I've learned a ton starting from basically 0 programming and algorithm experience to being farely competent in a few languages, design patterns and algorithms, as well as the math that I've missed for awhile. I'm currently self-learning Discrete Maths with OCW, Khan Academy, and books from the library.

I learn in my free time and it's been amazing. For support, I often use OpenStudy.com's amazing community, especially for math and computer science things. I'm planning on ramping up my experience and practice by starting to participate in open source projects (the folks at #openhatch on freenode and openhatch.org have been amazing here), as well as getting a portfolio of projects on github.

I've run into sort of a conundrum that I knew I'd have to face sooner or later -- how exactly do I receive recognition and get credit for what I've been learning for the last couple of years? I could always put it under education and experience on my resume, but are there pointers that people on HN can give on how exactly I can prove I know and learned the things I say I have?

I really appreciate that we live in a time where anyone can get a world-class education for free (almost all in the local public library and free time at home/after work) from some of the best institutions in the world like this. Even better (imho) is the amazing help and collaboration provided by the OpenStudy and OpenHatch communities.