Death of a Programmer, Life of a Farmer

That explains why the mega store doesn't want a local shop but not why there is no local shop.

Yesterday I posted a comment about being careful about how we try to bring people into programming and making sure that we encourage people to openly and honestly examine themselves for whether this is something they want to do, and not just thoughtlessly grease the slide into "programming" for everybody. [1]

This is the sort of thing I meant. Dig back into the first post and it's clear that this person was very interested in coding as a hobby, but that it didn't translate as a career. A bit of discouragement, or at least, something that most people who are gung-ho about encouraging people in, in, in to coding would consider discouragement but perhaps also could just be called "realism", could well have saved this person a lot of pain and suffering. Mindless encouragement is not a virtue... it must be mindful.

I am where I belong. I've done farming and gardening and it does nothing for me, for a variety of reasons. I would (and I suppose, do) pay not to do it. This would be a horrifying career change for me. But I am grateful that I am a statistically-crazy guy who actually loves this almost inhuman job of programming, grateful that I get to do this crazy stuff that few other people really want to do, and they can go do stuff that I don't want to do. Real diversity is great.

Be careful about encouragement, and be honest about the whole package. There are people out there who are natural programmers (or other technical positions), and don't know it yet. There are people out there who think it's a good idea, and really shouldn't do it. There are people out there who don't know about programming, and don't need to because it isn't for them, and somebody really needs to come talk to them about the virtues of plumbing, or how much charity work they could do. There's a lot of people out there who should be introduced to what computers can do for you as a hobby or an adjunct to another career but don't need to be "programmers". You can't perfectly predict, and ultimately everyone's responsible for their own decisions anyhow, but be thoughtful about what you say. Is the end goal to create a programmer, or to create a satisfied person?

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9486391

I'm in. Actually, it's a long term goal for me and my family to move to a farm and escape the cubicle/office environment. The article resonates deeply with me. Until then, weekend camping trips, nature hikes and tending to our small flock of chickens in the suburbs will have to suffice.

In the Midwest, suburbs are designed and developed around the car and the "local shops" are generally located in a series of strip malls off the major roads. On the coasts and in denser populated areas, there seems to be a renewed push for more walk-able areas, public transit and such though.

Hilarious...

I grew up on a large agriculture operation miles from town. I hated it. My friends all got to do cool stuff like skateboard and go to the mall. I had to have a milk cow instead. I couldn't wait to grow up and get away and live in a city. I was going to be an electrical engineer. Instead I became an agronomist. I worked on some different types of farms and although it was OK it wasn't exactly what I wanted to do. I wanted to think all day at work, not just exist and do the same thing season after season. I always loved computers and had ever since my first TSR-80. I started playing around with HTML. Then I learned Python and Javascript. Then I started writing more complex programs. Then I decided I wanted to do it full time about 4 years ago and quite my job as a land reclamation specialist. My boss was quite surprised... he knew I was "good with computers" but I was going to be a programming nerd? I got some contract jobs. Then I got a full time job as a web developer. I love it. Every day I'm clean, I sit in a comfortable chair in a climate controlled environment and I play with computer code. I'm very happy (although I still live on a few acres and have a big garden... it's a hobby now which is just the way I like it).