I find myself spending most of my time writing tests for my website. It's grueling and I hate it, but it's basically akin to eating my vegetables, as I would be completely lost without them.
Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
361–370 of 733 posts
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#362Earlier quoted context omitted.
> At large companies no one feels like they own 100% of the code, and each change is very collaborative. That's how you end up with endless process, design by committee, and having a dozen meetings with all "stakeholders" before actually writing any code. I'd much rather work at a place where individuals or small groups have a strong vision on the code and product and are capable on executing independently on that. I…
I read something about how a lot of 'super group' bands kind of don't do anything truly great because of this type of dynamic. They all know they're good, they know the others are good, and they all have a bit of an ego and don't want to stomp on the others, so they all tend to "go along with it" without getting too pushy. That leads to good, but not great music.
Definitely. Though there are exceptions. Led Zeppelin comes to mind first.
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#363> I have come to a realization that I don't really enjoy Software Engineering(& the processes that it comes with) but I do love programming & solving problems. I can almost guarantee that you’re just at the wrong company. Some software companies can turn even the simplest tasks into a grueling series of processes, endless meetings, and joint work across a big number of “stakeholders”. These companies will take the jo…
I think the real "unicorns" are * Small/medium size companies where you recognize most everyone even if you don't work with them. There are enough people so you don't have to do things you're not qualified for like in the very early days of a startup. * Steady growth, but not crazy, venture fueled moonshots. * Selling something that earns enough money to grow the business in a fairly organic way. I worked in a place…
I worked in a place like that and it was awesome. Unfortunately we were so good at what we did across the board that we got bought by another company to integrate into their larger offering. It made a lot of sense from a business perspective but the tech team in our office was made redundant and so my time there came to an end. I think this is the inevitable conclusion to good, small companies. Since it actually works they will eventually get swallowed by a larger fish who rightly identifies them as a tasty morsel.
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#364> What are some good jobs for a person like this?
Academia, using programming in another science. You can program all you want there but you never have to do anything like software engineering.
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#365Every few months or so we get these really circle jerky posts by engineers who believe the world of business is them just pumping out code and somehow getting paid. 1) that’s the difference between a job and a hobby. You do the hard parts you’re paid to do sometimes. 2) decisions you don’t like by stakeholders you don’t like aren’t always wrong just because you see some way to “code it”. A product is not just its cod…
I have my own solo consulting business. I outsource a lot of implementation so I don’t code boring bits in production and don’t have to touch technologies that I don’t like. I code a little kata every morning, and do hobby projects as means of research, promotion, and to keep my skills sharp. On rare occasion I make individual contributions to production, but mostly when I choose to. This could all be fun for OP.
But then I have to manage customers, project/products and above all, sell. I prefer technical stuff but I’ve learnt to find sales palatable, sometimes even exciting. More importantly: necessary. I am dedicating a fully focused and intense Monday every week (plus some residual follow-ups) at the moment, but even this moderate amount of dedication to business development (~15% of my working time) would probably horrify a lot of devs.
I doubt a perfect job exists. It’s trade-offs all the way down. Some people are suggesting academia but many people there complain about lower pay and lack of action.
Like in engineering, choose your trade-offs, and take your mind off them or, hell, embrace them fully.
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#366Every few months or so we get these really circle jerky posts by engineers who believe the world of business is them just pumping out code and somehow getting paid. 1) that’s the difference between a job and a hobby. You do the hard parts you’re paid to do sometimes. 2) decisions you don’t like by stakeholders you don’t like aren’t always wrong just because you see some way to “code it”. A product is not just its cod…
And every time these posts come around, someone immediately jumps in and plays a character in Office Space, saying "oh the engineers don't like talking to people, that's why I'm valuable".
Look at all the recent layoffs; get the data and ask around "how many Engineers with 1+ years of seniority were impacted by the layoffs". The number is dwarfed by literally every other business function. Dwarfed. Your probability of getting laid off is, actually, seemingly, directly proportional to how close you are to the center of business function, process, and revenue. Sales? Big impact. Marketing? Gulp. HR? Ruh roh. Product and Design? Eh, some get laid off. Engineering? Least of all. Well, except C-Suite; not seeing a lot of CEOs impacted by the layoffs, weirdly.
