Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#131

Post by vlladin » Tue, Jul 28, 2015, 3:16 PM UTC

I was in the same boat recently and this is what helped for me. I quit my job, and took a few years off. I have to admit, I was really burned out. Took as much time as I needed to rest, take walks, talk to people, and in general just change the perspective. Just like you, I had this huge dilemma. While programming was my biggest passion, I was sick of all the bitching and BS that revolved around it. After taking the rest I needed, I started learning new technologies. Without preconceptions. Just like I used to do when I first started coding. So far it keeps the flame burning. I am working again, and I am happy doing it. I am aware that one day I will get bored of it again, and I will repeat the process. I think the more you dwell in a technology, the more knowledge you get, the deeper down the rabbit hole you go. And the darker things get.

Take a break. Learn something new, and apply the cross technology knowledge you acquire to new fresh projects. Always keep an open mind, and by all means avoid pointless topics that try to establish the best language, the best IDE and so on.

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#132

Post by ak39 » Tue, Jul 28, 2015, 7:28 PM UTC

bbcbasic wrote: post #128

ak39 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An Ode to "CRUD" Apps: There's nothing unexciting or less complicated or challenging about producing good CRUD [sic] applications. I don't understand the industry cynicism towards producing good quality "bread and butter" software for any vertical market. It takes years of experience to learn good (relational) data modeling. It takes years of dedicated attention to assemble tried, tested and efficient user interface…

> User interface design (and yes, we are talking about your "boring" invoice capture screens here) may seem easy at first glance to be dismissed as unexciting, but almost every real world example is a challenge that requires creative thinking. But how does this tie in with the manager who says 'it's just an invoice screen, why are you taking so long' probably based on the mentality that $ revenue is proportional to #…

Fair enough. This sort of standoff with pointy-haired managers is always politically tricky. You have to show the manager that there is business value in creating effective and efficient user interfaces and that "getting it right" ultimately saves money. If you are developing software for high-volume capture, your manager will understand that doing it correctly is the main feature.

Also, I've noticed many end users are not confident to comment on what they believe is an inefficient interface. So, problems with user interfaces are not spoken openly unless the interface completely blocks the user from completing his/her task. It takes some amount of permission-giving from the developer's side to get valuable feedback that would otherwise not be spoken about.

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#133

Post by ak39 » Tue, Jul 28, 2015, 7:36 PM UTC

PopeOfNope wrote: post #119

ak39 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An Ode to "CRUD" Apps: There's nothing unexciting or less complicated or challenging about producing good CRUD [sic] applications. I don't understand the industry cynicism towards producing good quality "bread and butter" software for any vertical market. It takes years of experience to learn good (relational) data modeling. It takes years of dedicated attention to assemble tried, tested and efficient user interface…

CRUD apps are to programmers what walls are to carpenters. There may be an artistry to making good walls and there are lots of ways the task can be made challenging. But, 99% of the time, the customer doesn't care about the artistry that you put into the wall. They just want the damned thing up as fast and as cheaply as humanly possible. I think that might be where the root of the OP's boredom comes from. Doing the s…

If we were to use the wall analogy, I'd put it this way: the customer should care about the structural integrity of the wall, how much load-bearing weight it can carry, or whether extensions can be added easily to it etc.

So while getting "the damn thing up" may be the burning expectation in everyone who isn't making the wall, the wall maker knows the consequences of poor work and it is his responsibility to educate folks who depend on said wall.

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#134

Post by bbcbasic » Tue, Jul 28, 2015, 9:16 PM UTC

ak39 wrote: post #132

bbcbasic wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> User interface design (and yes, we are talking about your "boring" invoice capture screens here) may seem easy at first glance to be dismissed as unexciting, but almost every real world example is a challenge that requires creative thinking. But how does this tie in with the manager who says 'it's just an invoice screen, why are you taking so long' probably based on the mentality that $ revenue is proportional to #…

Fair enough. This sort of standoff with pointy-haired managers is always politically tricky. You have to show the manager that there is business value in creating effective and efficient user interfaces and that "getting it right" ultimately saves money. If you are developing software for high-volume capture, your manager will understand that doing it correctly is the main feature. Also, I've noticed many end users a…

Unfortunately in the enterprise, the purchasing decision maker is usually not the user, and may not even use the invoice screen before deciding to buy. So in the short-medium term it is not in the interested of the business to make it awesome. In the long term ... maybe.

The exception to this is in situations where the market is being disrupted. For example when the iPhone 3g came out it just made any other hard-to-use smart phone look like shit. And thus the competition was forced to catch up.

However in enterprisey applications we are a long way off that. The awesome invoice screen may add value to the customer, but not much if none of that will be captured by the provider of the software.

Unless a certain class of invoice screen is on the list of must-have things the buyers must have, because it is a particular pain point. In which case you will be told by the pointy haired boss to make it awesome, it won't be your choice as the developer.

Damn I sound cynical!

Your point about users is spot on, and we have all been such users. I mean you have used MS Word ... right? And often at work we have to use such applications. We just push on through. Users that are not programmers may not even know to question it, they assume that is the way it is unless they have used a competing product.