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Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

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Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#481

Post by ge96 »

honopu wrote: post #470
ge96 wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm doing it because the site is too slow where people don't stay/staring at a loading icon. 0.5Mbps and lower is really annoying to deploy a photo-based site gee who would have known. The Dom loads just over 1 second, but things are still waiting to show up(js?) So I'm thinking of building empty templates like "Hey something is here don't worry." I don't know. I'm actually not sure what progressive loading is. I cur…

server side render or put in HTML as placeholder. I've wanted to placeholder images with the primary color or some gradient that can be made in canvas but never got around to it for a project.

I never really understood what that meant. Server-side render it's not template generation? Time to learn how to read.

I do build a template and spit it out according to what is requested, but then a JS function runs to "fill in the blanks" with a secondary call for the missing data. I should probably get rid of the images formatting (based on aspect ratio) to fit into the tiles. I don't know...

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#482

Post by taway_1212 »

QuantumGravy wrote: post #159
randcraw wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Work somewhere where software is the main product and not just a cost center. This is THE big difference between S/W dev and IT. For 20 years I worked in the former, and for the past 10 in the latter. No question about it: IT is hell. Theirs is a never-ending mission to reduce the cost of moving data and being "compliant" with often-meaningless ever-excessive corporate standards (and forever meaningless MBA/CIO fad…

Having regrettably started from the IT side, it's seemingly impossible to make the jump to a software company proper. Nothing I do day-to-day is flexing any mental muscles an interviewer would find sexy. We're like a permanent underclass of undesirables. Without spending time outside work to focus on sharpening basic undergraduate CS knowledge, I know I'm getting objectively rusty at the types of problems I actually…

There is tons of middle ground between IT and "proper" software company - for example, banks, while not being tech companies, are nowadays operated via lots of sophisticated software, not unlike say Amazon (and BTW you could argue if Amazon is a retail company and not "proper" software company).

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#483

Post by taway_1212 »

bitL wrote: post #478
cookiecaper wrote: post #459

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is that no matter how good NLP becomes, natural language is inherently fuzzy, just like humans are inherently fuzzy. Human languages do not provide the precision that a computer must have. It is possible that the computer can learn to guess correctly in some percentage of cases, perhaps even a very high percentage of cases, but it can never be more than a guess because that information is simply not express…

It's like LEGO - you have some basic building blocks and you can compose some cool things with them. Your first LEGO set has only 3 different blocks, but nevertheless you make some nice tools just with them. Then some smart person adds another 2 blocks later. Then another 3 blocks. Then an electric engine. Suddenly your scope becomes much bigger. Then somebody makes mini LEGO to mask rough edges, making your creation…

How is that different from say Unreal Engine, where you can already make a top-notch (graphics wise etc.) 3D game without any programming - by using their blueprint model? The point it, it still requires someone expressing the desired gameplay mechanics in terms of the blueprints ("lego blocks") -it's not that different from programming, except maybe looks more friendly than code.

It's a looong way from tools like that to a state where a CEO can ramble on his vision for some app in 100% natural language into the microphone, and clever AI figures out all the blanks and automatically programs it for him.

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#484

Post by collyw »

Tinned_Tuna wrote: post #30
rhubarbcustard wrote: post #21

That shipping stable software that works and meets requirements is what people really want. In other words, what the non-tech business people want, or your customers want, is software that fixes their problems, makes their lives easier or makes them more money. It's easy for us programmers to become fixated on using a newer JS framework, a slightly tighter Java loop or the latest cool language. Took me a few years to…

This. Make your _business_ case, not a technical case. This applies to software engineering, security engineering, etc. The above comment does not absolve you from doing cool things, it's just that the cool things should align with business interests. No yak shaving. Sometimes writing a one-off script will take 30 minutes, and doing it by hand will take 10. Do it by hand.

The problem with that is if you make a mistake the first time, then redo it by hand, you have used up 20 minutes. Made a second mistake, and you are even with automating it.

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#485

Post by rhubarbcustard »

agentgt wrote: post #321
eropple wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The thing you will find using Java for a long time at any company is you eventually end up with your own framework / stack.... Yeah sure there is some underlying DI or Web framework but a majority of it becomes your framework and workarounds/plugins/extensions for whatever DI/Framework you choose. This doesn't match my experience at all. Only really ossified organizations get to this state, even in Java-land. The a…

I think you may have misunderstood me a little. I'm not saying go use the Servlet API directly all the time but you damn well should know it since almost all the others build on top of it (including most of Jersey). Particularly Servlet Filters. It seems like every framework has their own take on onion processing a request but servlet filters are actually easier to write then say some Spring framework "Advise". As fo…

> "Until shit breaks, or doesn't fit your exact requirements or the project dies, etc, etc, etc and believe me it does happen in which case you will need to know the lower level stuff. But yeah don't reinvent the wheel."

