How to test my knowledge?

Question

I am a senior in high school planning on majoring in Computer Science in college. I have been programming for a number of years. However, I have no idea how I stack up to professionals. What would be a way for me to measure my skills in specific languages? I currently use Java, C#, Ruby, and C.

Answer 1

Try answering a few questions on StackOverflow. You'll find out soon enough. On second thought, never mind. I can't answer most of the questions on StackOverflow.

Don't compare yourself to others. The only real metric is "Do I have enough credentials to land a job." The rest is just a continuum of learning. Everyone's skill sets are different. Just keep learning.

As to whether or not you have good skills in a particular language, try building a non-trivial, working application. You can judge the quality of the application a number of ways:

1. Is the code clear, concise, and easily understood by others?
2. Is the code testable? Can I write unit tests against it?
3. Is the code maintainable? Can I easily modify it without breaking things?
4. Does the code follow sound design principles and methodologies?
5. Is my application easy to use by others?
6. Does the code perform well?

And so on.

Answer 2

Join to a team that do a real project, if you can. This is the best way.

Answer 3

You don't need to test it, it will test itself.

When I got my first/current job, I knew I can't compare to anyone I was working with. So I simply did my best and hoped for the best. Turns out I managed to prove myself - or so I was told/shown in different ways. Whether this is true or not, I can't really say objectively.

Just do what you do best, and sooner or later you will get feedback, whether you want it or not:

• People will seek your advice
• You'll get more responsibilities (e.g. increasingly larger features to code)
• You'll (hopefully) get more money
• You'll be asked to salvage a failing project (which can be a bad thing:))
• etc...

or

• You'll get boring tasks no one else wants to do
• No one will ask you anything, you'll just get a task and be expected to do it without discussion
• No raise
• etc...

Having said all that, always try to surround yourself with people better than you, if you can. Don't ever miss an opportunity to learn from other people, especially their mistakes! ;)

Also try to read some of these, I just started going through the list myself, and I can't recommend it enough.

Don't worry about your knowledge now, worry about how much you learn each day!

Answer 4

There are plenty of online practice tests for various certifications. I would find one that suites your skills and see where you stand. There's really nothing to lose.

Answer 5

Programmer competency matrix has some ideas if you want a kind of ballpark to some degree.

Answer 6

I would say that you shouldn't worry about how you compare to others. Programming has the nice quality that your work can stand on its own.

But if for some reason you must absolutely know how good you are, join some software project. Either join the workforce or some open-source project. You'll soon find out how good you are.

But don't expect people to tell it to you explicitly.

Answer 7

I completely agree with the already chosen answer. But just to add, if you just want some ARTIFICIAL metric on how much you know, just find some certifications on the languages you know and do a couple of mock tests. Other than that, I think that the best and most edifying way to test your knowledge is to have a conversation with someone who's already working in industry.

Answer 8

• Sphere Online Judge :

Wikipedia description :

SPOJ (Sphere Online Judge) is an online judge system with over 100,000 registered users and over 10000 problems. The solution to problems can be submitted in over 40 languages including C, C++, Java, Python, C#, Go, Haskell, Ocaml, and F#. SPOJ has a rapidly growing problem set/tasks available for practice 24 hours/day, including many original tasks prepared by the community of expert problem setters associated with the project. SPOJ allows advanced users to organize contests under their own rules and problems. It also includes a forum where programmers can discuss how they can solve a particular problem.
Apart from the English language, SPOJ also offers its content in Polish, Portugese and Vietnamese languages.

• TopCoder

Wikipedia description :

TopCoder is a company which administers contests in computer programming. TopCoder hosts fortnightly online algorithm competitions — known as SRMs or "single round matches" — as well as weekly competitions in design and development. The work in design and development produces useful software which is licensed for profit by TopCoder. Competitors involved in the creation of these components are paid royalties based on these sales. The software resulting from algorithm competitions — and the less-frequent marathon matches — is not usually directly useful, but sponsor companies sometimes provide money to pay the victors. Statistics (including an overall "rating" for each developer) are tracked over time for competitors in each category.