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Being a Developer After 40

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Re: Being a Developer After 40

#81

Post by tribaal »

Create wrote: post #78
tribaal wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a developer in Switzerland, I'm unfortunately not surprised. Maybe Swiss firms have a real arrogance problem (not all, but many). If it makes you feel any "better", your country of origin is not the reason (I get comments like that while living in Switerland too). They are mostly just clueless. Large Swiss firms even more so (Swisscom being the main offender). EDIT: To clarify, I got lowball offers with some other…

Precarity at CERN, aka cheap disposable temp labour w/o healthcare: http://www.tdg.ch/geneve/actu-genevoise/suisse-prete-aider-e... And a warning to non-western members: "The cost [...] has been evaluated, taking into account realistic labor prices in different countries. The total cost is X (with a western equivalent value of Y) [where Y>X] source: LHCb calorimeters : Technical Design Report ISBN: 9290831693 cdsweb.…

While I understand the point you are trying to make (CERN is partially on Swiss territory), it is not a Swiss employer by any stretch of imagination: they have extra-territorial status, like the UN.

Swiss laws and wages don't apply to CERN (workers there also don't pay taxes, or contribute to Swiss social welfare).

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#82

Post by HNSucksAss »

spacecowboy_lon wrote: post #68
RyanZAG wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess the real message is: believe whatever the mainstream audience believes at the time. You can't really go wrong with always agreeing with whatever the current thought bubble agrees with - and be quick to change your opinions if the herd is moving. When the author saw the derision against Steve Ballmer, and the favor Apple was getting, he made the clear choice to jump ship. And because he was part of that popula…

So your always going to be playing catch up - back in 94 when i had been playing with the www I volunteered to go to Edinburgh for a month to work on a cutting edge RAD/DSDM Project. Basically I told my then boss see you after Christmas - If I have followed that advice I would have stuck with Oracle and Java or spent my career in Mainframes

"So your always going to be playing catch up"

Your WHAT is always going to be playing catch-up?

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#83

Post by spacecowboy_lon »

wodenokoto wrote: post #72
spacecowboy_lon wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So your always going to be playing catch up - back in 94 when i had been playing with the www I volunteered to go to Edinburgh for a month to work on a cutting edge RAD/DSDM Project. Basically I told my then boss see you after Christmas - If I have followed that advice I would have stuck with Oracle and Java or spent my career in Mainframes

> I would have stuck with Oracle and Java or spent my career in Mainframes And last I heard, there are tons of job openings asking for experts in Oracle and Java. So how exactly would that have been terrible in terms of getting a steady income?

Well enough if you want a traditional 9-5 job (which is fine if it suits you) - pity Java is such a PITA to work with though and Oracle do charge a lot! for there product.

Trouble is if your company pivots and you have been doing Mainframe COBOL for 20 years - you might find transitioning to a new language hard.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#84

Post by huhtenberg »

tribaal wrote: post #79
huhtenberg wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Google Switzerland employs remotely?

No. On-site, in Zurich. They have arrangements with authorities to get work permits more easily (it made a lot of debate in the press). They "import" qualified workers, paid Swiss salaries. If price was the only matter, that wouldn't happen - Google would open a development office there instead (they have smaller ones, but the Zurich office is the largest that is not in Mountain View).

> No. On-site, in Zurich.

Yeah, so I assumed.

Your "very much untrue" remark is very much off the GP's point then, which was that those considering remote outsourcing to Eastern countries do that mainly for the cost reasons. Not that these countries lack the talent worth paying for when onsite.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#85

Post by buserror »

I think that misses one big point here; and a point that I live by: Don't waste your neurons and time.

Time is the most precious thing you have, so don't waste it learning stuff you won't need. Even if it's shinny. Resist, and for the things you do need, don't become an 'expert' -- pick the things you NEED and scope it well. Then hop along on the new tech that came around...

I always see any new thing I take on as an investment, and I try to make it pay down the line...

I didn't use to do that, and I'm an expert in a few tech that I had fun learning, but have absolutely zero relevance today. See, I can write Altivec code without the scalar version for example. That was useful for about 2 years...

