Reddit reviews The Complete Software Developer's Career Guide: How to Learn Your Next Programming Language, Ace Your Programming Interview, and Land The Coding Job Of Your Dreams

You'll see this one recommended a lot :
How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. It's a classic and for good reason. I always find myself going back to it. In fact there are quite a few books I'd argue that build upon it

Another very good one is by Leil Lowndes called
How to Talk to Anyone. It gives a lot of useful tips on how to make conversations exciting and vibrant.

Also, John Sonmez's books are really good too because they focus on communication skills from a developers point of view. I really liked these because it also teaches how to develop your career and start your own brand:

• Soft Skills
  
  
• The Complete Software Developer's Career Guide
  
  
  
  These are just off the top of my head, I'm sure there are plenty more. Hope that helped!

From The Complete Software Developer's Career Guide

1. Start becoming friends with people well before you need help from them
   
   
2. Attempt to help them before they help you
   
   Though depending on how close you are to graduating, these may not be options for you. But they generally result in a non-fake way to network.

If that is the case. Look in your area at the software companies. check to see if they are hiring, if so, see what they are looking for in an applicant. It might give you some clarity on what to study. Also look the company up on LinkedIn and reach out. I was always advised that by my professors. I personally want to work for microsoft (i have a few friends in Seattle and it is a "good" company to work for), very demanding I know. It will be a lot harder to focus on one aspect with a large company like that. I am currently reading this https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B073X6GNJ1/ref=kinw_myk_ro_title I have kindle unlimited so it was free. It is a good resource if you are stuck.
as for the passion part. IDK man, I am in the same boat right now. honestly, I think it is just a wall you have to force your self through. Make a list of 20 projects. 8 easy ones (tic tax toe, calculator etc), 8 intermediate ones, and 4 dream ones. put a lot of detail in the "dream" ones. Then make the 8 intermediate ones parts of the 4 dreams ones. umm like a break down. if you want to make a game. one of the intermediate ones can be a user input program, a second can be a physics one, a third one can be graphic output and so on. I know of me and many others i get lost in the OVERWHELMING complexity of things. I freeze and cant move forward. Maybe learn some programming start to finish processing/design. Do not worry about the code, just get your ideas on paper. Start with the mission statement. then break it up into sections. Pretend you are working with a team of developers, where you are each role. but you act separate. Shrugs. In all honesty the best path might be to take an online course from a college and just get into the work force

Saw a similar thread yesterday and I responded with this:

Just thought I'd give some advice as I have learned programming over the last year and was hired as a developer four months after starting my journey.

I was pretty overwhelmed with all the different options there are out there, however I'd recommend to sit down and first think about how you like to learn. Some people like to read, others like to watch or listen. This will help you filter out the methods that may not work for you.

I started with a programming school called launch school. It is $200 USD per month however during my salary negotiation I got my employer to take care of this cost as I can only do the program part time and it will likely take me another year of learning to complete.

I would suggest picking a program or method of learning and sticking to it. Immerse yourself with coding and push yourself through when you get bored or want to give up and try another program or method of learning. If you are like me and have trouble staying on track, take a break and come back to it.

Finally, I just started to read a book called the complete software developers career guide and I wish I read it when I was deciding on how to start learning.

The Complete Software Developer's Career Guide: How to Learn Your Next Programming Language, Ace Your Programming Interview, and Land The Coding Job Of Your Dreams https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B073X6GNJ1/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_NisBDbMBN03E1

If someone wants to discuss my journey, let me know! I now work on two very successful SaaS applications and there are only 3 developers where I am employed. It has been a life changing journey from last July!

Thanks for your input.

I'm intending to get college credit for this intenship. My major itself had 4-5 classes that focused a lot on programming. My computer science minor included anther 3-4. The internships I'm pursuing aren't radically different from what I learned in school. There shouldn't really be any issue with this, right?

I'm taking advice from The Complete Software Developer's Career Guide, where he says to specialize in something. I've tried sending in lots of resumes as more of a "jack of all trades", but that didn't seem to be effective either.

I figured I needed to do something to stand out. I changed up my strategy 2 months ago by focusing on .NET and widening my search to all around the country rather than just the state. I still have a few other languages and frameworks on my resume, such as Ruby, C++, JavaScript, jQuery, and SQL. I just haven't gone deep enough into the different frameworks for Ruby, C++, and JavaScript to really focus on them, like I have for .NET.