Ask HN: Advice for someone starting out (in tech)?I'm a student (aged between 16-18) in the UK at a secondary/high school, considering whether to get a job or do a degree. Given that I can write programs reasonably fine (I wouldn't claim to have mastered the craft by any means, but I can write non-trivial stuff – e.g. compiler bits, web servers, web applications, etc).What I can't seem to do reasonably fine is to work out whether I should do a degree, and what my employment prospects are. I've previously managed to get on a 12-week internship sponsored by some "big tech" companies, if that counts for anything.I therefore guess this isn't just one question but several (I would love answers to any of them :D).- Are FLOSS contributions and (relatively large) code samples sufficient to get a job or is past experience essential? Obviously this question is really hard to answer in the abstract, but any thoughts people have on this would be really appreciated (anecdotes,, advice, etc would be really useful).
 - If experience is essential, any suggestions for how to get experience as someone who doesn't have one would be great!
 - If I do go down the degree route, how essential is the university's reputation (e.g. are league table positions important)?
 - I like working on relatively complex stuff (compilers, distributed systems) – is it viable to self-teach these things (and at some point get a job doing that) or is university essential for that?Any other advice would also be much appreciated :D