I would have hired Doug, but...
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I would have hired Doug, but...
1–10 of 244 posts
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#2"Unlike Engelbart, I have re-tooled. I now work in JavaScript in the browser and on the server. I had to walk away from the codebase that I loved. I understood that the price of relevance is to give up fighting at some point and settle for a partial victory. I think I was right in the development environment I created. But right doesn't mean the world uses what you created."
Yep. That's the key to staying relevant: change with the times.
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#3I'm 30 now (from time to time I feel that I've already lived enough and am mostly done), the idea of expecting at least 30 productive years ahead of me is intriguing.
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#4 "We Make Shitty Software... With Bugs!", [0]
best slogan ever
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#5"Unlike Engelbart, I have re-tooled. I now work in JavaScript in the browser and on the server. I had to walk away from the codebase that I loved. I understood that the price of relevance is to give up fighting at some point and settle for a partial victory. I think I was right in the development environment I created. But right doesn't mean the world uses what you created." Yep. That's the key to staying relevant: c…
I think I'm coming to grasps with this too. I'm over 30 and have spent most of my life building large desktop applications in C/C++. I want to eventually work remote, and looking at what's out there, there are very few opportunities with someone with my skillset. It's all modern frameworks and languages. So, I'm spending some of my own time learning some of this stuff.
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#6When I was a young man, a slightly older associate told me that "programming is a trap". What he meant is that if you are relatively smart, you can get a CS degree, get good at it, and go earn a fantastic income right out of school. I heard the words. I understood the words. I agreed with the words. Even now, 30 years later, I keep asking "is this a trap that I choose to remain in?" I still love programming, but it is a trap in that I've not, for a long time, seriously tried doing anything else. So for me it has been 30 years of regular retooling, and likely another 20 years of the same. Unless I decide to open the trap and leave.
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#7I'm 30 now (from time to time I feel that I've already lived enough and am mostly done), the idea of expecting at least 30 productive years ahead of me is intriguing.
What have you done that makes you feel satisfied with your life? Just curious. I'm 37 and feel like I'm just getting started. Keep in mind that I have wasted very little time. Always working on some project here or there. Right now I'm planning my next fourty years. So it really makes me wonder how you can feel you are done.
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#8"Unlike Engelbart, I have re-tooled. I now work in JavaScript in the browser and on the server. I had to walk away from the codebase that I loved. I understood that the price of relevance is to give up fighting at some point and settle for a partial victory. I think I was right in the development environment I created. But right doesn't mean the world uses what you created." Yep. That's the key to staying relevant: c…
This. I see too many older developers who complain about ageism, but what's really going on is that they're essentially the same developer they were 2-3 years into their career. If you've been working in the industry for over 20 years, employers can and should expect that you've made the most of it. Those developers have very few problems with ageism. It's the ones that have become comfortable and stagnated that have trouble.
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#9"Unlike Engelbart, I have re-tooled. I now work in JavaScript in the browser and on the server. I had to walk away from the codebase that I loved. I understood that the price of relevance is to give up fighting at some point and settle for a partial victory. I think I was right in the development environment I created. But right doesn't mean the world uses what you created." Yep. That's the key to staying relevant: c…
For me, the thing that gets a bit discouraging at times is the feeling of riding a slow-motion merry-go-round. Every 10 years or so you see the same ideas start to come around again, only with some new paint and landscaping.
I have found myself more than once thinking that learning about some new trendy buzzword is just ultimately a waste of time, since I will barely have mastered it before it's been replaced by the next new/old thing.
On the other hand, it gets easier since none of the concepts are new anymore, and I tell myself, "hey, if you want to pay me to build a client-server app in the browser like it was 1995 (substitute Powerbuilder for Firefox/Chrome), great, happy to take your money."
Re: I would have hired Doug, but...
#10"Unlike Engelbart, I have re-tooled. I now work in JavaScript in the browser and on the server. I had to walk away from the codebase that I loved. I understood that the price of relevance is to give up fighting at some point and settle for a partial victory. I think I was right in the development environment I created. But right doesn't mean the world uses what you created." Yep. That's the key to staying relevant: c…
Generally sound, but there does seem to be a certain breed of vanguard who lives off being heterodox with regards to the computing mainstream, yet functions just fine and likely harbors plenty of insights. Much of the Go team lived full time on Plan 9 at one point or another, and it's not like all of them were Rob Pike or Ken Thompson.
There is value in keeping up with trends, but on the flip side there is value in sticking with sound ideas, even if they are not necessarily attractive in the labor market, and learn enough to be employable or self-sustainable in some regard.
I would say server-side JS might not necessarily be a great long-term prospect, at least in part due to limitations with SMP and unwieldy concurrency models. Even if it persists, the value of knowing might be more of a labor necessity than any inherent utility.
Because programming operates on lots of trends and conjecture, knowing which ones not to waste time on is a much more valuable skill than jumping to stay "relevant".