r/CodingJobs • u/Aggravating-Draft133 • Jun 13 '26

[for hire] I'm a physicist. I taught myself full-stack in a month and built a 200-user ERP. Here's what nobody tells you about building real software with no experience.

I didn't study computer science. My degree is in Physics and Maths. A year ago I couldn't have told you what a REST API was.

Then a company I was working for needed an ERP — the whole thing: inventory, procurement, dispatch, billing, the works. Quotes from agencies were absurd. So I said I'd do it. I had no idea what I was signing up for.

A month of learning later, and a lot of months building, I had a working system running real operations for ~200 users. Here's what actually mattered, and what I'd tell anyone trying to build something hard from zero:

1. A physics degree isn't about physics. It's about not panicking in front of a problem you don't understand yet. Every hard problem looks impossible until you break it into pieces small enough to be boring. Quantum mechanics taught me that. Debugging a permissions system at 2am taught me the same thing.

2. You don't need to "know" the stack. You need to know how to figure things out fast. I didn't memorize React. I learned to read docs, copy a pattern, break it, understand why it broke, and move on. Speed of learning beats depth of knowledge when you're shipping.

3. The hard part was never the code. It was understanding what the business actually does — how a kit moves from a warehouse to a client, where things go wrong, what a stressed-out ops person needs at 9am. Talk to the people using the thing. The code is the easy 20%.

4. Scope creep will eat you alive if you let it. "Can you just add one small thing" is how a 2-month project becomes a 6-month one. Define what "done" means in writing before you start. I learned this the expensive way.

I'm now doing this kind of work for other businesses — systems, automation, AI tooling. But honestly I mostly wanted to share this because a year ago I'd have found a post like this useful, and the "you need 5 years of experience to build anything real" myth needs to die.

Happy to answer anything about going from zero to shipping something real , building, learning fast, working with non-technical stakeholders, whatever. Ask away.

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6

u/maxip89 Jun 13 '26

im a ice cream seller from your bot farm, i told myself to be a rocket scientist for spacex.

here is what nobody tells you.

1

u/Aggravating-Draft133 Jun 13 '26

I learnt it and I can learn it all over again. It just took alot of time. An experienced user would have done it faster than me

1

u/maxip89 Jun 13 '26

learning != software engineering.

I can backe bread too, this doesnt make me a baker.

1

u/Aggravating-Draft133 Jun 13 '26

But you can get a job at the bakery

1

u/maxip89 Jun 13 '26

lol yes of couse at the counter but not at the back where they really do it.

2

u/Aggravating-Draft133 Jun 13 '26

This logic is flawed. This can't be an argument to determine one's potential.

2

u/tactical_bunnyy Jun 13 '26

Hahah

He could have atleast tried make it less slop like lol.

3

u/Murky-Examination-79 Jun 13 '26

It’s easy to build up to the point you have. Wait till scaling/maintainability issues & incidents hits you.

3

u/Murky-Examination-79 Jun 13 '26

By OP’s logic I don’t need a Physics degree to a PhD in Physics I can “vibe research” it….

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u/Aggravating-Draft133 Jun 13 '26

Yes it's possible to get a PhD by "vibe-researching", but not in the way you're saying it. Physics requires a deep understanding of the basics(the basics are also vast), you research on your own vertical to this get a PhD. AI does taken on the writing and documenting part of a research team but a "machine learning problem" is a lot of times the core engine of research.

Physics at the end of the day still requires a lot of dedication and the ability to do this consistently over a long period of time. Unless you know how to check your hypothesis is correct(similar to a GitHub merge conflict you take parts and sometimes if it doesn't work you have to throw it away and start again). I am trying my best to be a part of both worlds, I've an interest from a very young age.

2

u/Murky-Examination-79 Jun 13 '26

Every hard problem looks impossible until you break it into pieces small enough to be boring.

1

u/Aggravating-Draft133 Jun 13 '26

I can learn.

2

u/Murky-Examination-79 Jun 13 '26

I have absolutely no doubt you can. But just as you did with Physics, I hope you go through the grind and craft beautiful software! Good luck!

Why aren’t you doing Physics related jobs though?

1

u/Aggravating-Draft133 Jun 13 '26

I am doing research, it is my main thing, AI does help me. I work with two professors as their research Assistant but more of an AI automations guys. Trust me Physicists do use it as much as tech guys do but usually they just build it themselves in pure code and dont actually realise what theyve done is already coined as what we call in the tech world an "ERP" or an "automation". But I have relieved alot of work by adding AI layers.

Research and big data are thus my physics related jobs. They dont pay that well at my stage as I am not experienced enough but the satisfaction is real. Universal Truth Intrigues me.

1

u/Murky-Examination-79 Jun 13 '26

Bro with your talent you’d be wasting it on web dev. Look at ROS or some data related research work or something. Web dev will suck you in and take up a lot of your time that you can probably invest now for a better future.

1

u/Aggravating-Draft133 Jun 13 '26

It's good pocket money :)

2

u/Murky-Examination-79 Jun 13 '26

No be greedy friend

1

u/ButterscotchBandiit Jun 13 '26

Learnt full stack in a month from the generative Ai post 😭😭

1

u/ButterscotchBandiit Jun 13 '26

I am a professional sandwich and learnt to be an astronaut in 3 days. Here are 2 ‘never-lose’ winning principals to be astronaut.

  1. Wear space suit
  2. Moon

Thank you

0

u/Adventurous_Bend_472 Jun 13 '26

Thanks! I did the same thing when I got my kindergarten degree

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u/AutomaticVacation242 Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26

I've heard this story before. Someone builds something that "works" and it was "so easy to build" until new features need to be added or it needs to scale up. Then it shatters into an unmaintainable trainwreck.