own. I'm not respecting your opinion, so my intention isn't to teach you anything. It's to dominate... this is your own intention as well... I mean with phrases like... "we're done here"... let's be real; what's going on in this thread is an argument, you weren't trying to teach my anything.
How do you know what he used? Have you met him or talked to him?
So only inventing a 3D engine from scratch from your own brain is impressive? Learning from tutorials, books, papers, etc. is not?
I don't know how you learn a new skill but I learn from tutorials, books, papers, lectures, videos. It is impressive to me as long as someone can learn, apply and do something creative.
What is absolutely unimpressive is dissing on others' projects and accomplishments.
I find it highly unlikely. Either a tutorial was used to build something before or lessons were learned from reading some sort of instructional material.
The only materials I used were JavaScript documentation and math I learned in 8th grade (I was a few grades ahead).
I didn't need tutorials. Sometimes I literally dreamed about those projects at night. Occasionally I would see solutions to the problem in the dream, and implement it in the morning.
Hi Owen - I'm a moderator here and would first like to say that you are welcome on Hacker News and I hope you find lots of interesting things here for years to come.
Here's my suggestion—I don't know if it will help you become one of the best programmers ever [1] but it will be helpful in general if you can pull it off: when encountering hostile/critical/uncharitable comments on the internet - don't respond. It may not look like it, but the way the internet game really works is that the first person who stops reacting wins.
It's not easy, because these comments sting. The trick is to learn to feel the sting and absorb it, i.e. let it run through your system without responding until the bad feeling goes away and you have no more need to respond. At that point you are free. If you think of it as a kind of training challenge, it might get easier.
By the way, a lot of HN users used to be precocious kids whose self-worth got bound up with how good they were at being smart-while-young, and also with being the "smartest kid" in their world. That's my own story, and it's the story of a lot of people here.
When someone like yourself comes along, who's obviously smart and still very young, it can trigger insecurities in people like us, even decades later. The solution is to realize that it's (a) not your problem, and (b) not interesting—and then (c) to focus on engaging with people who actually have something interesting to teach you. Fortunately there are a lot of those here, too!
[1] It might, though, because it has to do with focus.
"Web development is easy". Not when it involves working with other people. People are hard, code is easy.
"His accomplishments don't stand out as impressive." How can you know this, let alone conclude this?
He memorized 500 digits of pi in a week and wrote it out on a whiteboard in front of an audience.
He built amazing command line tools and importers to automate migrating and testing large eCommerce systems.
He built a fully functional piano in the browser from scratch, in a few days, before I'd taught him JavaScript.
He built a custom 3D rendering engine from scratch shortly after learning JavaScript, allowing one to simply export any model from Blender and render it in the browser.
He built incredibly complex mapping, routing, and geometry algorithms for delivery systems within a year of learning HTML and before turning 18.
Lastly, one of the most humble people I know.
Please don't continue to detract other new developers from the profession because they run into people like you. Especially when they open up and ask for honest help, wisdom, and feedback.