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Ask HN: Non-web developers, what do you do?

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Re: Ask HN: Non-web developers, what do you do?

#11

Post by kalyantm »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #6

I work in embedded systems. It's a smaller area, I'd guess maybe 5-10% of software engineering, but it's not going to go away any time soon. It also is much less focused on "frameworks" and APIs. It's a lot of C++ on Linux these days. Harder-real-time stuff is more likely C or C++ on vxWorks or some similar RTOS.

can i ask how you got into the field? Not op, but I too am stuck in this web (pun intended lol) about frameworks, and REST and only have a high level understanding of software I really want to dig deeper, do DS/Algo and get better at the basics (usually C/C++)

Re: Ask HN: Non-web developers, what do you do?

#14

Post by lumberjack »

dyingkneepad wrote: post #2

I do low-level operating-system C programming. There is some C++, and lots of scripting in Bash, some in Python. Also lots of Math is involved in what I specifically do. I kinda daydream in laterally switching to working on Security and cryptography, maybe one day I'll pull some strings and try that. Or do some programming that helps Physics people better understand the universe. But I don't want a salary downgrade.

Are you in the simulations/HPC field by any chance? If so do you mind telling me what it looks like in terms of career prospects from your vantage point? Also if not in that field can you elaborate a bit more on what industry you are applying your skills to? You don't have to be very specific. I ask because I have the exact same skill set and am in search of what to do next.

Re: Ask HN: Non-web developers, what do you do?

#15

Post by lumberjack »

khadgar25 wrote: post #7

I do scientific computing i.e. solve partial differential equations that arise in engineering using C/C++/CUDA/OpenCL with some Python/Matlab interfaces for non-specialist scientists to use.

I do that too. May I ask if you work for a university or national lab or industry and how competitive the pay is? I work for a university and the career prospects don't seem so good for me at this point.

Re: Ask HN: Non-web developers, what do you do?

#16

Post by jugjug »

I develop a system to monitor energy production of solar panels. Before I helped build a system to manage large number of EV charge points. There is some web frontend, but most of the work is in the IoT communication, scaling, and insights into many kinds of malfunctions.

Re: Ask HN: Non-web developers, what do you do?

#17

Post by khadgar25 »

lumberjack wrote: post #15
khadgar25 wrote: post #7

I do scientific computing i.e. solve partial differential equations that arise in engineering using C/C++/CUDA/OpenCL with some Python/Matlab interfaces for non-specialist scientists to use.

I do that too. May I ask if you work for a university or national lab or industry and how competitive the pay is? I work for a university and the career prospects don't seem so good for me at this point.

I have a PhD but I work in industry. We have people from national labs usually because of compensation. It's not high six figures but it is pretty competitive especially for the area I live in. I worked in finance for a few years in New York and although the pay was better, living in Manhattan has a way to humble you :)

To be honest, I feel like I really lucked into this job and don't really know many places that employ people like me for solving PDEs in industry but you could definitely try something like quant researcher/developer which will alleviate some of the compensation woes from university and still have aspects of mathematical code to some extent.

Re: Ask HN: Non-web developers, what do you do?

#19

Post by AnimalMuppet »

kalyantm wrote: post #11
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #6

I work in embedded systems. It's a smaller area, I'd guess maybe 5-10% of software engineering, but it's not going to go away any time soon. It also is much less focused on "frameworks" and APIs. It's a lot of C++ on Linux these days. Harder-real-time stuff is more likely C or C++ on vxWorks or some similar RTOS.

can i ask how you got into the field? Not op, but I too am stuck in this web (pun intended lol) about frameworks, and REST and only have a high level understanding of software I really want to dig deeper, do DS/Algo and get better at the basics (usually C/C++)

I can give you very little advice. My first job out of college was in embedded systems, and I've spent most of my career there. I never had to figure out how to switch into it.

I'm sure there must be some leet-code-ish thing that gives embedded puzzles, about writing to hardware registers, and bit flipping, and race conditions between threads. But I don't know where it is, so I can't point you to anything.

If you want to get better at C++, you might start with Stroustrup's Tour. For C, I don't know what to say. You might also consider Rust, though I don't know if it has much traction in embedded yet.

Re: Ask HN: Non-web developers, what do you do?

#20

Post by igotsideas »

a_lifters_life wrote: post #13

I've moved successfully to application security from software dev - primarily breaking apps now and helping devs more securely (re)write apps

I’ve been thinking about going this route but wouldn’t want to give up writing software. How did you make the transition?
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