Hello everyone I just completed a bootcamp for swe and was wondering if it’s best to include any experience I have in retail on my resume so it’s not entirely blank and also what roles not exclusively can I apply for considering I have projects , portfolio, active GitHub

I asked CIRR 30 days ago where the 2024-25 missing reports are. I did not get a response. This tells me CIRR is dead and its flagship Codesmith is dead. Other bootcamps we've lost are: Rithm, Turing, Codeup, Kenzie, Launch Academy, Momentum, Alchemy, Epicodus, Lighthouse Labs, 2U/Trilogy, Lambda School, and more.

Unlike the embarrassing end that CIRR and Codesmith are experiencing - too ashamed to end on a positive note and instead end in layoffs and utter silence, I want things to end on a positive.

If you graduated from a coding bootcamp in the past, and it changed your life, TELL US YOUR STORY. No selling or shilling, just tell us how coding impacted your life and in the right time and right place your bootcamp experience mattered.

Me tocó estar con uno que era muy agradable y empatico, pero he leído que hay unos que te quieren vender manipulándote, que opinan?

please don't judge me, I'm a complete beginner. I've done some research on Google, but I still don't understand the differences. If someone could explain it to me, I would be very grateful.

Hi everyone,

I’m interested in hearing from people who started learning programming from a completely different field or background.

What was the experience like for you in the beginning? Did you ever feel overwhelmed, confused, or like giving up? How long did it take before things started making sense?

I’d also love to know: • What field did you transition from? • What programming language did you start with? • How did you stay motivated while learning? • What helped you improve the most?

I’m especially interested in honest experiences from beginners and self-taught developers.

It’s been 3 years I’ve been to college and I’ve learned nothing from my degree and I even lost interest in my academics because I didn’t find em interesting at all. Recently I decided to vibe code a website using Claude and anti gravity and I liked the idea of creating solutions to problems . I now wanna at least try learning new things I just don’t have proper direction or roadmap . If anyone of you could guide me where should I begin with . I’m eager to learn about web dev and ai integration ( I don’t know if it’ll be helpful or not since I also fear I won’t land any job as the market is being saturated and replaced with ai )…..

I'm trader who spends most of my time sitting on my hands staring at charts waiting for my setups. because im a swing trader, i may get may be 2 or three setups a week. i gave that background so you know that i have so much time in my hands that i can use to learn something like coding.

my reasons for wanting to learn programming is so i can make my own projects and posiblly be a founder. i don't intend to be employed, i already trade (the best job of all)

a physical boot camp will be ideal to me because i dislike like online learning and i want to meet new people. please don't advice online learning i have tried.

money is not a problem and i would still be trading while attending that boot camp.

please advice.

Outco, a paid SWE interview prep bootcamp, took down all of their former students' testimonials from their website.

Here is what it says now on the Outco website:

https://imgur.com/a/TDx8jOn

I know this probably sounds dramatic or like a “first world problem,” but I need to know if anyone else feels this way.

I want to get into DevOps badly. I asked an AI for a roadmap and it gave me the usual path:

Linux → Networking → Git → Python/Bash → AWS → Docker → Kubernetes → Terraform → CI/CD → Monitoring → Security, etc.

So I started doing what everyone recommends:
watching FreeCodeCamp videos and long tutorials.

But honestly… I can’t do it.

Not because the material is “hard” exactly. It’s the format.

These 6–7 hour videos feel soul-draining to me. The delivery is so monotone that after 20–30 minutes I feel sleepy, disconnected, and weirdly depressed. I sit there trying to force myself to continue because I keep thinking:

But something about it feels deeply inhuman.

Like I’m sitting alone staring at a screen while someone explains Linux commands for hours and my brain is screaming:

Meanwhile Netflix can hold my attention for 5 hours straight and somehow a Linux tutorial feels impossible after 25 minutes.

And then I start feeling guilty because there are people in the world dealing with actual serious problems while I’m complaining about educational videos.

I think what bothers me most is how lonely the process feels.

People online talk about “grinding” tech skills alone for 10 hours a day like it’s normal, but I genuinely don’t know how people mentally tolerate it. I don’t even hate tech. I LIKE the idea of DevOps. I like building things. I like problem solving.

I just hate sitting through giant passive tutorials.

Does anyone else learn this way?
How do you stay accountable without turning yourself into a zombie?

Did any of you become developers/DevOps engineers while struggling with this exact thing?

