If you have a patch of soil with good sun exposure you can learn how to grow your own food. It’s not free but you can be very thrifty while doing it. Huw Richards has published a nice book on the cheapest ways to garden.
Even in a pot on a balcony you can grow a blueberry bush. They’re pretty hardy, nice looking, no thorns, the flowers are good for pollinators, and you’ll be able to pick and eat fresh berries. One little bush won’t produce enough at one time for a pie, but at least they don’t get moldy like strawberries.
This barely qualifies as a hobby, but at some point I decided to learn how to count in binary on my fingers. It’s handy if you need to hold a number in your head for a bit and can’t write things down, or to count past 10 visually on your fingers for somebody. There are probably YouTube videos on it. I literally can’t remember where I learned, but I practiced a lot when bored in church. It’s relatively non-disruptive and practicing can eat a decent amount of time.
0 materials. Just takes time. Literally free.
I practiced a lot when bored in church
I’ve heard church frowns upon non-binary people. But I had no idea they convert people to binary counting.
I did the same when Masahiro Sakurai explained how to do so when revealing Byleth for Smash Bros. Ultimate. It’s come in handy a few times when needing to count things out, and honestly can be a fun exercise for dexterity to just count to 31 on each hand.
Oh absolutely, you just gotta be careful who you direct those 4s toward
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/CXhbyCGi5hs
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.
You can learn how to make a donut: https://youtu.be/nIoXOplUvAw
All hail Blender Guru!
Mental math. People overcomplicate how difficult things are but quickly calculating numbers and percentages is a super useful skill that’ll save you a lot of time.
Warning - incoming Redditcomment©®™
Uh, that’s mental arithmetic, not maths
Snorts
Lear how to cook. Just grab a simple online recipe, a bottle of your beverage of choice and try cooking something. It’s a really simple and useful skill acquire.
Agree. The number of people I know who “don’t” cook blows my mind. 75% of my repertoire takes less than 30 minutes of involvement to cook. It’s cheaper, healthier, and a great zen thing that’s totally different from my day job.
For those trying to get started, do a meal kit that involves cooking, and start there. Not having to buy ingredients or plan things out makes it less intimidating.
What really helped me learning to cook was experimentation. I was always ok at following recipes but at some point I decided to cook Bolognese every week and every time I cooked it I had to use an ingredient I hadn’t used before. Cooking the same thing with variation helped me learn the effect of adding different ingredients.
Recently i picked up an electric smoker and oh boy it’s been life changing. If you want to be the “cook” in your family this is the easiest way.
Take your meat of choice and smoke it. Make sure to tell everyone how long it took to smoke so they know to tell you it tastes good
I approve!
The best thing for home smoking is electric- best control, set it & forget it.
What really helped me learning to cook was experimentation. I was always ok at following recipes but at some point I decided to cook Bolognese every week and every time I cooked it I had to use an ingredient I hadn’t used before. Cooking the same thing with variation helped me learn the effect of adding different ingredients.
Having cooked professionally for the last 15 years, I take this for granted sometimes.
It amazes me how many people can’t cook anything more complicated than kraft dinner. I don’t mean to rag on anybody, but it’s a skill you really need to learn if you don’t know how. You’ll save a ton of money and there’s a lot of simple dishes that can impress people.
You’ll save a ton of money
idk dude, kraft dinner is pretty cheap.
Check out The Odin Project. It is a free full stack developer course. I’m going to give it a try myself.
programming
It’s not free, but you have to pay for it no matter what, so it kinda is, but cooking. Everyone should learn the basics of navigating a kitchen and the basic terminology.
Singing and dancing are both learnable free. Art in general tends to be cheaper. Usually anyway.
Intellectual skills are all fair game, there’s wide availability online. You need to start with Information Literacy though, to kinda unlock the rest. Otherwise you’ll waste too much time on bullshit.
