Thanks for signing up to my newsletter about learning to code. I'm sharing an interview today with Lior, a self-taught developer who has made a successful remote job board after learning to code.
A quick bit of housekeeping - I now send this newsletter with Ghost so the emails are going to look a little different (in a good way!). You don't have to do anything different.
Before I share today's story I'd like to thank Nulab for sponsoring this edition!
Better, faster code reviews—with zero friction
Trying to tighten your development workflow? Backlog makes code review simple for teams of any size. Manage repos, review pull requests, leave comments, and track issues—all in one place, without the complexity of traditional dev tools.
Teams using Backlog streamline review cycles, reduce context switching, and ship quality code faster.
Whether you’re improving an existing process or replacing a messy tool stack, Backlog keeps everything organized in one clean dashboard.
Start reviewing code the easy way →
Lior's story
Hey, so can you introduce yourself?
Currently I’m the founder of Remote Rocketship, a job board for remote jobs. It currently has 1,000+ paying subscribers. Before this, I was a Software Engineer and Engineering Manager at Meta. I'm based in London in the UK.
Why did you learn to code?
I taught myself to code back in 2013. I was interning at my brother’s startup where they were building a mobile app for parking. Mobile apps were the hot thing back then and I remember thinking it would be so cool if I could build something that people I know would use and carry around in their pocket.
How did you learn coding?
I’m completely self taught and would do any course I found online. I remember the best ones were the Stanford course for iOS apps and RayWenderlich.com (which has now rebranded to Kodeco). I haven’t used either of them in years, but would definitely recommend both
What was a challenge you faced with coding and how did you overcome it?
The biggest problem was not understanding things, getting stuck, and then not being able to ask for help. The way I overcame this was pure persistence! I would do and redo courses and tutorials, even if I didn’t understand the code or what was happening. (Back then this was in Objective-C and there were lots of annoying things around pointers and memory allocations).Eventually, after about 6 months, everything seemed to click for me and I’ve been able to take giant leaps since then.
How has your life changed since learning to code?
A few years after learning to code I interviewed at Facebook (now Meta). I was rejected the first time! Then a few years later I interviewed again and managed to get in.
Facebook definitely changed the trajectory of my career and taught me many important skills – the most important one being how to evaluate effort required vs expected impact and how to consciously make a decision between these.
And funnily enough, while I was at Facebook, I was mistakenly given access to my interview feedback from the first interview. One of my interviewers said “this has been the worst interview of my life” 😂 So it just goes to show you that you shouldn’t give up.
What tech stack do you recommend people try?
I don’t think it really matters to be honest. The important thing is that you just start and build. I like Next.js and Supabase, as this simplifies a lot of things.
What’s your tip for people coding a side project?
Speed is the most important. Don’t be afraid to write shitty code. In fact, you should prioritize shitty code. It’s more important that you get something out there and into the hands of users, instead of prioritizing “beautiful” or “scalable” code.
What are your goals for the future?
My focus right now is on growing Remote Rocketship. The goal is for it to be as big as possible, while not hiring anyone else :) More people means more problems, and I enjoy the simplicity of building alone. You can follow me along my journey on Twitter .
