When you are starting out in an hiring environment like this, you pretty much have to do this, but you should also be prepared to back it up.

25 years ago during a major tech downturn I said I had experience with C for my first programming job (I didn’t, but I knew others). Before I started I studied my ass off and learned it so I wouldn’t look like a fool on the job.

End result was that when I started, I knew C.

Don’t lie about stuff that is easy to verify like a degree from Harvard. That is just asking to be blackballed.

Maybe yours doesn’t, but plenty do.

Source: have worked at multiple companies interviewing people who would have been promising candidates, but got bounced during the screening process.

Slackware in 1998 I think, from a cd that came in a book I bought while in university.

It didn’t stick, but it demystified it and I’ve used a lot of flavours of *nix since then.

I remember not being able to get sound to work at all on my pentium computer.