Since I’ve begun “trying” in the kitchen, I eat way healthier than ever before, and most of my meals are better and cheaper than restaurant equivalents.
I kind of resent the whole “celebrity chef shows you how to cook” media thing because it makes something that should be approachable seen really intimidating for a beginner
Can you expand on what you mean by information literacy?
Rather than try myself, I’ll let a bunch of school teachers and librarians do it instead. They’re better than I am.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/P4HWuRRUMBs
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.
You can teach yourself how to change the oil on your car simply by watching YouTube videos. And then all you need to buy are a few basic supplies, and you’ll be able to change your oil for life. Oil changes are either absurdly expensive (dealership) or done half-assed (Jiffy Lube), so doing it yourself gives you a job done right for pennies on the dollar.
And if you find that you have a knack for it, you can teach yourself more basic maintenance jobs like changing brake pads.
Also, if you have a warehouse membership from like Sam’s Club or Costco, they often have the synthetic oil you need for an absurdly low price.
I was buying 5 quarts of oil for like $20-30, I bought a 4 pack of Costco brand 5 quart motor oil for like $40
I took more stupid long to realize you bought 20 qts of oil from Costco And not 5. Guess I need to learn that mental math stuff from earlier in the thread.
Please correct me if I’m wrong because I am by now means a car repair afficionado, but isn’t disposing of oil supposed to be the problematic part of the oil change? At least from what I heard, getting rid of it in a legal/safe manner is difficult for individuals doing their own oil changes.
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In the US, all AutoZone and Advance Auto Parts will dispose of your oil for free. Also, most municipalities will take it at special centers (same place where you might go to dispose of electronics).
Personally I have a designated where I let the oil collect from multiple oil changes, and then I take it to the county landfill maybe once every two years when there’s enough to justify a trip.
It’s a small hassle, but worth it IMO. Just depends on what is available to you.
Its a total pain in the ass and the most annoying part. Usually you can take it to an auto parts store in your area that has a container you can dump it. But half the time its full and isnt emptied for weeks.
Programming started as a hobby for me as a teenager. I always “liked computers” so thought I’d give it a try. I never intended to make a career out of it because it seemed so hard at first, but over a decade later, I’m decently accomplished in my field and get paid bank for it.
As a hobby, it’s fantastic. You can add in missing features to open source software you use (including the one I’m posting this to right now!). You can make your own little apps to fill niches you haven’t found an existing program for. You can automate boring stuff from other work. You can make mods for certain types of video games. Or if you’re really ambitious, you can even make a video game (but I gotta tell you, video games are hard and need much more than just programming – I do not recommend making video games as a goal unless you’ve thought out just what that involves).
If you make a career out of it later, cool. But even if you don’t, it’s a fun and rewarding hobby that costs almost nothing. As long as you have a computer (preferably not a mobile phone, though it’s technically possible to use a phone), you can program. Hardware doesn’t generally matter. Any cheap laptop works. All the tools you need have free and often open source ones you can use. You only need to pay for web hosting if you make a web tool and want to share it with others.
Same. Been a hobby since I was 13 back in 1984. 39 years later, I’m still doing my hobby and being paid for it. I’ve made a career out of it. Although, I’ve done it so much I no longer do it as a hobby. It’s just too much. If I never saw another computer or programming language again for the rest of my life, I don’t think I’d mind. Hoping to retire within the decade.
Meanwhile my dumbass has been trying to be even remotely functional with programming. A degree and a software dev job later I still don’t think I really get it.
That happens to us all. My first year I felt useless. Once I started running projects and getting the opportunity to actually design our framework, I got a lot more confidence. The first project I ran I was not prepared for. But I improved in confidence so much while I did it.
Imposter syndrome affects us a lot. But even if you’re a shit dev, remember this: we literally do magic. Think about it for a moment. We write words in an esoteric script to convince electricity to create things that didn’t previously exist. Even the worst wizard is still a wizard. And the best part is that they can improve! There’s so many resources out there to improve your skills. It might not be for everyone, but I love my job.
