The freeCodeCamp Podcast #166 From broke musician to working dev. How college drop-out Ryan Furrer taught himself to program
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Mar 28, 2025 
Ryan Furrer, a self-taught front-end engineer, shares his fascinating journey from being a broke musician to succeeding in tech. He discusses the challenges of teaching himself to code while balancing life and work, including a difficult divorce that led him to move back home. Furrer highlights the importance of creative design in coding and the emotional toll of navigating a non-traditional education. His story emphasizes community support, the joy of learning, and the impact of resilience in career transitions.
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Start with Astro
- Start with Astro before learning React, even if your goal is React development.
- Astro's HTML-like syntax makes it less overwhelming for beginners and easier to grasp framework concepts.
Astro as Expanded HTML5
- Astro acts like an expanded HTML5, incorporating JavaScript-like features while remaining relatively simple.
- This reduces the learning curve compared to complex frameworks like React.
From Musician to Developer
- Ryan Furrer, a front-end engineer, dropped out of college and worked as a musician.
- He later transitioned to a tech career after teaching himself to code for five years.