Are coders worth it? • Hacker News Board

Re: Are coders worth it?

#241

Post by blar » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 8:56 PM UTC

Falling3 wrote: post #203

damoncali wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However, like a draftsperson or an engineer who refuses to learn Solidworks, the more powerful software will be a negative for those who cannot, or choose not to, evolve their skill set above a more basic level. That line jogged loose a memory that might cause some thought in other so I'll share: I used be an aerospace engineer. Typically, what we called * designers* were technical people who were very good at workin…

But doesn't it stand to reason that if he'd been just a little more personable and just a little less resistant to change, he could have done even better?

I'll avoid the personability side of the question, but focusing on the "change" aspect: Let's not confuse "physical" tools - like a hammer, press, CAD program, or text editor - with "thought" tools - like a paradigm of programming, say, Functional or Object-oriented.

I'm still a rather young programmer (only about 6 years into my career). But I've found myself actually working in a reverse flow of technology, in terms of what tools I use on a daily basis to do my job. I'm primarily a Microsoft-stack web applications developer. I spend most of my day writing out c# and t-sql; often, using Visual Studio and MS Management Studio to interact with my code and the database. Those are the tools I used at the start of my career, when really getting the hang of basic programming.

As I've moved forward (career-wise), I now find myself using rather "older" tools for my day to day tasks. I hate to touch a Windows machine without Cygwin installed, as BASH is my primary interaction with the computer now. And I find myself generating code at a faster pace in VIM than I can in VS. As I've started using more Postgres databases, I've grown more comfortable with psql, and the terminal-based interaction with the db.

So the actual tools I'm using to generate my work are, in a sense, "old". I've found myself almost shunning new tools. Or at the very least, not embracing new tools _just_ for the sake of them being new. A new tool has to have some value aside from "newness."

Use of these "old" tools is not to say that my skills as a developer are lagging behind, however. The same even goes for the languages I've been using for personal projects. I find myself working out ideas more quickly in Common Lisp (how's that for old?) than I can in c#.

The point I'm trying to make is: don't focus on whether or not the person is using the newest tools to do the job. What's going to matter more is how well they understand the fundamentals of their discipline. Granted, I'm still young, but I feel like the craftspeople that really understand the core principles of their craft, and keep an eye on the horizons of their craft, are going to remain in demand (so long as the craft is needed). And if that craft is software development, it won't so much matter whether the coder is embracing Rails or not; what will matter is that s/he understands the new ideas that Rails might embody, and can incorporate those ideas into their daily flow.

Re: Are coders worth it?

#242

Post by 6d0debc071 » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 8:56 PM UTC

nostrademons wrote: post #208

mark_l_watson wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1 ""Software engineering has not yet gone through a true manufacturing disruption."" I keep expecting this to happen: the disruption. How much more productive is an engineer using something like Meteor compared to an equally talented engineer several years ago for building web apps where users interact (data wise) in some way. Same comment for Rails, even better IDEs, PAAS providers, libraries, etc. When I started p…

I think it's not that software engineering has not yet gone through a true manufacturing disruption, it's that each new disruption increases the scope of problems that software can be applied to rather than reducing the skill it takes to create it. The invention of compilers was a huge watershed moment for programming. All the manual labor you had to do, keeping track of memory layouts and registers and stack frames,…

How many computer programmers really work on the complex problems; speech recognition, computer vision, etc; though? Even games, how many programmers are writing really top-notch engines? How's their share of the pie break down as compared to the rapid explosion of in the assets side of things?

It seems to me, and I may be wrong on this, that the complexity of the problems that most programmers are approaching doesn't scale on a 1:1 basis with the power of their tools.

Re: Are coders worth it?

#243

Post by nostrademons » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 9:08 PM UTC

6d0debc071 wrote: post #242

nostrademons wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's not that software engineering has not yet gone through a true manufacturing disruption, it's that each new disruption increases the scope of problems that software can be applied to rather than reducing the skill it takes to create it. The invention of compilers was a huge watershed moment for programming. All the manual labor you had to do, keeping track of memory layouts and registers and stack frames,…

How many computer programmers really work on the complex problems; speech recognition, computer vision, etc; though? Even games, how many programmers are writing really top-notch engines? How's their share of the pie break down as compared to the rapid explosion of in the assets side of things? It seems to me, and I may be wrong on this, that the complexity of the problems that most programmers are approaching doesn'…

There's complex technical work, and there's complex social work. The programmers who use a speech recognition API to solve a human problem - say, hands-free in-car navigation - are doing work that's every bit as difficult as building the speech recognition API in the first place. And they're often more highly compensated for it, if they succeed - it's just the risk structure of trying to match known technology to unknown problems is a lot more vague than trying to match unknown technology to known problems.

Re: Are coders worth it?

#244

Post by jseliger » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 9:10 PM UTC

sologoub wrote: post #153

This article seems to be missing a parallel that was drawn previously many times. PG has written on the subject, and so have others. The closest parallel we can draw between "coders" and the distant past, is that with the artisans of the middle ages. Aside from the landowning nobles, the artisan class was probably the closest thing to a true middle class. Many advanced to upper-middle and later became the industrial…

Software engineering has not yet gone through a true manufacturing disruption. We cannot put software on the kind of assembly line/stamping process we can with say door hinges or other metal works that used to require a skilled blacksmith. That doesn't mean it won't happen some day.

We also can't do this with writing. Is software more like writing prose, or more like manufacturing? That's the heart of the issue as I see it, and to me it looks more like "writing."

It is possible that AI software will eventually produce better writing than human writers, but that seems unlikely without human-like AI and also seems far enough into the future to be highly speculative.