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#86

Post by Create »

tribaal wrote: post #81
Create wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precarity at CERN, aka cheap disposable temp labour w/o healthcare: http://www.tdg.ch/geneve/actu-genevoise/suisse-prete-aider-e... And a warning to non-western members: "The cost [...] has been evaluated, taking into account realistic labor prices in different countries. The total cost is X (with a western equivalent value of Y) [where Y>X] source: LHCb calorimeters : Technical Design Report ISBN: 9290831693 cdsweb.…

While I understand the point you are trying to make (CERN is partially on Swiss territory), it is not a Swiss employer by any stretch of imagination: they have extra-territorial status, like the UN. Swiss laws and wages don't apply to CERN (workers there also don't pay taxes, or contribute to Swiss social welfare).

Its annual budget is about 1 billion _swiss francs_.

La Suisse pourrait contribuer à améliorer les conditions sociales des travailleurs détachés du CERN. Le Conseil fédéral est prêt à évoquer la question avec l'organisation.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#87

Post by oblio »

tribaal wrote: post #66
eps wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The manager's rant part aside, the reason to outsource to the Eastern Europe, Ukraine and Russia is and has always been the rates.

That's very much untrue. EDIT: I stand corrected - this misses the point. Sure, wages are lower than elsewhere (especially Switzerland), but the quality of engineers in eastern europe is very high. Case in point: Google Switzerland employs lots of eastern europeans with Swiss-level wages . That wouldn't make any sense if the only reason was money. EDIT: My math and electronics teachers (both women, data point) in my…

I think there are several other reasons why hard sciences developed more than soft sciences in former Communist states:

1.You can't really use ideology to fight them. If a researches comes and says that 2 + 2 = 4, even the most fervent apparatchik (Communist party member) would have had a hard time spinning it into 2 + 2 = -1. While in other fields such as sociology or history... things are a bit more malleable.

2. They're practical and quite far removed from anything that might stir up anti-establishment actions.

3. The "1984" factor: if you need highly skilled mathematicians and physicists for your weapons, you really need them. You wouldn't want to issue your army 7.5mm rounds for their 7.62mm rifles because someone was bad at engineering :)

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#89

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

blub wrote: post #67
greenspot wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saying 'you will live like a king' is not the smartest thing. He should have said: 'Please consider that your local living costs are much lower than in Switzerland. We incorporate those differences in our offered rate like every other company does. Thanks for your understanding.' So the tone was—yes—unprofessional, the attitude not. And even if this attitude is debatable, you have to allow the other party to express…

I find it quite bizarre that remote workers living in a country with lower cost of living are expected to take lower pay than locals while doing the same work and offering the same value. Otherwise yes, people are allowed to express silly things and one shouldn't prevent them from doing so, especially when they show their true colors. Looks to me like they dodged a bullet.

It's essentially about power differentials and narcissism, not money.

When you call out someone trying to lowball you and they start ranting, they're really ranting about a narcissistic injury to their self-image.

Someone who does that will be a terrible client, because they're operating from a position of contempt for the people they employ. They do not see you as an equal, but as an inferior.

If the "inferior" challenges their default entitled one-up world view by expecting to be treated like a competent and well-compensated professional, they're absolutely going to have issues with that.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#90

Post by toddkazakov »

naivepiano wrote: post #31
toddkazakov wrote: post #21

I am based in Bulgaria and I recently had my first experience with a potential Swiss employer. It was rather unpleasant. After I went through 5 interviews we discussed my rates (as a remote consultant). I received a low ball counter offer which was about the half of what I usually charge. This quickly became a racist rant and a senior manager at the company tried to persuade me by saying that with the money they offe…

Sad as it may be your being based on a low income country was probably one of the main reasons they approached you. And it is quite universal so I wouldn't attribute it to unprofessionalism. From company's point of view it makes perfect sense to outsource to the best quality/price ratio.

Actually, this wasn't the reason. I already knew the guy who approached me. They were developing a data analytics solution quite similar to others I have worked on/built in the past. They needed a developer with a real-world product experience in their domain. Unfortunately, it wasn't my acquaintance who was responsible for the hiring.

Luckily, the software development market is global and there are some really sane people out there.

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