I actually got my first real project a few weeks ago after over a year here and just completely screwed the pooch on it. I had like 2 methods written but no functionality after a week with it. I don’t know if I was asking the wrong questions or what but the product owner which was one of our senior devs really had me struggling.
I’m finishing up on a course this week that covers a few things that my school didn’t cover and then I am gonna start working on my own project to hopefully get my bearings straight. I don’t really have one in mind but I’m considering a messenger app or ye ole student registry type app that a lot of people start with.
Hey, we all start somewhere. I remember the first time I broke prod I was freaking out. I skipped lunch and a company event with my boss while we figured out what happened, and we had a few major customers who couldn’t use our software all morning.
Screwing up is what makes us devs in my opinion. When the shit hits the fan and the fire flares, that’s when we find out our real mettle. I like to joke that I moonlight as a fire fighter lol.
Keep at it and I promise you’ll get your confidence when you have that major breakthrough and fix a complicated problem with a simple solution.
If you’re gonna work on a personal project I suggest doing something you want that isn’t easily accessible. Something everything out there is subscription based or something. Do something fun that you will actually use. That helps you stay motivated.
Thankfully what I mostly do right now isn’t gonna break anything major but I have had a few after 5 calls from product owners because certain things in our software that is custom configured for each client might have been done wrong(it’s kind of common enough that it isn’t that big of a deal) and it’s mostly a quick fix and from lack of communication. Where I struggle with is that I am first to call for support issues and I still don’t quite know the software or the industry like the back of my hand.
The small project I am rolling around in my head is probably already made but I want to be able to create a chat app that has full E2E encryption with chat history/room deletion based on if the chat hasn’t been active for a few hours or whatever. Sort of encrypted chat but with the killswitch of a VPN. But I don’t know if it already existing matters as much as the experience I would get from just doing it.
Also thanks for the encouragement. Lately especially I have been beating myself up because I should really be further along than where I am.
Programming is great.
On that note, kinda similar: Selfhost your services. There is a lot of cool software that you can run on your old computer, or on a more dedicated machine. A file storage, a media server, your very own AI server, the lost is endless.
I’d like to learn more about how to do this. I’ve got a home theater PC I’ve been using as a NAS via simple windows & samba file sharing, but I’d like to expand that to tools like Jellyfin and potentially something like writefreely or a podcasting platform for others to enjoy. I’ve looked it up cursorily but would appreciate if you could share additional resources my way in developing my own server here as well. (All good if you don’t have any to share, I can just google as well I suppose)
Sure I can talk a little. First things first: If you’re hosting on windows, you should probably use a different OS.
If you’re looking for something easily manageable, there is a couple of specifically made systems made for easy administration, True as comes to mind, but that’s not what I use.
If you’re more proficient, or ready to learn, you should really have a Linux distro on your server. I recommend Debian 12, but there is many valid choices.
When setting this kind of system up, the essential service that you want to run all the time is SSH, as that’s how you will configure and use the server. On Debian 12, you can just check a box in the installer and it will set up ssh for you.
After that, you don’t need a screen or keyboard on your server anymore, just go to any of your work stations and go
ssh user@(your server IP)and boom you get a shell on your server.Okay, so now what? Think about what you want to host. Then just look up the documentation of your stuff. Learn Docker, as it will make hosting way easier. If you’re a friend of the visual click click interface, you’d probably want portainer.
With docker, you can host a ton of service without actually having to do a lot of configuring with them. Want to host a database? Marinade Want to host a media server? Plex
Okay, now you probably think that sounds way too complicated and are about to get demotivated. Now you see, the most important thing is to start. If you set it up yourself, your first server will be a mess, and that’s okay. You will scream at docker because it does weird things, you will scream because your Webserver finally connects with the database and you can play your music and you will break things to the point where you will just reinstall. It’s a great learning experience.
