Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#281

Post by antoniuschan99 » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 3:40 PM UTC

vonseel wrote: post #235

antoniuschan99 wrote: post #76

The prediction that everyone should learn to code is basically happening more and more now. I work at a bank and the business guys are finally coding. They’re using VS Code, Python, Jupyter Notebooks, React, and JS. I doubt they’ll get into Hadoop Spark or Java. Their depth of knowledge will never be as deep as a CS major, but it’s a good pause to think of a field to specialize in where you will be utilizing CS to so…

I'd like to know why business guys are writing React (or even JS). I can imagine why they might write Python and use Jupyter Notebooks, but React seems a little further out there, maybe they are prototyping some in-house applications or writing their own little apps for some small use case?

Yes, it’s a PoC. They want a UI for the calculations they wrote in Python. Eventually the devs will take over. But the fact they’re even using React and NodeJS now is something to think about. But also it’s more of the technically minded business people who will have the initiative to do this.

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#282

Post by kls » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 3:40 PM UTC

randomdata wrote: post #216

mycall wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe genetic algorithms could help you optimize correlated questions you might need answering.

And if that's the case, someone has already thought of it and I can simply buy their product at a fraction of the cost that would require me to implement the same. Not only that, but it will be higher quality too as they have staff working on it day in, day out, while I've only got time here and there, between farm work, to work on it. There is no economic incentive for me to build it myself. It would be a net drain…

You are falling victim to the everything has already been invented line of thinking. There are plenty of things still needed for agriculture. Some of them just require thinking about turning the industry on it's head.

For example no one likes Round-Up, people are not big fans of GM crops, one of the reasons we GM crops is the make them Round-Up resistant. The big player in the space has no incentive to change due to the fact that they own the IP to round-up and they own the IP to the GM crops that can resist it.

But what we are really talking about is getting rid of weeds. They way it is done now leaves a lot to be desired. A way to fix it is automated machines with object detection that eradicate weeds. Primary problem solved, weeds are gone, secondary problem solved Round-up is not needed and as a bonus not buying GM seeds.

The problem is no one is looking at it from that equation because either they have a vested interest in the current order of things or they do not have the technical chops.

That is just of the top of my head there are thousands of problems to address in the agricultural space.

I mean there are pest problems. There are water management problems. There are pollution problems. There are yield to market problems.

Anything that has a workflow has potential improvements.

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#283

Post by mywittyname » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 4:12 PM UTC

heedlessly3 wrote: post #275

Dowwie wrote: post #94

I think you have no idea how privileged you are for having the opportunity to enter the market with your background and a computer science degree in three years. I interned during summers during university starting around 2000. The dot com bubble had burst before I even graduated. The party was over. Managerialism was in full force. IT Managers at what was then a Fortune-10 financial powerhouse were going on an on ab…

I disagree with "double major". Instead graduate in 3 years, get a master's

Having a background in a secondary science can be a huge benefit because clear understanding another domain is a lot harder to master than figuring out how to code up that understanding into a functional product.

For example, where I work, aero/mech engineers-cum-developers command a huge premium. My partner has a medical background and no programming experience, but is a very productive programmer for her team because she understands deeply what needs to be done. Her stuff isn't scalable past N>3, but it does the job she needs and was developed for a fraction of the cost from a professional dev team.

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#284

Post by thatcat » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 4:13 PM UTC

leetrout wrote: post #143

JimboOmega wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was basically born into CS; there was no question even from Kindergarten that I would ever go into another field. Got my first real full time job at 25, and it was mediocre, it was definitely not a FAANG paradise, and I remember we worried a lot about getting off-shored in those days. I'm really glad the thing I was naturally interested in turned out to pay so well. Though I do wonder what do I (as an SF dev) offer…

I look at my skills compared to the earning potential of some other trades. This is certainly not 100% accurate because it’s based on what I pay in more rural America but I like it: Barber - 3 cuts per hour @ $20 ea = $60 / hour Mechanic - $60-80 per hour Lawn Care - $40 / yard up to 3-4 yards per hour = $40-$120 per hour Steam cleaning = $150 for a couch = $150 per hour (carpets are less) Plumbers in East Tennessee…

Most of those workers don't own the means of production so make half or less of the charged rate with the other half going to the business owners.

