But sometimes, that advice actually equates to "don't drive the minivan in your garage. Go out and buy a bicycle."
By the way, do you have any suggestions for tutorials that teach someone a mental model for how CSS/HTML layout works? In particular, I'm looking for a mental model that I can apply consistently and which doesn't feel like I'm playing whack-a-mole. So far I've found that with flexbox, but I'm still finding myself in situations where I need to work with existing block/inline/inline-block code.
Very sadly, I don't. Beyond the Box Model (and the basic notion of "cascading"), there seem to be very few mental models, as such, out there; if anything, people tend to learn through a collection of experiences (many of them negative, at the outset).
Not that there aren't important concepts to understand. Just that the quirks and exceptions tend to rise up from the mists, and -- just when you thought you got a handle on some particular area of functionality -- overwhelm the nice, tidy, conceptual aspects.
Which is why it has proved to be by far the hardest programming environment I've ever hard to learn.
Reading the source of popular open source frameworks is a great way to get a sense of how to write maintainable, reusable CSS. Oftentimes it's not actually too confusing behind the scenes because CSS logic is relatively straightforward to begin with.
Other than that, the hard knock school of life is my primary instructor. There's no "Code Complete" for your stylesheets (at least not one that I've found).
Yes. Within the first four years, a million dollars will have flowed through your bank account. By 10 years, somebody with a rudimentary ability to save money and a disinclination to purchase sailboats or lease BMWs should have a million dollar net worth after taxes.
It's a really good time to in history to know how to program computers.
You don't need a $250k salary to save $1mio in 10 years.
My rudimentary calculation shows you need to save ~50k in the first year, get 4% raises, keep expenses constant, and get a 5% return. Bonuses, options, etc are on top of that. Also, you could get step-raises in the middle for bigger promotions. And, you could marry someone doing the same thing and get there faster.
Or one can choose to believe actual data (see: published Visa related salary info, various government surveys, etc.), which indicates the average salary for these companies is somewhere around $150k (give or take). Sure, throw in bonuses and equity grants and some employees might top $200k regularly. Some very high performers are also going to regularly break $250k. I doubt anybody would debate that.
Let's assume the "big" guys (Google, Facebook, etc.) regularly pay average total compensation around $250k, so that patio11's remark is correct. So what? As many employees as they employ, they represent a small fraction of the number of people who are very well qualified programmers and engineers. Their salaries are by no means common. The market is good, but it's not that good.
You might have to live in the heart of the housing bubble to get that salary. A colleague who was very gifted at JavaScript was offered a job at Google but he was coming out behind after the increased living expenses.
You can walk around but the company store is pretty much it. Unique way to buy Apple t-shirts and stuff ;) IF you're into museums there's also the Computer History Museum next to Google in Mountain View. I haven't actually been there though.
"IF you're into museums there's also the Computer History Museum"
Even if you are not into museums it is my most recommended place to go in Silicon Valley. I have been here 3 years and never wanted to go walk around Google or Apple campus. But I guess it is something FREE to do.
