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Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

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Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#31

Post by japhyr »

hanniabu wrote: post #24
japhyr wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Python Crash Course: http://nostarchpress.com/pythoncrashcourse

Wow, I feel like I'm meeting a celebrity. I absolutely love your book! I'm about a third of the way through and love the flow and logical process you take when going through the lessons and what to teach in what order and you use great examples. Thank you so much for writing this Eric!

Thanks for the kind words! I'd love to hear your feedback as you work your way through the rest of the book, so feel free to get in touch if you'd like.

Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#32

Post by elbigbad »

I wish I hadn't had the attitude of, "I'm going to learn everything from scratch because I don't need help or dependencies." I was stubborn and thought that to be a "real" programmer I had to know how to implement libraries from scratch and build out every single feature myself and learn the ins and outs.

Upside: Now I know many of the "under the hood" implementation things

Downside: Took FOREVER to build anything useful, demoralizing to spend so much time on algorithms and learning every bit of C and JavaScript from the ground up and not be able to do anything useful quickly. Didn't know how to put what I knew to practical use in the modern web.

I got into a funk and one day started learning a framework and it changed my life. I could use what I learned to build on top of the framework and quickly get webapps running that people could actually use.

I regret that I was stubborn and wanted to "learn it the hard way." If I could do it over, I would go through a book on a particular programming language to learn the ins and outs, and then quickly apply that knowledge to a framework. Much better positive feedback loop being able to see the fruits of my learning come together into something practical and actually useful rather than little programs that lived on my local machine and didn't do too much.

It's much more fun and less tedious to built out my own apps on the structure of people who came before me. GOod recent example: Building an app and wanted people to be able to drag and drop to upload files into their browser. Old me would have spent a month learning how to implement this in JS from scratch, new me just uses the DropZone JS library to make this happen and then I can focus on what I really want the app to do.

Not sure if any of what I'm saying makes sense to anyone but me.

Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#33

Post by meric »

thebaer wrote: post #30
meric wrote: post #23

No regrets, though I'm thinking maybe in a year or two I'll retire completely from programming and work on physical fitness instead. Perhaps find a job that doesn't involve programming. I will probably program as a hobby. I know if I continue programming as my employment until I'm an old man without trying other pursuits, I will definitely regret it. I'm 26, and I wrote my first line of code when I was 13 or 14 years…

I'm 25 and am definitely feeling its effects on my body too, as well as longing for the outdoors. It's worse because I know the damage I do from sitting around means that I need to spend more time actively counteracting it later through stretching, etc., instead of it being built in to the day, like it would be at a more active job. It just takes a little effort to do it sustainably. For a couple years I never drove…

I have no car - I even used to ride a bicycle everyday for 15 minutes to the train station. I've started becoming weaker after I moved to another suburb where it was inconvenient and difficult to ride my bicycle daily. These days while I'm sitting in front of Terminal.app, I often imagine I'm spending the whole day in this giant park riding a bicycle around it's 3km circumference, over and over again. Just as it was right for me to go home, forget my home work and program after thinking about code the whole day while I was sitting in class in high school, I think it would be right for me to plan an exit from employment and spend a year or so to do what I like to imagine myself doing.

Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#34

Post by gcheong »

ones_and_zeros wrote: post #27

This probably isn't what you are looking for but I wish I never learned, or at least never decided it should be my career. A career writing software has a shelf life. Age discrimination is real, software engineer experience isn't valued like other professions. And yes, there are plenty of firms that will hire engineers over 40, the fact remains that there are vast numbers of employers that won't and once you hit the…

I've had this exact same thought process, esp with regards to going to medical school if I were to do it over. Also, while what we know about the body changes and grows at least the technology developed is new rather than having to learn a new framework that does the same stuff as an older one just because that's what the cool kids are doing these days. That and I've never heard anyone complaining about there being too many doctors/lawyers coming to the city and "ruining" the culture.

Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#35

Post by wh-uws »

ones_and_zeros wrote: post #27

This probably isn't what you are looking for but I wish I never learned, or at least never decided it should be my career. A career writing software has a shelf life. Age discrimination is real, software engineer experience isn't valued like other professions. And yes, there are plenty of firms that will hire engineers over 40, the fact remains that there are vast numbers of employers that won't and once you hit the…

This is going to sound more mean spirited than I mean it to be because I enjoy programming.

You should move away from San Francisco. In places like Austin, Tx or Atlanta, GA you could easily retire with a nice home after 5 or 10 years as a software engineer.

Your view is incredibly myopic

In tech and honestly in most other industries in America (I won't purport to speak for the rest of the world) you only end up "managed people without a seat at the big boy table" if you never have the gall to go out and try to strike it on your own. This is because you'll be managed by people who did.

And the shelf life of which you speak only happens if you refuse to learn new skills and improve.

Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#37

Post by ones_and_zeros »

wh-uws wrote: post #35
ones_and_zeros wrote: post #27

This probably isn't what you are looking for but I wish I never learned, or at least never decided it should be my career. A career writing software has a shelf life. Age discrimination is real, software engineer experience isn't valued like other professions. And yes, there are plenty of firms that will hire engineers over 40, the fact remains that there are vast numbers of employers that won't and once you hit the…

This is going to sound more mean spirited than I mean it to be because I enjoy programming. You should move away from San Francisco. In places like Austin, Tx or Atlanta, GA you could easily retire with a nice home after 5 or 10 years as a software engineer. Your view is incredibly myopic In tech and honestly in most other industries in America (I won't purport to speak for the rest of the world) you only end up "man…

Hi thanks for your comment.

I'd agree it is cynical, but not myopic. My whole post is about the long term career prospects of software engineers...

I don't live in SF, I was using it as an example to point out that even in our industries hottest, most competitive market engineers are still bottom of the totem pole. I don't live in Austin or Atlanta either but an area that is supposed to be more affordable but it's the same story.

I also did start my own software company and even went through an incubator (not YC), but that's beside the point, I was speaking about the profession as a whole. Doctors don't have to go out and strike it on their own, lawyers don't have to, management doesn't have to, investment bankers don't have to so why do we? Why isn't the skill of software development good enough for a successful career? Why must we switch to the new shiny every 6 months? To be honest that mentality is the exact thing that I lament about our profession. Why aren't we demanding better for our own? I'm not sure, but the independent attitude just isn't sustainable in the current political and economic climate, IMO.

Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#38

Post by wh-uws »

ones_and_zeros wrote: post #37
wh-uws wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is going to sound more mean spirited than I mean it to be because I enjoy programming. You should move away from San Francisco. In places like Austin, Tx or Atlanta, GA you could easily retire with a nice home after 5 or 10 years as a software engineer. Your view is incredibly myopic In tech and honestly in most other industries in America (I won't purport to speak for the rest of the world) you only end up "man…

Hi thanks for your comment. I'd agree it is cynical, but not myopic. My whole post is about the long term career prospects of software engineers... I don't live in SF, I was using it as an example to point out that even in our industries hottest, most competitive market engineers are still bottom of the totem pole. I don't live in Austin or Atlanta either but an area that is supposed to be more affordable but it's th…

I see what you are saying but I think you are falling for the grass is greener fallacy. I'll explain because I have visibility into those other industries personally.

I happen to have to have a close friend who was an investment banker and have met many through him. Their shelf life is 3 to 4 years max unless they perform well enough to make to make it to the next rung in the chain which their are few spots for. Most try as hard as they can to impress to make it into private equity, a hedge fund, or a VC. And if you dont make it you have to go into something else.

I have another close friend who is a lawyer. You are correct about that profession.... But only if you make it into a top 10 law school and a top tier law firm. If not you're lucky if you can find a job period.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/08/25/opinion/too-many-law-st...

Doctors are a similar position to lawyers. More secure but you have to go to school much longer which I hope you can extrapolate means a lot more debt to pay off before you get a shot at making retirement money.

You are also drastically underestimating the amount of continuous education in other fields as well. Not quite as fast as in tech but not non existant either.

So I'm telling you we have it the best out of all the other professions you mentioned.

No school is required, a CS degreee helps immensely but it can be done without it. If you play your cards right you can make enough money to live in the top rung of people in every city except SF (you can even live really good in NYC if you land a good gig). I can think of few other professions like it.

P.S if it helps you feel any better Id be happy to ask my network to get more info.

Here's the fields I have friends or family in to go find more info to help dispell myths about.

Finance, Law, Healthcare, Oil and Gas, Dentistry, and probably others im not thinking of.

Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#39

Post by JDShu »

wh-uws wrote: post #38
ones_and_zeros wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi thanks for your comment. I'd agree it is cynical, but not myopic. My whole post is about the long term career prospects of software engineers... I don't live in SF, I was using it as an example to point out that even in our industries hottest, most competitive market engineers are still bottom of the totem pole. I don't live in Austin or Atlanta either but an area that is supposed to be more affordable but it's th…

I see what you are saying but I think you are falling for the grass is greener fallacy. I'll explain because I have visibility into those other industries personally. I happen to have to have a close friend who was an investment banker and have met many through him. Their shelf life is 3 to 4 years max unless they perform well enough to make to make it to the next rung in the chain which their are few spots for. Most…

I'd be curious about Oil and Gas. I'm familiar with the other fields, but that one seems to require even less training for around the same amount of money. Or if you get into petroleum engineering - I remember in college that was known as the profession with the highest salary straight out of school.

Re: Ask HN: What was your biggest regret about learning programming?

#40

Post by ak39 »

svisser wrote: post #4

Postponing to learn SQL. This should be done sooner rather than later.

Old dog here. I have the opposite problem: I should have begun sooner with CSS and HTML & JavaScript. NodeJS next.

Also, I should have started with Modafinil sooner to fix my ADD that prevents me from learning new stuff.

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