Why you would want to program at fifty (or any other age)

Why you would want to program at fifty (or any other age)
blog.vivekhaldar.com

@chmike Personally I still learn very rapidly and when I integrate it with past experience it's very powerful. I make the joke that I'm like a diesel engine, one crank is equal to 10x the lawn mowers some younger programmers are using. That said I love learning new stuff from the younger crowd, I'm convinced they keep me young because they inspire me and I try harder to keep up while sharing with them the mistakes I've made so they hopefully avoid a couple of them! :-)

Well, I wouldn't say its horrible :) I suppose I'm a "kid" here at 25, but I've been programming in c since I really was a kid and I love it. And even though people are always ranting about some other new awesome languge, fact is, if you need to program a driver, or basically do anything thats really os/hardware programming, c is still by far the best choice out there.

I've been in jobs that I have no motivation for. It's a bad deal for me, and my employer, but especially for me in terms of opportunity costs.

As a developer that is much closer to 50 than many here are, I can say that it's a crapshoot whether I will be programming when I'm 50. I tired of it after a handful of years, but decided to stay on with it because I can't afford the paycut, and am still am going with it, getting close to 15 years now. But everyday, and I've tried another employer, I still can't stand it. I enjoy the freedom and art and creativeness, but when things don't work, which happens a lot, I waste time on it and feel stupid and depressed. Feeling smart 1% of the time and stupid 99% of the time and worrying about whether you will be able to continue it without getting fired is a horrible way to live. It has affected my health, my attitude, and makes me drink more than I should at times. But, we justify this with "we are making a good living".

Common things I think about doing are (1) buying and running a bar, but then I would have to deal with the alcoholics, prostitution, drugs, and other crap that goes with it (not worth it) and would feel that I was contributing to an evil in our society even though I love beer and good times, (2) selling old computer equipment and games (there is little money here, and I'm not a hardware expert, so screw that), (3) getting involved with my church (but they don't need more IT, I'm a developer anyway not IT, and I have no idea what else I have to offer), (4) helping humanity get into space (but I have little to offer there also), (5) developing Indie games (which I've done in the past to some extent, but I think that writing games just means that people will waste time away from their family and solving problems playing them), (6) going to work for a non-profit development group (but I'm a conservative, and I can't work with tree-huggers even if I have a very liberal opinion that software should be free or open source, which I realize is not the same). So instead, I take care of my family.