Besides abstract reasoning, the most important skill for a software engineer is the ability to learn quickly.
I'm not sure the OP understands that fact.
Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
121–130 of 231 posts
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#122I'm a 25 year-old former Marine who thought he could take a shot at being a programmer when he exited the military. I never had any background in programming other than being interested in UNIX and Linux at a young age, so CS seemed like the logical choice for someone who had a GI bill to burn. 2 years and a lot of classes later, I'm realizing I'm too old to compete at this gig, and I should have started when I was 1…
> 2 years and a lot of classes later, I'm realizing I'm too old to compete at this gig No, you're not. You have the wrong teachers and wrong texts. In the contrary to what popular posts say, it takes a long time, years, to be a good programmer. You need to be able to be self-critic, completely change the way you do things. Many times. Pick a decent open source project in something you find interesting. The harder and…
I like your support because you gave me some very clear goals to work with. I will consider doing all of them.
What I'm struggling with now, since I'm still an lower-division undergrad trying to make my way into a BS program, is do I continue on and persue this - perhaps getting a meaningless part time job in the meantime to supplement my income? Or, do I just go full speed ahead and try and apply for some very entry level IT work. I have no idea what I'm doing in the civilian sector despite my getting out 2 years go - I've only been a full time college student since. Perhaps I'm just rambling because I need answers to these questions, but you seem salty, and wise. Thanks for your help.
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
That 15% is not taking into account base salary (I'm including bonus + 401k matching)... it's more like 25% if you look at it that way ;). And this is a pretty entry level rate... in a year from now I know I'll be able to command at least 50-70% more. Health insurance can be had for barely more than the cost of fuel I was using in my daily commute, which is $200/mo. Yes, I have to do my own taxes, and yes they'll be…
The starting point for your contract rate should be the thousands number of your salary multiplied by 1.5 i.e., if you make $50k a year, charge $75/hr. If you make $100k/year, charge $150. How much do you think an associate attorney at a law firm that makes $150k per year is billed out at? CPA? Management consultant? All of these professionals are generally billed out at a median rate of nearly $200/hr. And the top e…
First and foremost, I named my price on this contract, which will be 27 hours per week average for the first 3 months, then option to renew for another 3 months. By your metric I should have asked almost 3x as much. But I'm not charging for a principal .NET guy, I'm charging for a jr. Rails dev. Put it another way, I'm probably at 1/3 the speed of a sr. Rails dev. There will be a day... so in a way, perhaps by this scale I took a huge pay cut against the risk. More than the $$, I get tremendous amount of value from this experience. It's my first paid 1099 (well not quite, but in this space it is). I get to work with a top-notch client and design firm, and I have a very sr. guy on retainer the client pays for for my use to help out on areas I get stuck and review all my code (FWIW, he is actually the one who introduced me to this client, we worked together on the prior project as well).
I also have another client who wants me to bid shorter term work (they did offer at a rate that's 40% higher) but I told them to hold off for now because I want to get used to the new contract first and make sure I'm comfortable with the cadence.
Key point - I will consistently be raising my rate, but for now I'm making almost as much as my day job and working much less hours, and I need to get out there network, get good, etc... and the rest will come. I'm approaching this in a way that aligns with my own principles. I'm not trying to be a bottom feeder in this market. I just am getting my feet wet with a minimal portfolio and simply happy to be in a position that I can make the transition into something I'd much rather be doing.
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
Another point to bear in mind is that us programmers can be a vain lot and since it is possible to be highly successful in software very early in your career. This can mean you will be put in a position of doing the hiring early on. We will naturally prefer someone younger and greener than us that we can mentor rather than hire someone 10 years our senior who's experience we might find threatening.
I see this all the time, and I think it's the least useful way to further your own career. Sure, I understand that notion of the power grab, but why? What real world benefit will you see by asserting unearned power over a new hire. Much better to hire someone who you can learn from, someone who perhaps can mentor you, and help you actually achieve more in your career.
Objectively that may well be true, however if you hire someone more experienced than you then perhaps they should be supervising you and not the other way around.
Also I think most geeks like to think of themselves as Jedi Masters. There is also the fear of someone tearing you a new one for the quality of your codebase.
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#125This article touched a nerve for me. I haven't always been in computer science. I actually minored in English in college, and now I'm finishing up a MS program in CS (though I've always tinkered and programmed computers). I have a tendency, for better or worse, to constantly think about the future. I'm 26 now, and about to graduate and go to work for a well known tech company. Originally I was much more interested in…
This is obviously anecdotal evidence, but I've met a bunch of older programmers who were very good. And this is across several specializations--all the way from developing drivers to virtualization software to enterprise Java development to compilers. I suspect that, right now, by pure competence the best programmers I've met have actually been older. (And this is ignoring my professors who tend to be exceptional as well as older.)