This.

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#486

Post by celdon25 »

i336_ wrote: post #145
Tinned_Tuna wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Make your _business_ case, not a technical case. This applies to software engineering, security engineering, etc. The above comment does not absolve you from doing cool things, it's just that the cool things should align with business interests. No yak shaving. Sometimes writing a one-off script will take 30 minutes, and doing it by hand will take 10. Do it by hand.

Here's my problem. I'm not particularly prolific, so the number of ideas I have far outweighs my execution so far. This is mostly due to ADHD and other issues which I'm working on fixing, and while contextually relevant is not my point. This lack of prolific-ness means that I have a literal tower (it's rather intimidating) of wanting to build cute but objectively not so useful routines simply for the sake of building…

I also have ADHD which has reached debilitating levels at times. Noise cancelling headphones, removal of computer games, and being disciplined has helped. In all seriousness though, it's a more complex condition than most people realize and seeing a specialist is never a bad idea.

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#487

Post by pvdebbe »

sk1pper wrote: post #418
pmarreck wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Everyone's code basically sucks, including yours. Which is why I'd say, unit-test your code, or TDD, or something. When you look at that crap months later, your mental model of how it all works has completely eroded, and only the test suite is left to preserve your expectations as they existed back then, preventing you from wasting a lot of time stepping on your own toes while you re-grok the big picture, if you ha…

TDD seems to be mentioned in a lot of responses here. I'm warming up to the idea but frankly not many folks I've come across in my (short, 3 year) career seem to understand tests really, definitely not TDD. So I've been having to learn the hard way. My main thing with TDD right now is - how do I avoid writing tests that are too tightly coupled? I've gotten burned in the past, not even doing TDD, with tests that "know…

Tests and TDD are different things.

I view TDD as a workaround for a lack of a REPL.

When the code is finished, the tests can be written or polished but writing them before any code is just one variation of testing.

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#488

Post by pvdebbe »

fixed_carbon wrote: post #250
hasbot wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Work somewhere where software is the main product and not just a cost center. I've done both and I can't say one is better than the other. I've worked on software products where marketing couldn't figure out how to sell it and kept changing the core functionality. Or where the CEO kept shoving his ludicrous ideas onto development. I've worked on rewarding IT projects where I worked very closely with the users and w…

"Marketing...kept changing the core functionality" "CEO kept shoving his ludicrous ideas onto development" Check and check. There's also my personal favorite: marketing informs the dev team they've just inked a big contract with a tight deadline for features that were never discussed with the dev team. "We kinda told them we already had those features but hadn't released them yet. Can you guys build that real quick l…

Classic. Our supports operative just happened to promise full IE support (we promise only Firefox) just like that.

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#489

Post by collyw »

lliamander wrote: post #362
hasbot wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Work somewhere where software is the main product and not just a cost center. I've done both and I can't say one is better than the other. I've worked on software products where marketing couldn't figure out how to sell it and kept changing the core functionality. Or where the CEO kept shoving his ludicrous ideas onto development. I've worked on rewarding IT projects where I worked very closely with the users and w…

Interesting! I switch very early in my career to working for product companies because I saw no other way to have a rewarding career as developer. So far it's worked out pretty well for me. However, recently I read Developer Hegemony[0], which seems to describe a path for IT developers to also have rewarding careers. My current thinking is that the Agile philosophy definitely contributes both to successful projects a…

The problem being that no one can actually define what agile actually is. (Or rather everyone can, but there is no consistent definition).

Re: Ask HN: For those programming 10+ years, what do you wish you knew 4 years in?

#490

Post by ajeet_dhaliwal »

mavelikara wrote: post #204
randcraw wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Work somewhere where software is the main product and not just a cost center. This is THE big difference between S/W dev and IT. For 20 years I worked in the former, and for the past 10 in the latter. No question about it: IT is hell. Theirs is a never-ending mission to reduce the cost of moving data and being "compliant" with often-meaningless ever-excessive corporate standards (and forever meaningless MBA/CIO fad…

Marc Andreessen argues [1] that this will soon have to change. I work at an SV software vendor which sells to big enterprise IT groups. From what I have seen, firms are starting to take their IT groups more seriously. [1] http://a16z.com/2016/08/20/why-software-is-eating-the-world/

Right, so many companies, such as in finance/banks are really going to have to get on with changing that mentality to compete with new or existing competitors who are more tech savy.
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