Re: Are coders worth it?

#245

Post by pjscott » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 9:17 PM UTC

DannoHung wrote: post #146

NickPollard wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> If you ask people in the street whether we need another Facebook, most would say no Don't take this as a disagreement with your whole comment (it isn't), but one trap that people fall into is equating what people say they want with what they actually want - at least as expressed by what they are willing to pay for , which is what shareholders and VCs care about. There was an article on HN a day or two ago about ho…

People are willing to pay for Heroin because it scratches a chemical itch in our brains. People don't say they want heroin because they intellectually know it ruins their lives and does nothing positive for them. Such is the predatory nature of the capitalist.

There's a disconnect between what people want, what they want to want, and what they say they want. This seems to be universal to humans; the connection with capitalism is tenuous, at best.

Re: Are coders worth it?

#246

Post by pjscott » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 9:20 PM UTC

ctdonath wrote: post #110

grey-area wrote: post #50

Wonderful writing, I loved the way it circled several times around the central issue - the value of work, and I particularly liked this conclusion - much validation and reward in our society is driven by how much people are willing to pay you for your chosen work, and it's very hard to separate your self-worth and confidence from that. It's hard to reconcile when your values don't meet those of the people around you,…

A thing is worth exactly what another is willing to give for it.

Usually a little higher than that, actually:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loss_aversion

Re: Are coders worth it?

#247

Post by hackula1 » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 9:23 PM UTC

malyk wrote: post #176

rocky1138 wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"What's actually wrong with being a plumber?" Nothing is "wrong" with it, but the skill required to be one is much lower than it is for other vocations. This means that there are more of them and so they are lower paid. The perception in society is one that because of this they have a lower value. From my perspective, people who choose low-skill, low-pay work aren't pushing themselves hard enough. It's great if you'r…

But what if being a plumber gets you all of the things you want in life? What is this bar you are talking about? Not everyone wants to be or has to be at the absolute top of their potential. There's a huge disconnect between economic value and, well, humanity, frankly. Somehow we've come to worship the economic return of everything over the actual experience of living.

ok... he op said there was nothing wrong with it, just that it usually required less skill.

Re: Are coders worth it?

#248

Post by jiggy2011 » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 9:27 PM UTC

6d0debc071 wrote: post #242

nostrademons wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's not that software engineering has not yet gone through a true manufacturing disruption, it's that each new disruption increases the scope of problems that software can be applied to rather than reducing the skill it takes to create it. The invention of compilers was a huge watershed moment for programming. All the manual labor you had to do, keeping track of memory layouts and registers and stack frames,…

How many computer programmers really work on the complex problems; speech recognition, computer vision, etc; though? Even games, how many programmers are writing really top-notch engines? How's their share of the pie break down as compared to the rapid explosion of in the assets side of things? It seems to me, and I may be wrong on this, that the complexity of the problems that most programmers are approaching doesn'…

If there's one thing I have learnt , it is that you can make "simple" problems arbitrarily complex (and if you don't someone else will).

If all of our "CRUD apps" were truly just CRUD apps we would have built them all in 10 minutes with rails scaffold.

Re: Are coders worth it?

#249

Post by Everlag » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 9:28 PM UTC

DannoHung wrote: post #146

NickPollard wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> If you ask people in the street whether we need another Facebook, most would say no Don't take this as a disagreement with your whole comment (it isn't), but one trap that people fall into is equating what people say they want with what they actually want - at least as expressed by what they are willing to pay for , which is what shareholders and VCs care about. There was an article on HN a day or two ago about ho…

People are willing to pay for Heroin because it scratches a chemical itch in our brains. People don't say they want heroin because they intellectually know it ruins their lives and does nothing positive for them. Such is the predatory nature of the capitalist.

I must say, that is a very powerful statement and I must congratulate you on your ability to sound exactly as a modern day marx might.

Honestly, that rhetoric is phenomenal.

Re: Are coders worth it?

#250

Post by dabent » Thu, Jun 06, 2013, 9:39 PM UTC

As someone who's worked through the dot-com boom and crash of the 1990's, I can offer some perspective.

- Everything is relative: My salary is just now what it was at the top of the dot-com bubble about 14 years ago, and I've been promoted twice. That $150,000 offer the author mentions would be $250,000 if we used the wages for 1999, adjusted for inflation.

- Like all things, this is cyclical. In 1999, my email was jammed with messages from recruiters. In 2002, I could hardly get one to return my call. The same will happen with this latest enthusiasm for coders. In a couple of years, the startup scene may cool off considerably. You could end up grateful for a job that pays 1/2 the salary at a bank. Enjoy the free Red Bull and flexible hours while they last.

- You will be replaced. By someone younger, someone offshore, someone with newer skills. You can't change your age or nation of birth, so keep your skills sharp. I've gone from Pascal to Python in my career and will keep going. If you want money, look for the skills people will pay for. Lisp is a great language, but Java has had this great feature of paying my bills and then some.

- Make something people want. If they want you to make a micro social network for an apartment building, do it. Some of my best jobs (and money) have come from the mundane, like software help track toilet paper production costs. One of the wealthiest people I know started as an electrician. He now runs and a company of electricians and has the kind of money us start up folks dream of because he runs wires in houses in a city that went on a building boom.

- Realize that how much money people make doesn't relate to the value their job provides to society. Athletes can make incredible money, while people disarming bombs, fighting fires and repairing power lines make little. It's just a fact of life and it isn't fair. Left handed baseball pitchers have inherent value simply due to the fact that they are left handed on top of their ability to throw a ball. Coders make money right now because of the internet and the information age. Make the most of it and make the impact you want to make in the world.