So really, do not worry about becoming a worse programmer. Worry perhaps that younger people will be subconsciously biased against you, sure, but this is just a bias not based on reality. That said, nobody mandates startups to be started by younger people. My dad recently worked for a startup doing some very interesting low-level work (they concentrated on using SSDs to speed up servers) that got acquired by SanDisk recently. And he doesn't have a CS degree either--he got the equivalent of a Masters in Physics in Leningrad where they didn't even have CS in his time. (I gather they barely had computers at all.) And, most importantly, I've noticed that he has become much happier after working at the startup than he was while working at a bigger company (VMWare) before.
So, ultimately, all that matters is that you are a good programmer--and I imagine you are. Perhaps it will take a bit more work for you to find a job at a startup, perhaps you will sometimes encounter bias against your age, but ultimately you should be able to do whatever you like.
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#126I'm a 25 year-old former Marine who thought he could take a shot at being a programmer when he exited the military. I never had any background in programming other than being interested in UNIX and Linux at a young age, so CS seemed like the logical choice for someone who had a GI bill to burn. 2 years and a lot of classes later, I'm realizing I'm too old to compete at this gig, and I should have started when I was 1…
Well, the competition is outrageous at the top end of programming jobs, also bear in mind that you are reading HN where many of the commentators are above average programmers who dream in code. However just because you might not land a job at Google does not mean you will not be able to create a decent career for yourself. If you can get any experience working on OSS at all, especially on a reasonably well known proj…
Thank you for your input. I'm not sure how to get into the Operation side of things, I might have to inquire with a career counselor about that path, if it's an avenue that I can take.
I'm aware that my time in is worth something, as I did obtain rank that probably looks decent, but I'm slightly edgy as to how it will be received. (I was an infantry Sgt.) Some have some derogatory views of how we are and I'm reticent to mention too much. (Everyone thinks you have PTSD despite studies)
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
That 15% is not taking into account base salary (I'm including bonus + 401k matching)... it's more like 25% if you look at it that way ;). And this is a pretty entry level rate... in a year from now I know I'll be able to command at least 50-70% more. Health insurance can be had for barely more than the cost of fuel I was using in my daily commute, which is $200/mo. Yes, I have to do my own taxes, and yes they'll be…
As someone who left full time about 2 years ago to do 1099 work only, I recommend you definitely work on pushing your rate up as you go. Not only do you have to account for the extra costs, it's also likely you won't always be billing 40 hours a week. I've finally gotten my rate to a point where I feel alright if I only bill 20 hours of work a week. I am working a full week, balancing programming time with managing e…
Thank you. Those are great points.
Is it weird that I love doing this stuff so much, that the simple idea that I can go work anywhere means I can go on a 2 week road trip and work while doing that is vacation enough? Granted, me from 2 years from now might have a different take. But the fact that 'work' means going into a coffee shop, staying at home with my dogs on the couch, or going into a cool co-working space and collaborate with like-minded people... it's like my whole life will become this big vacation. Because I really love writing software, it's just exhilarating. 'Work' to me is having to slave through rush-hour, deal with water cooler talk, walk into a sea of cubes in a faceless corporation, spend hours upon hours in meetings that accomplish little, then put on my headphones and pretend I'm somewhere else. The work itself is what actually takes me away from that reality.
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#128He seems to have missed making the point in the title. Why would software engineers work for english majors? He thinks that a 20 something english major is a better manager for a software engineer than a 40 something software engineer? Plus he seems to completely miss a separate alternative for software engineers over 35-- start their own businesses. I think the perception that 40 year olds are not up to date on tech…
Age-related observations tend to be 1% fact, 99% confirmation bias. It is also a short circuit to actual debate by invalidating opposing viewpoints.
"John refuses to switch the project to MongoDB. They're too old and complacent."
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
How many 40 year old software programmers could there be the area of science has only been around 40 years.
You really think that the first computer was invented in 1972?
Sure, computers were around back then. But I don't think there was much of an industry around them outside of academia. There are quantum computers now, but not many "quantum programmers" :P. (It's not a perfect parallel; I'm just being a little glib.)
Edit: My point was that there won't be very many programmers with 40 years' experience. Turns out the OP meant 40 year old programmers, which is a different story.
Re: Software Engineers Will Work One Day For English Majors
#130I'm a 25 year-old former Marine who thought he could take a shot at being a programmer when he exited the military. I never had any background in programming other than being interested in UNIX and Linux at a young age, so CS seemed like the logical choice for someone who had a GI bill to burn. 2 years and a lot of classes later, I'm realizing I'm too old to compete at this gig, and I should have started when I was 1…
You started out with the hardest programming language in common use. Bad idea. Start with Python and grow from there.