I have a few qualms with this app:

1. For a Linux user, you can already build such a system yourself quite trivially by getting an FTP account, mounting it locally with curlftpfs, and then using SVN or CVS on the mounted filesystem. From Windows or Mac, this FTP account could be accessed through built-in software.

2. It doesn't actually replace a USB drive. Most people I know e-mail files to themselves or host them somewhere online to be able to perform presentations, but they still carry a USB drive in case there are connectivity problems. This does not solve the connectivity issue.

3. It does not seem very "viral" or income-generating. I know this is premature at this point, but without charging users for the service, is it reasonable to expect to make money off of this?

This is nonsense. GraphQL queries are simple HTTP requests, with no more complexity than REST. You POST a query string and some JSON and it’s done. If your client makes it harder than that, don’t use it.

Here’s my workflow for creating an API with Postgraphile:

    create view graphql.object as select some,columns from table;

(That’s it)

It’s trivial to query it with curl, I’d give an example but I’m afk rn.

I’ve been using GraphQL for about the same amount of time as in the article and it solved a bunch of problems for me.

It’s so easy to use, and saves so much time - once you spend the time to understand it.

Here are some ways to learn deeply and be relevant:

1. Pick a data structure (such as a hash table or LSM-Tree) then read all the literature there is to read, every single paper that's great, following the best conferences year after year, and implement a 10x faster or more scalable version for the std lib of your favorite language.

2. Pick a fault model (such as storage faults, network faults, cryptography faults) then read all the literature there is to read, every single paper that's great, following the best conferences year after year, and write a fault injection or fuzzing harness to break some of the most respected storage/network/cryptography systems (for examples, see the work done by Remzi and Andrea Arpaci-Dusseau on storage faults, Kyle Kingsbury on Jepsen, and Guido Vranken on Cryptofuzz: https://github.com/guidovranken/cryptofuzz).

3. Pick a software field (such as web applications, mobile applications, native applications, file formats such as Office Open XML, or protocols such as SMTP, MIME, HTTP, QUIC) then read as many CVE reports and bug bounty reports as you can find, and then start participating in bug bounty programs within this field. Pick a target and give yourself a goal, e.g. DoS, RCE or read/write access, and do the work to make it happen. Chain as many steps as you can. Automate and enumerate. You'll find a way in if you keep at it. There's nothing like crafting an exploit to change the way you think about programming.

As you gain experience in data structures, storage/networking/cryptography, and security, you'll find this translates well to most software engineering work. You'll gain a speed/safety/security way of thinking, you'll have fun being curious and learning along the way (and hopefully you'll earn a bounty or two and get some CVEs under your name).

Limited input data, but my sense is that this could have nothing much to do with age. You've been talking to people who say plain out illegal things in interviews (at least in the USA), and it sounds like you've been looking for jobs through "commodity" channels -- asking for "interview projects" to be done in two weeks, hiring for experience with very specific tech, and so on.

Recommendation: don't do that. Instead aim to get a job with people who value inherent capabilities and flexibility, and who aren't abusers. To do that you may need to do some work first. For example, develop a web application of your own, open source, using some modern tech stack (doesn't matter which specific one). Then, when you interview you can talk about your experiences, thoughts, etc with that tech. This shows the interviewer that you have the capability to pick up new tech, to understand its strengths and weaknesses, to produce output. A good interviewer will see that and know that you will therefore be able to pick up whatever tech they want you to use. It's not about specific knowledge and buzzwords : it's about the ability to learn and apply. You can now go into interviews with the approach : I don't know anything about some of the tech you're using, but that's ok because I have proven I can learn, and I know a huge amount about _something_, and perhaps the interviewer will be interested to learn from me about that.

One of the advantages of age is that you have had more time to meet more people, with with more people, build a network. Use those contacts to look for jobs rather than recruiters.

Entrepreneurship is like one of those carnival games where you throw darts or something.

Middle class kids can afford one throw. Most miss. A few hit the target and get a small prize. A very few hit the center bullseye and get a bigger prize. Rags to riches! The American Dream lives on.

Rich kids can afford many throws. If they want to, they can try over and over and over again until they hit something and feel good about themselves. Some keep going until they hit the center bullseye, then they give speeches or write blog posts about "meritocracy" and the salutary effects of hard work.

Poor kids aren't visiting the carnival. They're the ones working it.

I regret causing confusion here. It turns out that this correlation was true on the initial small data set, but after gathering more data, the correlation went away. So the real lesson should be: "if you gather data on a lot of low-frequency events, some of them will display a spurious correlation, about which you can make up a story."