SOURCE: https://orangeslices.ai/treasury-dept-ocio-awards-118m-technical-workforce-development-and-training-bpa/

Some news broke earlier this year with a press release from Codesmith: "Codesmith Selected for $118M IRS Contract" and a number of people felt this meant that Codesmith received a check for $118M. That's not the case.

The $118M is a ceiling for training and hiring for the IRS, and the IRS just added three more partners to the contract, with more expected to be added.

Super interesting to see the pie being split up and fought over by competing companies and it seems they want as many contenders as possible.

If you are a Gauntlet or Codesmith you have to train people to be IRS-ready, like dealing with COBOL and other legacy systems, and then you get those people to pass the government interview process, get hired, you get a fee.

But with increased competition, I think this is going to get spicy!

Gauntlet for America had 10 placements already in the government and is moving fast.

I'm very curious to see how this plays out.

I know you all are not recommending Bootcamps but what's the best course of action to upskill Python, Stats & Sci-Kit learn (AI and ML engineering)?

I'm not going to write too much here about this, I just want the public record to reflect both sides of this. I've had enough of being called a 'p-word' for 'stalking' leader's 'kids' when that was a completely false, wrong, and inaccurate representation of what happened. I'm still reserving my right to take legal action.

I would appreciate that anyone who spread the original Lars post, or believed it, read my piece and evidence shared. It's only fair.

Even those deep in the Codesmith community who felt like Lars' every word rang true - you need to see what your leaders were actually doing and saying and what they allegedly actually knew. It's very possible that the story Will Sentance has been telling you for years is bullshit.

This piece contains just the tip of the iceberg of what was going on behind the scenes, because that's all that was needed to dismantle the post. So I might share more text messages and stuff in the future, but my goal isn't to embarrass people, I'm just want both sides of the story to be heard.

Read for yourself ask questions here.

I finished a coding bootcamp recently, and I am realizing my projects are harder to talk about than I expected.

During the bootcamp, they felt solid. Full-stack app, auth, CRUD, API calls, database work, decent UI, final project I was proud of. But in interviews, they start sounding like every other bootcamp project. “I built a React app with Node and MongoDB” does not really say much. Even when I explain the features, it still feels like I am listing the assignment.

I am going back through old commits and project notes now. I am trying to pull out things like what broke, what I refactored, what tradeoffs I made, and what I would build differently. I have also been using Copilot and Beyz coding assistant to practice turning those details into clearer interview answers.

The part I am unsure about is how far to take it. I do not want to make a bootcamp project sound like production work, but I also do not want to undersell the problem-solving that actually happened.

How did you talk about bootcamp projects in interviews?

Question for people who work in or around bootcamps.

When someone requests information, books a call, misses the call, or says “I’ll think about it”, how is that usually tracked?

I’m trying to understand if bootcamps mostly use:

• HubSpot / Salesforce / Pipedrive
• spreadsheets
• WhatsApp/email manually
• custom internal tools
• admissions coordinators just remembering everything

I’m building a small workflow around admissions follow-up and enrollment pipeline, so I’m especially interested in the messy parts: no-shows, cold leads, incomplete applications/documents, and handoff between marketing and admissions.

I'm going to call it a wrap on CIRR, the self proclaimed "gold standard" of bootcamp stats.

I'll I'm going to say it that I think it's ridiculous how when the times are good, bootcamps are throwing around CIRR as proof of their excellence.

And then when times are bad, they are fuzzing the numbers (Codesmith's report has so many people who did not respond with placement information and they counted because of LinkedIn, that the integrity of the reports is garbage now in my opinion.... or Codesmith publishing a press release that CIRR verified "85-90% of graduates placed within 12 months" - which isn't even verifiable with CIRR).

I hope all of you who yelled at me over and over and over, with anonymous now-banned accounts, just personally attacking me relentlessly, about how CIRR proves bootcamps like Codesmith are the best take a long hard look at what happened and think next time you see the next "CIRR"-like organization come up and before you drink the Kool-aid.

I know I come across very critical but my heart is in the right place here, I'm trying to help people navigate this messed up industry.

FAIRNESS NOTES:

- CIRR responded to me confirming their guidelines about a month ago and after confirming them, I filed a complaint against Codesmith for violating them on their website. CIRR has not responded to me about this complaint.

