It seems like that would be a ticket to a QA automation job, not a dev job. People say QA -> dev is a good way to get in, but I've seen very few people actually accomplish it.
I've seen it happen several times (my employer may be unusually prone to hiring jr devs as qa automation).
I agree that if you can hold out for a dev job, do that and save a year or two getting to the same place. If you really can't get a dev job and need the income, get a QA Automation job and start migrating early by asking to fix small bugs yourself, or work on the automation tooling.
At a smaller company, working on the build system and QA automation tooling might be more interesting and get more attention than what you would do as a jr software dev.
Yes, but it's also quite hard to get hired as a dev without either qualifications or experience. If you've got the qualifications you can go in directly.
