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What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

economist.com

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Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#11

Post by perryizgr8 »

I think the next big thing in software is going to be that almost every office worker will start writing basic software. Maybe in a python like language.

People spend a lot of time and effort to do simple repetitive stuff that anybody can do with a 10 line python script. They don't do it because nobody has told them it's that easy.

30-40 years ago, an average office worker wouldn't use a word processor for typing out documents. They would have probably used a typewriter or written it by hand. Now everybody uses Microsoft Word. And they use it well, without major issues.

The same thing will happen to python or another language like it.

Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#12

Post by friendlydog »

Then the "geek elite" would spend more time fixing things they should have learned before starting. Devs who have fixed general office worker's abominations of Microsoft Access and turned them into proper apps would agree. This isn't to belittle the creations, just an observation. The work the normal office workers build had value to the business or their managers wouldn't have let them build it. The issue comes in risk to the business when best practices are unknown and not followed. When the Access app collapses under its own weight is often when "geek elite" are summoned to pull the team's mission critical homegrown application out of the fire, and the expectations are often not matched when they build something the wrong way it takes a few days and it might take a few sprints to "do it right." The solution is probably to meet in the middle and take the apps made by the regular office workers and migrate the ones with value as soon as possible. Accruing technical debt is cheaper and it can be unpaid until disaster strikes so that is often the choice of management especially if the environment or relationship between front line office workers and internal app developers is strained.

Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#13

Post by jvanderbot »

Kon-Peki wrote: post #6

My experience is that most office workers are perfectly capable of writing software, especially if they have access to some basic training material and documentation. However, most office workers would rather not write software and think that the whole pay-someone-else-to-do-it paradigm is great.

What if we ignored division of labor and asked everyone to be mildly capable at everything? Well, that sounds terrible.

Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#14

Post by kanaffa12345 »

anm89 wrote: post #5

Having taught at a coding bootcamp, I can tell you that some people will never in their lives be capable of writing functional software. People exist, with college degrees, who cannot in months of lessons, understand the idea of a variable. Not every person in the world needs to or is capable of writing software. Probably a majority are given the right exposure but there's a big difference between being able to write…

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Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#15

Post by 908B64B197 »

anm89 wrote: post #5

Having taught at a coding bootcamp, I can tell you that some people will never in their lives be capable of writing functional software. People exist, with college degrees, who cannot in months of lessons, understand the idea of a variable. Not every person in the world needs to or is capable of writing software. Probably a majority are given the right exposure but there's a big difference between being able to write…

You'll get downvoted for this, but it's been observed repeatedly.

It’s also the reason I stopped hiring from bootcamps. The signal to noise ratio is just too low.

Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#16

Post by Kon-Peki »

jvanderbot wrote: post #13
Kon-Peki wrote: post #6

My experience is that most office workers are perfectly capable of writing software, especially if they have access to some basic training material and documentation. However, most office workers would rather not write software and think that the whole pay-someone-else-to-do-it paradigm is great.

What if we ignored division of labor and asked everyone to be mildly capable at everything? Well, that sounds terrible.

It sure does!

On the other hand, having some mild programming capability gives a lot of people a lot more agency in their job and is a good thing. It's just that once they've proved out their idea and it is ready to be a real thing, they are overwhelmingly going to prefer to hand it off to the "experts".

I think there is a lot of opportunity in a no-code product that believes that this is how it works. I've just not ever seen anything where the developers say "this is great, I can slide right in and keep going with this!". It's always "what a mess, we have to start from scratch!"

Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#17

Post by uejfiweun »

908B64B197 wrote: post #15
anm89 wrote: post #5

Having taught at a coding bootcamp, I can tell you that some people will never in their lives be capable of writing functional software. People exist, with college degrees, who cannot in months of lessons, understand the idea of a variable. Not every person in the world needs to or is capable of writing software. Probably a majority are given the right exposure but there's a big difference between being able to write…

You'll get downvoted for this, but it's been observed repeatedly. It’s also the reason I stopped hiring from bootcamps. The signal to noise ratio is just too low.

What's your take on bootcamps? I worked pretty hard to get my BS CS, but now it seems like a lot of people I knew from college who were liberal arts majors are going to bootcamp. It's got me wondering about the value of my own degree.

Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#18

Post by 908B64B197 »

uejfiweun wrote: post #17
908B64B197 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'll get downvoted for this, but it's been observed repeatedly. It’s also the reason I stopped hiring from bootcamps. The signal to noise ratio is just too low.

What's your take on bootcamps? I worked pretty hard to get my BS CS, but now it seems like a lot of people I knew from college who were liberal arts majors are going to bootcamp. It's got me wondering about the value of my own degree.

Stuff they don't teach at bootcamps: Algorithmic complexity. "Don't roll out your own data structures" and "just use a library" works until it doesn't. Operating System fundamentals is another one.

It seems a lot of bootcamps teach with rote, rather than by looking at the underlying concepts. My favorite example is git. I've seen bootcamp grads claim they can use git, but what it really meant is that they memorized a few git commands and as long as they don't stray too fart from those they can sort of work using git. But cherry-picking, rebase, proper branching forget it.

I'm extremely skeptical of bootcamps, especially after learning that some of the TA's at Lambda (the most famous one) are hired to help with teaching as little as two months into the program as students[0]. I guess that counts toward their "placement" stats!

Not only that, but Lambda seems so desperate that they will offer a fresh grad at no cost to any company for a 4 week trial period. [1]

[0] https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/02/lambda-schools-job-p...

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25138610

Re: What if all workers wrote software, not just the geek elite?

#20

Post by uejfiweun »

908B64B197 wrote: post #18
uejfiweun wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's your take on bootcamps? I worked pretty hard to get my BS CS, but now it seems like a lot of people I knew from college who were liberal arts majors are going to bootcamp. It's got me wondering about the value of my own degree.

Stuff they don't teach at bootcamps: Algorithmic complexity. "Don't roll out your own data structures" and "just use a library" works until it doesn't. Operating System fundamentals is another one. It seems a lot of bootcamps teach with rote, rather than by looking at the underlying concepts. My favorite example is git. I've seen bootcamp grads claim they can use git, but what it really meant is that they memorized a…

Interesting, thanks for the information. So it seems bootcamps are not really the same type of quality signal that you would get from a degree and GPA. This assuages my fears somewhat.

As an aside, I always considered git to be in the category of "Easily Google-able Technologies". In that whatever I am trying to do in git, it is generally very easy to find a resource online that tells me exactly what to do. For this reason I actually never really bothered to really "learn" git beyond git commit, git add, git push, etc. It's the same attitude I take towards technologies like CSS. Wanted to hear your thoughts on this as you seem experienced and I have < 3 YOE.

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