The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry • Hacker News Board

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#261

Post by arunmu » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:35 PM UTC

I have been a big fan of C++ and have had used it for about 8-9 years professionally as well as for side projects. The baggage that comes with it is just not worth it. My recommendation for any new project is to go either with Go or Rust as a C++ replacement unless the environment or hardware or resource constraints does not allow you otherwise.

As an individual developer, learning and being an expert in C++ intricacies is not worth the time and effort. Instead learn more about data layout in memory, hardware, language tooling etc and write code accordingly in a much better language as per the _need_ and C++ would really only qualify for very niche requirements.

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#262

Post by twic » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:36 PM UTC

pyb wrote: post #188

twic wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

150k plus bonus. It's at a quant firm, so the bonus is likely to be ~50% of base salary if you do okay, and multiples of that if you do great.

Maybe, but C++ developers who haven't worked at hedge funds before wouldn't know it from this advert, and probably won't apply.

Perhaps. I note that position is being advertised by Oxford Knight, a high-touch recruitment firm. Their main modus operandi is to make contact with someone looking for a job, find out what they are looking for, and then suggest particular openings on their books to them; they would have plenty of opportunity to explain about the compensation. I think these public job listings are a bit of a cheap additional thing, and aren't that important to them.

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#263

Post by ho_schi » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:36 PM UTC

Actually I've learned C++ in the past years and want to look into a working in embedded development. Now I'm reading that the industry is in need for C++ developers but paying bad at the same time? I'm confused.

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#264

Post by cmrdporcupine » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:36 PM UTC

agumonkey wrote: post #169

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the embedded space pays terrible, and the employers don't seem great on the whole. When I was at Google I got to work on embedded stuff and really liked it; but I was getting a Google salary. When I left Google I pursued IoT and embedded jobs a bit and while I was not expecting Google level compensation at all, I was astounded at what was going on there, pay wise. General software eng back end jobs pay better. T…

Isn't this a sign of a problem ? where important domains with hard problems pay few .. while some dubious applications are throwing money on css plumbers ?

There's a strike happening here in Ontario schools by janitors and education assistants and early childhood educators, because they want more than a 2% raise on their $40-$50k year jobs ($30k USD, and look at inflation #s...). The government is going to use a special "shouldn't be used" clause in the Canadian charter or rights and freedoms to force a contract on them and ban a strike and forbid collective bargaining despite it being a charter right. These are people who clean poop, shape young minds, and keep critical systems running, and so on.

All of this to say: difficulty and importance of a job seems to have almost nothing to do with either the pay one gets, or the respect one gets.

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#265

Post by UltraViolence » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:37 PM UTC

spacemadness wrote: post #75

UltraViolence wrote: post #33

I believe they're misguided to invest in C++. Enormous amounts of time and effort are spent solving weird pointer errors in C++ programs which simply don't occur in other languages such as Rust and C#. Why is there this almost religious belief that their program needs the fastest execution time? It's madness IMHO. Trading a few percentage in performance for safety, reliability and security is more than worth it. I st…

I am no expert, but I am under the impression for HFT that high performance is the absolute goal and slight percentages in performance can affect profits.

HFT entails only a small part of the usage of C++.

It's still being used in many embedded systems (including automotive, aviation and building automation), where Rust is also available. Interop is always possible with C/C++ so there's little excuse not to use Rust there.

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#266

Post by inetknght » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:38 PM UTC

xtracto wrote: post #253

inetknght wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It seems what you're looking for is a "C++ developer who likes to write the same C++ style as myself" ;) No, I'm perfectly content with someone writing C++ in a different style. What I'm not content with is someone who uses old code without a technical reason why. C style arrays, for example, are 100% inferior to std::array. Old loops with indices are maybe 80% (off the cuff guesstimate) inferior to ranged-for. The…

holy mother of god! I used C++ around 2000 for some old projects. When new and delete where the object oriented "equivalent" for malloc() and free(). So, if you don't use that, what do you use in 2022 C++?

`std::make_unique()`, `std::make_shared()`, or another function that wraps `new` and `delete` into an RAII type (commonly called a smart pointer) so that you, the developer, worry less about explicit memory management.

And the standard smart pointers are perfectly extensible enough to wrap things allocated from C libraries (I like to pick on opengl's glalloc() and glfree(), though malloc() and free() are acceptable to pick on too), C-style `FILE` pointers, or even memory-mapped things from `mmap()`

I would also point out that even in 2000, `std::auto_ptr` existed. So even in 2000 you probably should not have been using `new` and `delete`.

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#267

Post by azinman2 » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:39 PM UTC

sqeaky wrote: post #127

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the embedded space pays terrible, and the employers don't seem great on the whole. When I was at Google I got to work on embedded stuff and really liked it; but I was getting a Google salary. When I left Google I pursued IoT and embedded jobs a bit and while I was not expecting Google level compensation at all, I was astounded at what was going on there, pay wise. General software eng back end jobs pay better. T…

I did a few a few months of contracting at a major voting machine company. They make a significant portion of all US voting machines. They had 4 developer teams Firmware (C++ where I was), UI (web tech on a voting machine), poll book (java), and a web/support team. Before I was hired in a massive influx of contractors each team was something like 3~5 people, except UI which was a new team with the contractor hiring s…

Sounds… problematic. What can you say about the state of security with it?

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#268

Post by npigrounet » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:39 PM UTC

sigi64 wrote: post #189

I was a C++ programmer for 25 years. Last 3 years, I'm using Rust language in my daily job and for all my hobby projects. I will not return to work in C++ again. No money can make me to change my decision. Nowadays, programming is a pure joy for me again. This was not the case when I had to work with C++.

No post body was provided.

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#269

Post by marcosdumay » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:39 PM UTC

agumonkey wrote: post #169

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the embedded space pays terrible, and the employers don't seem great on the whole. When I was at Google I got to work on embedded stuff and really liked it; but I was getting a Google salary. When I left Google I pursued IoT and embedded jobs a bit and while I was not expecting Google level compensation at all, I was astounded at what was going on there, pay wise. General software eng back end jobs pay better. T…

Isn't this a sign of a problem ? where important domains with hard problems pay few .. while some dubious applications are throwing money on css plumbers ?

It's a sign that people inherently want to work on those hard problems.

Re: The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry

#270

Post by NegativeLatency » Wed, Nov 02, 2022, 4:40 PM UTC

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #23

deaddabe wrote: post #9

Because Python pays more. Or Javascript. Or Ruby. More demand, more salary. Apart from finance, pay is lower than web languages. And finance is small. Embedded systems programming, that also uses the language, pays 30% less than web jobs from my last job hunting period. Employees may be leaving the embedded space (and C++) for web tech because of this. This is the feeling I get from my local job market (western Europ…

Yes, the embedded space pays terrible, and the employers don't seem great on the whole. When I was at Google I got to work on embedded stuff and really liked it; but I was getting a Google salary. When I left Google I pursued IoT and embedded jobs a bit and while I was not expecting Google level compensation at all, I was astounded at what was going on there, pay wise. General software eng back end jobs pay better. T…

My local bus/transit agency was hiring an embedded programmer a couple of years ago and while I thought it would be fun to do embedded stuff and get to work on busses/trains (!) the pay was like half my web dev salary. (Granted there is a pension but it's not that good)