Some time later, you will just go “hey that service sounds cool”, copy some compose file, tweak it a bit, and boom you hosted a new service in a couple minutes.
About ressources: I mostly use just what’s provided by the stuff I want to use. A lot of my information that goes directly to the act of hosting comes from Readme files in git repositories or descriptions on docker hub. Besides that, search for things you encounter.
In general, I’ve found the first party documentation of the things I use in tech to be the most reliable, but that seems not for everyone.
There isn’t a magic central Ressource, besides your head when you remember doing something before. Selfhosting/Homelab communities on Reddit or now Lemmy can help with ideas.
It’s pretty much how it started for me. It can work extremely well if your job can tie it in. But at that point expect it to stop being a hobby.
There are many free (static) web hostings: GitHub Pages, Azure, Vercel, and so on.
On the rest of your comment, I agree
Taking a break from making a video game to read this thread lol, you are not wrong about that part! Or any part, actually, programming is awesome and even outside of using it for work it’s come in handy at least a little bit in every other hobby I’ve ever done. Up to and including knitting.
Programming is super useful as a scientist, especially with how easy it is to collect huge data sets these days.
This, entirely. And especially with how tech-averse most scientists are in my field (biology), it’s really easy to set yourself apart with just some basic programming knowledge
Touch typing.
I’ve been practicing this. In 30 years when computer input is primarily voice and touchscreens, we’ll be the only ones left. It’ll be like knowing how to use Morse code with a wireless telegraph.
Touch typing is an absolute must, and I can’t imagine how anybody uses a keyboard without it. Though it is fun to see people’s reactions as you stare them in the face to hold a conversation while never breaking your keystrokes.
Recently I got a CharaChorder though, so I have to completely relearn typing. I definitely forgot how hard it can be at first.
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I’m a software dev and one of my coworkers is a hunt and peck typist. I couldn’t function that way. He’s actually incredibly fast though, so it works for him. Definitely wouldn’t for me.
I had to look it up, but chorded input? What made you switch to it? Interest or necessity?
Fun fact: My left hand is on gamer pose wasd for typing (not to f position). Doesn’t really hinder me from speedy touch typing.
I’m more of a QWER gamer.
You strafe with Q and E?
Depends, define free and define useful. ;)
You can learn a lot by reading up and watching YT vids. I already did my own car maintenance (started as hobby, now it’s a necessity, car mechanics cost twice/trice my hourly wage), but didn’t know how to replace the fuelpump on this modern car. Garage quoted €500, part was 109, special tool 79, seals 5 each (2). Replaced it myself in 4h.
I’m also learning to play bass guitar with the help of YT (already have the bass), painted my house, replaced kitchen and parts in bathroom including plumbing,… None of DIY things for free, but cheaper then hiring somebody to do these task. Even when you count your hourly wage, most of those tasks can be done cheaper yourself.
When you want no investment at all, languages are very useful to learn, at least when you meet others speaking those languages. Learning to setup a computer with free software is usefull as well (saves cash, so eeven better then free ;) ).
At this moment in time, in most pasrts of Europe and the USA, labour is the most expensive part of everything, so I’d say everything you can learn to do yourself is worth investing some time and maybe some cash in. Nothing wrong with hobbies that can save cash in the long run.
Clothing repair. Patch, darn, replace a zip or button. Expand that to full sewing and it isn’t free but you’ll save a bucket of money, have clothes that are exactly what you want, and don’t disintegrate in 6 months
You can literally go to the woods, pick up a thick branch and start carving away. Only tool you need is a cheap knife, even an old kitchen knife would suffice for starters.
Learn a language. It’s a great thing and you can easily do it instead of browsing social medias while traveling. I started with japanese about 5 months ago and can understand some phrases of native speakers already.
Nihongo difficult desu
ええ、難しいだ。でも、日本語が大好き。