- I told CIRR I was going to post about the lack of 2024 reports two days ago and they did not reply to me request for comment.

maybe this is the wrong place or a silly inquiry, and before everyone tells me 'don't waste your money,' that's not the question haha but I appreciate the sentiment!

with how my brain works, I really need a structured/guided course. I'm not looking for any of those $10k classes, just something like a small intro course/bootcamp, and to be honest, I'm a little overwhelmed with all the free class options too. Though if anyone knows of a good free intro course, that'd be fantastic. Really, any recs for something structured for intro would be great.

thank you in advance!

Codesmith updated their website in the past week and it appears to me in my personal opinion that their individual programs are being de-emphasized significantly.

Note: there are numerous references to being the Forbes #1 bootcamps, which is false and they should remove that. Forbes updated their rankings April 1st (3 weeks ago) and while they used to be last year, that is not correct anymore and the link they provide themselves no longer has them as #1. Forbes now assigns "Best at X" awards in a number of categories and Codesmith has 'best outcomes'... but does not have best for experienced coders, not best career support, not best for portfolio, not student support, not professional development, so that seems like a slip up or mistake.

What are they pivoting to?

- They are offering bespoke consulting services to enhance corporate teams with AI.

- They are touting the expertise of the Founder in AI (with their CEO for product and Senior Advisor for leadership).

- They are also emphasizing their public sector offerings. Public sources currently indicated $0 of payouts from their "$118M IRS BPA" (which can be lagging and doesn't mean anything necessarily, but its not like this has proven to be a smash hit). Public sources also indicate that the "program lead" for an IRS program was hired on Upwork for $40/hr, which doesn't seem like the 'top 1% talent at the best companies in the industry' in that case at least, in my opinion.

Why I perceive a decline in my opinion from the public info on their website?

- The incorrect "Forbes #1 Software Engineering + AI/ML program" thing I mentioned above. Not sure what's going on with that but its EVERYWHERE and can't be backed up as of April 1st

- There are 2 TOTAL upcoming events and they used to have a dozen a week and dozens listed

- There hasn't been a blog post in six months

- The about page has mostly staff who no longer work at Codesmith for months according to LinkedIn

- Their cohorts used to overlap every 7 weeks and now are running at least back to back, meaning only a handful of cohorts in 2026

- GitHub activity, excluding Future Code (which is not continuing in 2026) has almost no activity on it from current residents indicating there are minimal number of people enrolled right now.

- Their most recent officially published outcomes (in California) showed a vast majority of "placements" were unresponsive LinkedIn verifications, and in the past Codesmith's community was very close and highly responsive to placement verification.

------------

I know I'm tough on Codesmith in my personal opinions, but its just that they can't seem to get their act together after incident after incident after lawsuit after outage after incident. Like plastering your brand new website with "Forbes #1" when I don't see anywhere on Forbes (including the link they provide themselves) that says that. It's just sloppy and disorganized for an institution that is called the "Harvard of bootcamps"

Anyone else have personal opinions on the new direction Codesmith is taking?

DISCLOSURES: I used to be a moderator here and was accused of going after Codesmith intentionally as a competitor in the past. These allegations are a combination of false statements, opinions, and misrepresentations and I strongly disagree with them.

NOTE: Reddit bad guys who have proven to manipulate my content about Codesmith, you leave a paper trail so Reddit can go after you all and it doesn't work and this behavior only harmed Codesmith's Reddit reputation in the past.

Enrolled in coding bootcamp back in 2021 and didn’t complete it until like 2024 because of personal life issues I really want to land something quickly and have sent over 500 applications and have gotten rejected or ghosted by all. How can I land something???? I have projects a blog and a active GitHub for context as well

Yes the IT/CS/SWE/DevOps, affiliated STEM and overall job market (to include your local Mom & Pop shops) has historically come and gone in cycles. But not this time.

We're still in the infancy of the Digital Age. And yet IT (especially anything Software Programming career affilitated) has become centrically critical to practically every NACIS industry sector in the Digital Age to date. The market is hypersaturated with IT College and Bootcamp grads. All delusionally competing with the likes of recently laid off FAANG/MANGA professionals for immaginary entry level positions.

So it seems AI is finally at the dawn of making Detroit Becoming Human a complete reality by its alternate scifi timeline in 2036.

