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Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

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Re: Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

#351

Post by ryandrake »

hugatest wrote: post #286
dfox wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because not caring how FP values are stored and what the implications are (or even not realising that you favorite programming language uses FP by default) is a particularly fast way to become the "minus 10 times programmer". Storing monetary values as FP is one thing, but I've seen phone numbers and other numeric identifiers (long time ago before PCI-DSS even credit card numbers) stored as FP values, with predictabl…

As long as you know the implications, you don't need to know how the values are stored. You may say it's easier to know how they are stored, then you can derive the implications anytime you need them. Maybe that works for you, but most people who I know that got this wrong do actually know how FP values are stored, they are just drawing the wrong conclusions. So better focus on the implications, cause it's those that…

Knowing how the values are stored provides you the "why" behind the practical implications. Another example: Half of the range of all values that "float" can store lie between -1.0 and 1.0. Knowing how those values are encoded in memory tells you why.

Re: Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

#352

Post by matwood »

biorach wrote: post #173
pavlov wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Several years ago my father got promoted to some leadership role. In our conversation about it, he told me he had asked to get back closer tech, but his boss declined and said tech specialists are a dime a dozen. Technical leadership is very expensive to find though, and once you find one you don’t let them go back to the production line." Ah, the foundational myth of middle management.

Middle managers are a dime a dozen. However a good technical lead - who can contribute to the engineering team's discussions _and_ lead the team are very very hard to find.

The most important part of your comment is the distinction between 'management' and 'lead'. Leadership is critically important and very hard to find. Ideally you find a leader who doesn't mind managing, though you're getting into unicorn territory.

Re: Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

#353

Post by msarnoff »

I worked closely with the author (John Calhoun, @JKCalhoun) at Apple in my first job out of college. On my first day, I remember being introduced to him. I looked on his bookshelf and saw a printed and bound copy of the Glider source code. I asked him if it was the same Glider I remembered playing as a little kid in the early 90s on our friends' Mac. And it was. It was a real "holy crap" moment for me, not only did I get to meet the author of one of the very first computer games I ever played, but I got to work with him!

We'd hang out in each other's offices (the "open floor plan" trend hadn't quite taken hold, we actually had private/semi-private offices back then) and talk about old computers and stuff. I was starting to get into hardware hacking as a hobby. He gave me a Tektronix oscilloscope and an Apple IIe (both still work, they're sitting on my shelves and I'm looking at them right now!) which was amazingly generous of him. He wanted to give me a big box full of helium-neon lasers and optics and power supplies, but had to decline due to my lack of space. Hope you're doing well, John!

Re: Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

#354

Post by intended »

imdsm wrote: post #226
asdfman123 wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is middle ground though. I love to code and am doing this job for that reason, but there’s a lot of other things I want to do while I’m alive, too. When I’m done coding all day I want to do other things like exercise, climb mountains, learn instruments, etc. My motivation to do other things isn’t due to a lack of curiosity, but curiosity channeled into other activities.

And that's understandable. What John was saying and many of us here echo is that, for us, we'd like to want do the other things, but programming (outside of the commercial grind) is sweeter than all those things. To be consumed by (personal) work, working late into the night only to wake up and continue, uninterrupted and enjoying the bliss of focus, well, it can't be beaten. There's nothing like it. > Programming is…

I used to love code in school. Never ended up coding for work: Went from finance to analysis, biz dev and management. Work was work.

The happiest I’ve been is in the past few months, in a new role. There are several reasons, but one of them is definitely that i have ann excuse to get back to code.

I find myself waking up early, and having work to finish, on a Saturday - that I enjoy. It’s feeding my ability to work on other personal projects, that make me happier and I learn new things.

> To be consumed by (personal) work, working late into the night only to wake up and continue, uninterrupted and enjoying the bliss of focus, well, it can't be beaten.

Re: Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

#355

Post by entropicdrifter »

threadweaver34 wrote: post #339
ryeguy_24 wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, interesting. I'm 39 and used to have amazing flow sessions in late 20s and early 30s but not seeing them much anymore. I can't tell if it's because of stresses of life or simply because I don't have enough time (with 3 young kids) to allow myself to fall into a state of flow. I really hope it's not stresses or my brain changing because I really valued those periods of focus.

Late 30's no kids, no stresses beyond the threat layoffs and still being single. I recently tried playing some video games adjacent to ones I've loved before, and I found it really hard to get into them. The games are Red Dead Redemption and SimCity 4, so the graphics and gameplay mechanics are ok. It's just been hard to really get into them.

Try Cities Skylines. The newer SimCity games really botched it and Cities Skylines came along and ate their lunch. It's a fantastic game with a vibrant modding scene

Re: Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

#356

Post by karaterobot »

biorach wrote: post #173
pavlov wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Several years ago my father got promoted to some leadership role. In our conversation about it, he told me he had asked to get back closer tech, but his boss declined and said tech specialists are a dime a dozen. Technical leadership is very expensive to find though, and once you find one you don’t let them go back to the production line." Ah, the foundational myth of middle management.

Middle managers are a dime a dozen. However a good technical lead - who can contribute to the engineering team's discussions _and_ lead the team are very very hard to find.

Hot take: I think good middle managers are more rare than good technical leads.

"But my manager sucks!" Yes, probably. Part of the reason managers have a bad reputation is that there are so few good ones, and so many bad or mediocre ones, that most people deal with bad ones their entire career. And, since a good manager looks a lot like leadership material if you squint, the great ones often get Peter Principled into being mediocre bosses.

But when you do find a good manager, you realize they have a very specific skill set that is incredibly rare and difficult to master. They multiply the effectiveness of everyone on their team, including those good technical leads, but also the juniors and seniors.

Re: Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

#357

Post by vjk800 »

haswell wrote: post #252
vjk800 wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to love the long periods of focus in my 20s, but ever since more life started happening, I can't do those anymore. It turns out my stress tolerance is incredibly low and when the life outside my work is not completely in order (like it rarely is after the 20s), being able to get into the flow state gets very difficult. I wish I was one of those people who could just forget the problems at home, etc. when they…

I feel like I’m somewhere in this comment. For me, the stress and worry about things going on in my life eventually led to full burnout. Those periods of flow were what kept me going, and when I could no longer find them, it only compounded the stress. I ended up going on a self-funded sabbatical to focus on sorting out my personal and internal life, and the #1 change that has led to rediscovering deep focus was star…

> All of this to say, if you are at all similar to me, it might be worth considering the lack of ability to find flow a big red flag worth actively investigating. I don’t know if I could’ve avoided burnout, but I’m sufficiently convinced now that internal work is one of the most important (and accessible) ways of addressing this.

Don't you worry, I have plenty of other red flags besides inability to concentrate to keep me worried :).

I've tried meditation before, but didn't really "get" it. The instructions always tell me to let go of my thoughts and concentrate on a mantra or my breathing, but not a single time during the two months I followed a meditation program was I able to do so properly.

Exercising is one of the few things that even remotely work for stress relief. I've also done yoga and it works, but not any better than jogging or weight lifting.

Re: Same Stop: Life after 26 years as a programmer for Apple

#359

Post by esafak »

hugatest wrote: post #227
esafak wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cause distraction.

In the olden days it was IRC. Already then it was about controlling yourself. Whether you would get distracted or not. If you want to get into the zone, it's up to you how to do that. If you have an IRC or Slack window on the side to let you get distracted is your call.

Were you using IRC as your corporate messaging solution, because that's what slack is? İf people send you a message they expect a timely if not instant response. Their work depends on you.
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