A lot of companies think they want a top-10 l33tcode developer rockstar king, but what they're going to get is a normal run of the mill rule-following developer who produces consistent quality work.
Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
451–460 of 579 posts
Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#452I feel everyone who's in a bad place now, uncertain about the future. My approach has been often to take a mixed-risk approach, and it seems to work out well. First, no debt. Second, long-cash. After working for about ten years in relatively low paying roles I have something like a runway of about 25 years - that is I would not need to take on any job for 25 years while keeping mostly my current standard of living (p…
Yep. Living frugal has big advantages. You can just walk away if you need to. I don't have 25 years saved up (well, maybe I do counting retirement savings and I am getting pretty close to that 59.5 age where I can access them) but I can go a good while without working. Our cars are 20+ years old and still going strong, our mortgage on our very modest house will be paid off in a month or two. You have to be willing to trade status symbols for freedom.
Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#453Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think a big one is there just being fewer old programmers so you don't see them as much so you think there's ageism. But the market has grown a ton over the past 10-20 years. None of my friends in their 40s have trouble getting jobs. This includes software jobs that tend to skew young, such as game dev and startups. I wouldn't doubt it exists, but anecdotally it doesn't seem to be such a huge problem that you can't…
Maybe naive but I don't really see 40s as ageism territory in general. That said, a lot of people adapt. Go into management. More externally facing roles. Different types of companies.
I guess what's old is new?
In my 20s I was told 30 is the end of the line. In my 30s I was told its the 40s. Now the bar is higher.
Maybe I'm part of a large enough cohort of programmers that we continually push ageism out, and due to that it will be 'solved' as we hit our 60s and 70s.
Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#454Earlier quoted context omitted.
The issue is that Python passes references by value, so you cannot overwrite what the arguments of a function reference from the perspective of the caller. However, if you pass something like a dictionary or a class the function gets a copy of the reference and can use it to update the members of what was passed. Java operates on the same principle, although there may be some edge cases I'm not aware of where the two…
Perhaps I'm being simple minded, but the id of the passed object within the function is the same as the id of the object outside the function, no? My mental model is that an object's id in python is basically an address / pointer. So, how come it's the same inside the function as outside, if it's not pass by reference?
You're correct that the id is the same inside and outside the function, but when you modify the passed in argument the id changes because you're setting the value of the parameter, not what it's referencing. In C it'd be like changing the value of a pointer in a function instead of the value referenced by a pointer in a function.
Here's an example to include the id differences and the fact that a does not take on the value of d:
>>> def f(d):
... print(f"id: '{id(d)}'")
... d = {'foo': 'bar'}
... print(f"id: '{id(d)}'")
>>> a = {}
>>> a
{}
>>> id(a)
140362610196224
>>> f(a)
id: '140362610196224'
id: '140362610196160'
>>> a
{}
>>> id(a)
140362610196224
>>> def f(d):
... d['foo'] 'bar'}
...
>>> a = {}
>>> f(a)
>>> a
{'foo': 'bar'}Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#455I feel everyone who's in a bad place now, uncertain about the future. My approach has been often to take a mixed-risk approach, and it seems to work out well. First, no debt. Second, long-cash. After working for about ten years in relatively low paying roles I have something like a runway of about 25 years - that is I would not need to take on any job for 25 years while keeping mostly my current standard of living (p…
Life feels too short/uncertain to not make use of the cash you've got, is the other perspective I guess.
Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#456Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe naive but I don't really see 40s as ageism territory in general. That said, a lot of people adapt. Go into management. More externally facing roles. Different types of companies.
I guess what's old is new? In my 20s I was told 30 is the end of the line. In my 30s I was told its the 40s. Now the bar is higher. Maybe I'm part of a large enough cohort of programmers that we continually push ageism out, and due to that it will be 'solved' as we hit our 60s and 70s.
The key is probably that you can't be doing at 40 what you're doing at 20. Whether that means better technical skills, better management skills, better communication skills, just better able to navigate a company and the industry...
It probably does mean that, if someone just wants to code, they probably have a higher bar than people interested in doing a more diverse set of things.
Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#457Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thanks for sharing. If I may ask, when was the last time you looked for a job? I'm saying this because maybe you're having trouble due to ageism that you didn't encounter before.
Ageism is often conflated with higher compensation expectations.
I'm in my late 50s. When I hear about the salaries that much younger folks are pulling down in the FAANG companies I'm generally pretty shocked - I've never made anything close to that and don't have any expectations to. My expenses are way lower than most of the younger folks in tech because my house is paid off (will be in about a month), we drive 20 year old cars and we're quite frugal. For most of the past decade I've worked in startups where the pay hasn't been great but the work has been very interesting (in some cases, fun, even) so I'm willing to make that tradeoff. To summarize: I'd be willing to work for $90K/year if it was working on something I found interesting in an early stage startup (You get more control the earlier you get in). Are my compensation expectations high?
Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#458I feel everyone who's in a bad place now, uncertain about the future. My approach has been often to take a mixed-risk approach, and it seems to work out well. First, no debt. Second, long-cash. After working for about ten years in relatively low paying roles I have something like a runway of about 25 years - that is I would not need to take on any job for 25 years while keeping mostly my current standard of living (p…
Life feels too short/uncertain to not make use of the cash you've got, is the other perspective I guess.
Well, I use cash - I buy good food, for example. But just knowing that I can just say bye to any job, if it gets to the point is quite a value to me.
Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#459I feel everyone who's in a bad place now, uncertain about the future. My approach has been often to take a mixed-risk approach, and it seems to work out well. First, no debt. Second, long-cash. After working for about ten years in relatively low paying roles I have something like a runway of about 25 years - that is I would not need to take on any job for 25 years while keeping mostly my current standard of living (p…
For many people the main concern is not money, but maintaining visa status.
Re: Ask HN: How is the job search coming along for people who got laid off?
#460I feel everyone who's in a bad place now, uncertain about the future. My approach has been often to take a mixed-risk approach, and it seems to work out well. First, no debt. Second, long-cash. After working for about ten years in relatively low paying roles I have something like a runway of about 25 years - that is I would not need to take on any job for 25 years while keeping mostly my current standard of living (p…
Life feels too short/uncertain to not make use of the cash you've got, is the other perspective I guess.
70 to 100 years is short? You could spend your entire savings in a month if you wanted so I don't understand your advice