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Ask HN: Are compiler engineers still in demand, and what do they work on?

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31–40 of 98 posts

Re: Ask HN: Are compiler engineers still in demand, and what do they work on?

#31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Certainly! We do so :)

Can you elaborate on that please? Like how do they merge together? I am really interested in those two fields

You may enjoy the paper "Learning to Optimize Tensor Programs": https://arxiv.org/abs/1805.08166

Re: Ask HN: Are compiler engineers still in demand, and what do they work on?

#35

What qualifies someone to be a Compiler Engineer? Compsci degree? Working compilers? Opensource commits? Github repo full of parsers?

Having written one or more compilers, or large parts thereof. Obvious bootstrap problem notwithstanding..

Re: Ask HN: Are compiler engineers still in demand, and what do they work on?

#36
I'm interested in writing parsers, but my experience is only with small scale web editors for specific type of documents full of business rules

e.g user write documents with something like markdown and then editor renders document with things like auto numeration, displaying other referenced elements by syntax e.g '@element2'

Does there exist job in writing parsers?

Re: Ask HN: Are compiler engineers still in demand, and what do they work on?

#37
post #8

IMO, you should forget about compiler engineering as working on the backend of, say, gcc, or llvm. Yes, there are such positions (e.g., intel needs people adapting compilers to new processor instruction sets) but they are few and very specialized. Instead, think about languages in general. There is a myriad of opportunities between the js eco system, JVM and .NET, things like Rust and even low-level languages like LL…

minor nit: please use “goto person” if you’d like to keep all readers connected to your writing.

(or use “goto woman” to subvert so-called typical practitioner expectations)

thank you for considering

Re: Ask HN: Are compiler engineers still in demand, and what do they work on?

#38
Since there are people in the know here:

How would you go in the adjacent field of language design? I would be super interested in doing research on the mental load of different programming languages (and different representations of information). I.e. put a hacker in a fMRI and let her solve tasks in different languages.

Re: Ask HN: Are compiler engineers still in demand, and what do they work on?

#40
There's some work happening in the blockchain space because people are starting to create their own smart contract languages. I don't know of any other space seeing so many 'new' languages being created in such a short space.

I've seen jobs advertised by teams developing Cardano, Tezos, and Ethereum. It's worth looking at their project pages, seeing which teams work on it, and then checking their careers pages. I know IOHK have been hiring in the space although that's specifically functional compilers - however nothings up on their careers pages right now.

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