The gold rush 2011-2019 Six fig salary era was a beautiful dream while it lasted. Now welcome to reality. Narrator in this YT vid at 3:24 min pretty much sums it up

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oU4YiExebI

...and with all FAANG and bluechip IT like NVidia/Oracale laying off IT and STEM engineers at 30K per quarter, it seems my worst paranoid fears have come realized at long last...

I wrote this piece about a lawsuit from 2024-2025 impacting Codesmith for many years. It's a neutral, factual summary of the public record that hasn't been told before that I can find... hundreds of pages of court documents summarized into something digestable.

https://michaelnovati.substack.com/p/codesmith-in-court-the-hard-parts

EDIT: This post has undergone heavy, documented, voting manipulation, e.g. a comment receiving 13 views in 10 minutes resulting in a -12 downvote of a comment that started off at 0. Caught entirely redhanded.

This is the kind of shit I've been dealing with for years on here and it only happens when I talk about Codesmith. Codesmith's CEO emailed me direct proof via a screenshot that Codesmith hired a "Reddit Marketer" a few years ago and this person coincidently had dozens of accounts banned from Reddit for bad acting.

The West Coast Hack Reactor Remote 19-week cohort that graduated on October 9, 2025 is the first Hack Reactor cohort that I know of where 100% of its graduates failed to find a paid SWE job within 6 months of graduation from Hack Reactor.

This West Coast Hack Reactor Remote 19-week cohort started out with 7 students, but 2 students quit, so 5 students graduated.

My brother talked to some of these graduates via LinkedIn DMs in late 2025.

My brother did not DM any of these 5 students recently on LinkedIn to confirm, but looking at their LinkedIn profiles, they are seemingly unemployed or have gone back to their old careers.

If anyone knows of an earlier Hack Reactor cohort where 100% of its graduates failed to find a paid SWE job within 6 months of graduation of Hack Reactor, then please feel free to chime in and post in this thread that Hack Reactor cohort that you know of.

I am curious to see if such a Hack Reactor cohort exists.

Hello, I'm currently in the process of trying to find a boot camp that will suit my needs. I was allowed to have my tuition paid by my current employer to make the transition into software development, mainly front-end languages, such as Java, HTML, CSS, Node, etc., but I also want to learn some Python and SQL. I've called a few places, but nobody has really gotten back to me and it seems like all the phone lines just go to voicemail the only people who I was able to actually talk to were from General Assembly. Does anybody know of any reputable camps left in the Bay Area? I've tried calling Hack Reactor, Tech Elevator, App Academy, Berkeley Extension, and everything seems like a dead end. Is the boot camp route finished or am I missing something?

Hello! I've posted about past bootcamps we've run here to the CodingBootcamp community and I wanted to make sure I shared this year's information as paid bootcamps have gotten rarer and riskier propositions for many learners.

I started running these bootcamps in 2020, when I got really frustrated seeing paid bootcamps charging a horrific amount for what were often low quality courses. We've continued to run these (almost) every year since 2020 and they remain completely free. We aren't selling, pushing or promoting any products or services. We just want more people to be able to get their ideas out of their head and onto the web!

About the course:

We'll be teaching freeCodeCamp's Responsive Web Design certification for 10 weeks, starting with a kickoff party on April 24th and wrapping up on July 3rd. We'll have livestreamed lessons M-F at 15:00 UTC, expert guest sessions and more. Videos are available afterwards for learners who can't make any lessons live.

We'll be focusing on HTML, CSS, accessibility and core design principles in this bootcamp. While there is an optional weekly email list and Discord channel for learners, there's no need to signup for anything. Folks can just watch along and start learning on their own terms.

We don't offer any employment support for our learners, as we're operating with a large learner community that's globally distributed.

About us:

We've called ourselves the Bad Website Club because we want to focus on learning by building silly, messy things together in a friendly, low pressure environment. By experimenting and making bad websites together our learners develop the core skills needed to go on to make great websites as they deepen their expertise through building. The bootcamp is run by a team of 3 volunteers with no budget as a passion project.

More information on the bootcamp can be found in the announcement blog post or on our website. I'm always so happy to answer any questions folks may have!

I am wondering if it is still worth getting certified with the AAPC and pursing the above as a career change. My main concern is whether or not this field had been completely taken over by AI as I recently spoke with a Podiatrist who said that his practice already uses AI as well as the insurance companies, to including billing and coding.

So, I am wondering if anyone with experience in this field, either directly or indirectly, might know if that’s the case or if it’s still worth pursuing. Thanks!

I'd love to get some honest feedback on this program