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#285

Post by giardini » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 4:29 PM UTC

andreilys wrote: post #274

OP your comment comes across as very puritanical. It’s okay that some people haven’t been coding since they were 8. It’s alright that they choose to have hobbies outside of work that don’t involve coding. It’s also okay that they are getting into CS to make money. Programming has turned into a very lucrative career. Yes some people might be getting into it for “all the wrong reasons”, but it’s a job. Mercenary or mis…

andreilys says>"...The cream always rises to the top..."

That may be true for workers, but I heard the management version: "Shit always floats to the top..."

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#286

Post by mrep » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 4:43 PM UTC

kerkeslager wrote: post #236

I think that people who think money is a wrong reason to do something end up spending more time and effort getting money because they don't bother to come up with a system for making it efficiently. Which is a bit ironic. If you really don't want to care about money, make it efficiently so you can spend less time on it. If I were to do it all again, I'd do something that produces more passive income. You can make a l…

While there are definitely some shitty teams at FAANG, there are plenty of teams where you just need to put in your 40 hours a week and then go home. I've worked for multiple teams at 2 FAANG companies now and never worked more than 40 hours a week. Also, as andreilys mentioned, the high pay allows you to invest a ton of money into equities which is what I am doing.

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#287

Post by watt3rpig » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 4:44 PM UTC

trashface wrote: post #189

Age discrimination is real. If you choose a programming career and don't enter management, then when you are 40+ you might find that you have trouble getting hired for a decent paying job, even if the industry otherwise appears to be booming. When I was studying CS 25 years ago I didn't even think about the age problem. Even if I had, it would not have seemed real at that time, but its real now. That said, I don't kn…

There is an artificial shortage of physicians. The number of people that graduate from medical school >> than the number of residency slots.

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#288

Post by tom_mellior » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 4:50 PM UTC

phkahler wrote: post #153

patorjk wrote: post #90

> honestly makes me worried about the future of the field in terms of whether it'll still be a good career in the future. I had the same thoughts back in the late 90's and early 00's. Everytime I told someone I was interested in CS, they thought it was because of the money. While working on the major many people told me my job was going to go overseas and that the future was in managing developers. In fact, during my…

>> While working on the major many people told me my job was going to go overseas and that the future was in managing developers. I had a friend in the 90s tell me the entire workforce in the US was shifting to management. Everything will be outsourced and people here will just manage everything. This was an MIS major drinking the business school koolaid. I thought it was rather arrogant to think China or India could…

> I had a friend in the 90s tell me the entire workforce in the US was shifting to management.

I had a recruiter for programming jobs tell me at a job fair about 15 years ago that programming was essentially over in my country, in just a few years everything would be outsourced, and only software architect positions would be left. Turns out that people are bad at predicting the future.

Similarly, the OP might have posted essentially the same question 20 years ago, minus the FAANG reference (Microsoft and IBM back then, maybe?). The answers are the same as back then: Nobody can predict the future, but so far we have failed to automate/compete ourselves out of well-paying jobs even though people have always claimed that that's only five years in the future.

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#289

Post by thewanisdown » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:14 PM UTC

If it's what you like. You'll be just fine.

In the grand scheme of things, that degree just opens a few extra doors early in your career. It's still up to you, and your personal drive to succeed, to get anywhere past that.

You have passion, and that is a massive advantage. Stoke the fire.

Re: Ask HN: CS, still a good career in 3-5 years?

#290

Post by jiveturkey » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:44 PM UTC

> I've been coding for half my life, out of pure interest for the building things and never got into it for the money

stick with it. that there is money is CS is icing on your cake. so many folks have to do something NOT their passion because there is no money in their passion and they weren't born with silver spoon.