This is LITERALLY the companies saying you're wrong; that a lot of what you just said is a smokescreen fabrication invented by the people who are being laid off to justify their paychecks.
Which isn't me asserting that Sales isn't valuable, or Marketing, or any of those other functions. Hella valuable. Its just me going to bat for the other side: That comments like your's are insensitive to the very real fact that, in many organizations, Engineers are treated like extremely well compensated trash. Shit flows downstream, and in software orgs it really doesn't get more downstream than the engineers; so when they say "we need to re-architect this piece of the system" or "we need to add testing" or "we need process improvements around coordination with other teams" oftentimes they're the least-heard voice in the room. "Well, we have room for five epics this quarter, and product wants these four things done, sales wants these two, we'll include this re-architecture as a stretch goal".
Your entire worldview of a healthy organization is born from the largest bull market in human history, in the wealthiest country on the planet. Everyone is a genius in a bull market. Whether your opinion will still hold over the next few years is something you'll get to discover. I'll say this, though: There are people who do real work, and there are people who stand next to the people who do real work. I would much rather be the former than the latter. Engineers do real work; product managers oftentimes do real work; designers do real work; sales, marketing, lots of real work; coordinators, project managers, middle managers, scrum specialists, jira consultants, not real work. These are all problems born of too much money.
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#367I am the exact opposite. I mean, I don’t like processes and meetings, but I do like the planning and architecture part much more than I like actually writing code. Usually, if your mind is decently organized, I find that the problem is solved before writing a single line of code. If that happens, then the actual part of writing becomes dull and mechanical - the problem has already been solved. I’ve never understood p…
Hmm, I often feel lots of important details or edge cases are only discovered when you start programming. It's a reason waterfall was abandoned. Planning, prototyping and then making a more informed decision is my goto approach, instead of planning forever. Actually, I often feel the architects that think they've "fully solved the problem" are full of themselves, and just not smart enough to realize all the things th…
Problems are often "sticky" (A term I've read referencing this exact thing, a problem where you need to begin implementing before you understand it fully, but I don't think it's a widely used term) but I think the implementation step is a different matter than architecture stuff regardless. It's not that there aren't important things to work out, but for me I broadly consider that to be part of the implementation.
I get what you're saying though, I definitely don't think I'm solving all my problems before ever starting the code, but I definitely always finish solving the problem before I finish the code, and usually early enough that the rest of implementation drags even if there are quirks and edge cases to work out.
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#368Earlier quoted context omitted.
> agile has killed the happiness...meetings...rituals...meta-work...not actual productivity. All of that isn't actual agile. It's Fauxgile and has nothing to do with what agile is about, which is about removing impediments to productivity, removing meetings (why were there standups? Because they shouldn't exist in the first place, and if you absolutely positively can't avoid them then at least make them as short as p…
Can't upvote this enough times. Time and time again you see this: people say "I hate agile because of X, Y and Z" where X, Y, and Z - at best - are orthogonal to the idea of Agile, and at worst (and perhaps even "ordinarily") are complete anathema to the spirit of Agile. Sorry, but anybody who thinks Agile is about velocity, story points, planning poker, standups, retrospectives, backlog grooming, etc. has been sold…
What is actually Agile then, and how does one actually practice it?
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#369Things were better before agile / scrum / annoying processes took over. Not all companies were waterfall, they kind of just "did things" without any well defined process. This was how things were until roughly the early 2010's. I remember working for weeks, after a couple of whiteboard sessions. You'd meet about what you were going to do, work on it, and come back a week or two later. Occasionally there would be info…
> This was how things were until roughly the early 2010's.
"Mid 2000s" for some of us at some places, unfortunately.
Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?
#370Earlier quoted context omitted.
> At large companies no one feels like they own 100% of the code, and each change is very collaborative. That's how you end up with endless process, design by committee, and having a dozen meetings with all "stakeholders" before actually writing any code. I'd much rather work at a place where individuals or small groups have a strong vision on the code and product and are capable on executing independently on that. I…
I read something about how a lot of 'super group' bands kind of don't do anything truly great because of this type of dynamic. They all know they're good, they know the others are good, and they all have a bit of an ego and don't want to stomp on the others, so they all tend to "go along with it" without getting too pushy. That leads to good, but not great music.
Enterprise software is not art and shouldn't be approached the same way. You want a roller-coaster-like experience, go join a startup