Maybe this will be a balm to the soul:
Repair and remain (2022) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41226039 - 6 days ago (250 comments)
Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
41–50 of 112 posts
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#42I have been there before. Let me tell you, changing jobs is a lot easier than changing careers. And internal transfer is easier than changing jobs. Try an internal transfer to something with growth opportunity. If that doesn’t work, try changing jobs. I’d only change career if you have thoroughly weighed my options though.
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#43I frequently think about the Neofetch dev who archived everything on Github and just put “Have taken up farming.” It just feels like he escaped the Matrix.
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#44Nice rant. Go watch “Office Space” that will tell you what to do, and no it’s not burn it all down.
Tell the consultants you come in late through the back door and only work just hard enough to get fired?
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#45Knee-jerk reaction: change jobs.
Slightly longer reaction: find out what the actual problem is, get more context (you got any dependants?), are you in a position to trial-and-error? Is the job the problem or is it multiperson work that is the issue?
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#46people you like or admire, what do they do?
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#47Is there any market or industry that you would like to work in? Like the domain itself is interesting to work in?
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#48Nice rant. Go watch “Office Space” that will tell you what to do, and no it’s not burn it all down.
I love how at the end of Office Space, Peter goes to work construction. The shift from IT work to home building perfectly prefigured the 00s economy. Talk about life imitating art.
If the OP does end up making a career change, keep us updated so we can place some bets.
In all seriousness, I hope the OP can find satisfaction in their work... somewhere.
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#49Some options: * Move to a frontend job that is less chaotic. RoR jobs are relatively easy to find and some codebases are quite tidy. Plus, the framework moves slowly and there is little JS. * Move to a backend job that uses an interesting technology, like Erlang, OCaml or Haskell. These technologies will provide some stimulation due to elegance and novelty. * Pivot to a job in a different domain. Consider academic, i…
Erlang and Elixir project organization can be a spaghetti mess too. You can construct spaghetti out of anything that has relationships in it.
And in the functional world, there are people with awful egos due to the connection with academia. In many areas of academia, engineering best practices and tooling are mostly irrelevant.
Re: Ask HN: Tired of software career. What now?
#50For more context, I develop on weekends and I enjoy that because I can tackle problems I find interesting. But I’m yet to find a job I enjoy that makes me feel whole.
You might be asking too much of a job. Speaking from my own experience, the only times I've ever looked for a job that "made me feel whole" were also the times I felt like other important parts of my life were empty, and I was trying to compensate for that by finding some mythical job that would "complete me." It's as big a mistake to ask that of a job as it is to ask it of a partner. If you don't show up to the situ…
A lot of value to this wisdom. That said, individuals can have a different kind of brain and carrot/stick equation. For me, the only time I felt whole was when I was only working 20 hrs a week as a freelance dev and I took a lot of breaks/vacation. Made half of what I could be making as a salaried employee but I had the space to build the rest of my life to feel whole. Kept my dream space nice, not dreaming about code or work.
I doubt such thing is sustainable in average software dev gigs but I'll keep trying.