Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
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Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#2Some of these go beyond just advice for programmers. Everyone should reflect on the first point: most authors and essayists are read because they are good writers, not necessarily because they are experts on the subject matter.
Take walks!
Try different types of work. Learn about other job functions at your company. In big companies in particular, you may be doing things that just have to be corrected or worked around somewhere else, when you could make things easier for everyone.
Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#31. Software does not make money. Not ever. Sales makes money. Software only costs money. When your developer peers get confused, distracted, or lost on this matter you better hope your employer is either too big, too stupid, or too wealthy to care.
2. The only purpose of software is automation. There is ultimately no other goal. When your peers start talking about frameworks, easiness, a bunch of tools, or other bullshit realize they have absolutely no idea what they are doing. Typically that occurs from some combination of narcissism, self-preservation, and stupidity. Either way when too many bad decisions occur your peers will burn you.
3. Becoming excellent at software is no different than becoming excellent at absolutely anything else. Software isn’t special. Practice. The people that argue against this are lazy and stupid. As an example of talent look at the Polgar sisters.
4. Just like with absolutely everything else being excellent at software means having enough challenging experience to form a vision around risk management, cost analysis, and unnecessary repetition. All of that should be tempered against novelty and asking the right extraordinarily critical/harsh questions. Most people don’t do any of this because of some combination of real life constraints and cowardice.
Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#4> From a person who really shouldn't be giving others advice.
Ok, now I’m listening.
Also, #8 is the best long term advice for programmers. Walk.
Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#51. Software does not make money. Not ever. Sales makes money. Software only costs money. When your developer peers get confused, distracted, or lost on this matter you better hope your employer is either too big, too stupid, or too wealthy to care. 2. The only purpose of software is automation. There is ultimately no other goal. When your peers start talking about frameworks, easiness, a bunch of tools, or other bull…
There is no excellence in software — only advanced opinion.
Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#61. Software does not make money. Not ever. Sales makes money. Software only costs money. When your developer peers get confused, distracted, or lost on this matter you better hope your employer is either too big, too stupid, or too wealthy to care. 2. The only purpose of software is automation. There is ultimately no other goal. When your peers start talking about frameworks, easiness, a bunch of tools, or other bull…
> 1. Software does not make money. Not ever. Sales makes money. Software only costs money. When your developer peers get confused, distracted, or lost on this matter you better hope your employer is either too big, too stupid, or too wealthy to care.
I feel like people exagerrate this idea to prove a point that, ultimately, sales is the gateway to money. Which is fair and important to keep in mind. But, worded like this, it goes too far. Sales and marketing do cost money. They can cost a lot of money, and it's not always as tangible as real product features. Non-marketing people tend to handwave away how hard it can be.
And the product is important. It's much easier to sell a product if it has the features a client is looking for. To do otherwise is a whole different game that will also cost a lot of money but is feasible given certain conditions. For example, building a really strong brand where trustworthiness is more important than price/quality.
Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#71. Software does not make money. Not ever. Sales makes money. Software only costs money. When your developer peers get confused, distracted, or lost on this matter you better hope your employer is either too big, too stupid, or too wealthy to care. 2. The only purpose of software is automation. There is ultimately no other goal. When your peers start talking about frameworks, easiness, a bunch of tools, or other bull…
There is no excellence in software — only advanced opinion.
There is. You just can’t be excellent at parts that are constantly changing. Avoid those who bumped more than 3 versions in a decade, they aren’t confident in what they want.
Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#81. Software does not make money. Not ever. Sales makes money. Software only costs money. When your developer peers get confused, distracted, or lost on this matter you better hope your employer is either too big, too stupid, or too wealthy to care. 2. The only purpose of software is automation. There is ultimately no other goal. When your peers start talking about frameworks, easiness, a bunch of tools, or other bull…
> 1. Software does not make money. Not ever. Sales makes money. Software only costs money. When your developer peers get confused, distracted, or lost on this matter you better hope your employer is either too big, too stupid, or too wealthy to care. I feel like people exagerrate this idea to prove a point that, ultimately, sales is the gateway to money. Which is fair and important to keep in mind. But, worded like t…
Sales is the gateway to money. Parent never said it wasn't important to build a great product, they said that even if you have the most amazing product if it doesn't sell there is no money coming in.
To your point, the goal of "trustworthiness" is to translate into more future sales.
Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#9> People don't listen to me because I'm a good programmer, they listen to me because I'm a good writer.
I think this point extends beyond the idea of guarding ourselves while reading the contents of good writers; it's also about how we should approach our jobs. Being a good writer will most likely improve your skills in dealing with other people. As software developers, writing and communicating with others is crucial to our work.
I would also recommend beginners to write about the challenges they have encountered, their experiments, and their thought processes, among other things. If possible, they should write essays. This will prove to be a really useful skill later in their careers.
Re: Advice for new software devs who've read all those other advice essays
#10The one I have a hard time explaining well enough for new folks to get is: "It is not your job to write code."
We use code as a tool to solve problems. Code is the mechanism of achieving our goals, not the goal in and of itself. If we are coding just for code's sake, we'll deliver the wrong results. We need to be focused on solving problems, and if we aren't sure what problem our code is solving, we need to stop coding and figure that out.