281–290 of 534 posts
Now, after having attended conferences, after having read the books and admired the best codebases, those developed in companies than care and are proud of their DevEx; now you see it for what it is after all, shovelware.
1. Covid. My number came up in September 2022. The mental fog is real and is not what generally people think it is. For me it surfaced as diminished short term memory (example, write down a phone number you see one a website. Before covid, it’d take one or two looks. After covid 3-4 looks back and forth. Hand in hand with this - affected executive functioning. In other words, you just feel dumber lol
2. Burn out. It starts with lack of energy, low executive functioning and progresses into depression and/or anxiety. If this applies to you - get help. Make changes. This one you can fix.
Somewhat related, 41 was the age I realized I don’t want to drink again. Some people have this moment earlier, some never. 1.5years later, the feeling is freeing and awesome. I was not a heavy drinker before but lately I was less and less enjoyable with more hangover (and irritability) the next day.
I don't know you personally but I doubt cognitive decline has anything to do with this. As we age, we usually end up with more and more life responsibilities, beyond just the work we are doing. All of that is input to the brain and requires energy in response. The brain is not infinite. I often feel as you do, but then I have periods where I am as light and agile in my productivity as 20 years ago, maybe even more so…
I'll second this. Based on my own experience (I'm 50) it's all about energy levels. When my energy is high, I can code like I did two decades ago. Probably better. I guess the difference is that in your twenties, energy is almost for free. As you get older, you've got to be smarter about it - all the usual things - diet, exercise, avoiding stress... Not that I'm good about those things - I do OK but not great. Someti…
When I use to eat sugar like a madman, I use to feel just like you, so perhaps there could be other factors impacting your mental sharpness.
I have a few questions for you to answer to yourself:
1 - How fit are you? (Cardio and strength) 2 - How is your sleep? 3 - How often do you practice programming / play with greenfield software projects outside of work?
There could be more questions, I am not a specialist, but I have felt just like you described when I use to eat more sugar-based food than I was supposed to.
My brother, who's 18 months my junior and a developer like me, shares the same sentiment: "It's like I used to have 20 registers, and now I'm down to 12".
It's comforting to believe that age hasn't diminished us, but working directly with my juniors has disabused me of that notion.
I feel that Tennyson put it best when he said, "Though we are not now the strength which in old days moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are."
I don't know you personally but I doubt cognitive decline has anything to do with this. As we age, we usually end up with more and more life responsibilities, beyond just the work we are doing. All of that is input to the brain and requires energy in response. The brain is not infinite. I often feel as you do, but then I have periods where I am as light and agile in my productivity as 20 years ago, maybe even more so…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hmm. Do you think we will ever get a pill to replace exercise?
Exercise is a source of enjoyment, why would you want to replace that?
I wish I felt like this. Exercise is tolerable when I'm doing something at the same time (walking, chatting, listening to music) but that's enjoyment despite the exercise, not because of it.
Then pick an easy endpoint and start to implement the code. Follow this through for the rest and add tests as you go. You'll probably want to adjust some of the app structure and maybe do small refractors to help keep things organized when you get there.
Nah, I think your expectations are wrong. No matter how good you are, nobody is good enough to port an API like you are saying it, by memorising or thinking 9 levels deep. Humans aren't designed for this kind of tasks. Instead, you should take steps to understand the parts that compromise the abstractions that make up that API and implement it. Also have good test coverage from both sides, so you make sure you are im…
There's a lot of good, generic advice in this thread, but this is I think the right answer. I specifically scanned for one like this. What OP is trying to do is quite literally impossible. Not even the best chess players in the world can hold such a big (decision) tree in their heads _at once_. And they might be the most extreme data point we have on this matter. The way we humans compute needs to be supported by bre…
My suggestion would be to try to tackle the low hanging fruits first: find the parts of the lowest complexity, try to understand these and get the simplest things done first. This will also restore your confidence.