What every developer should know about GPU computing
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What every developer should know about GPU computing
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Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#2Thank you for sharing!
Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#3Not every developer.
I'm not trying to be snarky. I think there's an unhelpful compunction to want to know everything about everything among STEM types like programmers (of which I am one). Specialization is fundamental to the success, not just of whole economies, but of the individuals in them. It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn, say, the entire Python language specification, or how type inference works, or any number of other things someone might tell you is critical knowledge. But it's often liberating, and more often than that, mandatory.
(Maybe I was trying to be a little snarky initially, but I'm not any more.)
Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#4Not every developer. I'm not trying to be snarky. I think there's an unhelpful compunction to want to know everything about everything among STEM types like programmers (of which I am one). Specialization is fundamental to the success, not just of whole economies, but of the individuals in them. It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn, say, the entire Python language spec…
Over-specialization is hard on your ability to find another job if you lose your current one.
Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#5Not every developer. I'm not trying to be snarky. I think there's an unhelpful compunction to want to know everything about everything among STEM types like programmers (of which I am one). Specialization is fundamental to the success, not just of whole economies, but of the individuals in them. It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn, say, the entire Python language spec…
This is just minimum for those don't need to know details.
Even general knowledge has depth. Even if you are generalist, or specialist in different area you should deepen your knowledge at every area gradually.
Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#6Not every developer. I'm not trying to be snarky. I think there's an unhelpful compunction to want to know everything about everything among STEM types like programmers (of which I am one). Specialization is fundamental to the success, not just of whole economies, but of the individuals in them. It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn, say, the entire Python language spec…
I dunno. The section "Latency Tolerance, High Throughput and Little’s Law" has many applications in programming. Ever need to scale your cache, or size a connection pool? Little's Law.
Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#7Not every developer. I'm not trying to be snarky. I think there's an unhelpful compunction to want to know everything about everything among STEM types like programmers (of which I am one). Specialization is fundamental to the success, not just of whole economies, but of the individuals in them. It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn, say, the entire Python language spec…
Over-specialization is hard on your ability to find another job if you lose your current one.
Completely true. The analogy to hydration holds, I think -- too much and too little can both be problematic. But I see seem to run into much more under-specialization than over-specialization. More than 90% of the wildest successes I know went really deep on something pretty narrow.
Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#8Not every developer. I'm not trying to be snarky. I think there's an unhelpful compunction to want to know everything about everything among STEM types like programmers (of which I am one). Specialization is fundamental to the success, not just of whole economies, but of the individuals in them. It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn, say, the entire Python language spec…
> It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn
And even if you do have time, you'll probably forget most of it if you don't make use of it in your daily job. Also if you do want to learn about a new topic, it'll take commitment. I remember going through an MIT OS project, it took me something like 50 hours of hours to complete the project. Pretty much impossible when you have a full time job (I didn't at the time). And despite that, I still consider myself a newbie in OS development.
That being said, a little extra knowledge can come handy and make a difference in an interview for instance, or reduce ramp-up time when changing teams.
This is also what school is for. Give you full time and a structured program to pick the fundamentals. There's only so much you can learn once you have a demanding job. It's actually pretty sad we don't get to go back to school in the middle of our career.
Edit: still an interesting article ;)
Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#9Not every developer. I'm not trying to be snarky. I think there's an unhelpful compunction to want to know everything about everything among STEM types like programmers (of which I am one). Specialization is fundamental to the success, not just of whole economies, but of the individuals in them. It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn, say, the entire Python language spec…
Indeed, one thing that most seniors learn is humility and being able to say I don't know, without caring about consequences.
Re: What every developer should know about GPU computing
#10Not every developer. I'm not trying to be snarky. I think there's an unhelpful compunction to want to know everything about everything among STEM types like programmers (of which I am one). Specialization is fundamental to the success, not just of whole economies, but of the individuals in them. It can feel like a paintful sacrifice to admit that you'll never (have time to) learn, say, the entire Python language spec…
Over-specialization is hard on your ability to find another job if you lose your current one.
And so it’s a balance :^) I personally take the approach of specializing in what I believe to be my natural talents (i.e. seemingly able to pick up X much easier than whoever) while just being generally aware of new technologies or other spaces/sectors. Also tinkering and/or having a general interest in tech helps lol.. IME doing this has helped me pivot into a new tech or other areas where I may not be specialized in, but may need to eventually be for a new role. Also worth mentioning is taking a pragmatic approach to problem solving in general.. I’ve personally found that if you’re able to demonstrate solid reasoning and/or problem solving, generally learning a new lang or specializing in something different than what you’re used to, isn’t too too bad. I’m not really sure how specialists outside of tech/in other sectors can transition into other roles “easily” though… hm.
Edit: I wanted to mention that IME in STEM, most? More often than not? are goal oriented… It is _completely_ okay to not have any “working” thing at the end of your tinkering/learning… The journey into that “thing” can be a learning experience in and of itself. I’ve often started to learn things but after a certain point have told myself “I’m gonna stop here and that’s okay. I don’t need to have a solid understanding of this, at this time”. YMMV…