121–130 of 334 posts
Anytime you speak to any subject matter expert they're likely thinking "ok what's the simplest way I can phrase this for this idiot".
Not sure what the solution is beyond being kind & understanding & patient
As for markdown I showed it to my girlfriend and this is now what she uses for everything. She is a designer and loves that here she does not have to bother with design, just with markup. She hates Microsoft Word with a passion. People who used formatting in any 2000s internet forum know in principle how to use markdown. That aside, I see it as a problem that tech people fail to anticipate the needs of their peers. I…
Highly agreed. This seems to be common among all programmers, but most prominent in products that have little input from non-programmers (e.g. open source projects).
Most people would understand your explanation ... given the effort. But they don't care, they just want it to work. And that sometimes involves going with an expensive proprietary solution over a FOSS one because the first screen provides a better introduction.
"Do I look like I know what a Jpeg is?".
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The interesting part to me is, these "non-technical" coworkers aren't proposing simpler solutions. When reading "Why couldn't you just do this in something simple like Word?", Word isn't what I'd call a simple program from any angle. It's not preinstalled on most computers and costs money, it won't run everywhere (running Word on a school provided Chromebook is a world of fun), for decades it had version compatibilit…
> " It's not preinstalled on most computers and costs money, it won't run everywhere " It runs in a web browser and doesn't cost money https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-365/free-office-on...
Many orgs work on Google accounts, so asking for a microsoft account is an additional hurdle. It also probably requires I upload the files to my OneDrive. I had a look at the interface and had no idea how to just open a document I have locally.
I get your point that it's totally doable (and also free up to some point. The OneDrive space is the limit ?). I'm not convinced it's simple though.
The problem is mainly one of discoverability. The non-programmer in the examples says "simple" when they mean "discoverable". The programmer says "simple" when they mean "not much code complexity". Of course you disagree. All the examples - installing and using a package manager, running a command line program - are "simple" from a software point of view, but they're not at all "discoverable". To understand the steps…
There probably even is a button or a sequence of ui actions in your system for half of things you wanted. But these are less discoverable than a bash pipe available right there on SO, three clicks away rather than ten+ that will change location and names with the next update. It becomes hard either way, but only a stable and replayable way wins.
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One thing I learned in my 41 years is that nobody thinks like me (or you). It's not that I 'think better' or that I am 'better at thinking'. But sometimes I deal with variables that I can't correctly communicate or translate. I often think that people deals with the same information as me, and will follow my same path of reasoning. Perhaps the dev thought it should be a tool that you will be using every day, or a thi…
Building the long-term solution first is often wrong even when you need one. I use the quick and dirty method until I know I'll do that task more regularly and I know enough about the problem so I don't need to make wild guesses about the design.
If your boss at the workplace you've been working probably "within the month" or a little longer tells you to write a program to do X, you'll maybe pulling all your knowledge out to write a program to do X as if it were the most important program in the world.
I find a version of this even with fresh out of college programmers. They just know how to type Java on an IDE, maybe some SQL (using some graphical front end), some HTML/CSS. They can't operate in a Linux dev environment at all, can't use the command line or exit vi or perform any kind of simple shell based automation or use git without a plugin for their IDE. And they also are reluctant to learn because they are se…
> I find a version of this even with fresh out of college programmers. I've noticed something with boot camp programmers too. Something that may have changed is that newer graduates may have studied programming because "it pays well", and not because they were computer hobbyists before deciding what to study. I've been on meetings with some programmers that didn't know how to use a gui ftp client or how to manually u…
I would consider myself a decent programmer I have a masters degree, and have a deep technical understanding of multiple areas. I've plenty of experience and have shipped successful products.
I've never (not once) in my life used a GUI ftp client, and I can futz my way around an SCP command to shuffle a file around if I need to.
I can make the same argument against someone who refused to use a new development environment because they understand how their compiler works under the hood.
Just because someone doesn't know something that you know doesn't mean that you're better than them, it means you're different. Personally, i would rather have someone on my team who understands how to extract logs from cloudwatch/datadog/new relic than someone who insists our VPN solution has FTP access to our servers.
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If you're wording your CV the way it screams sysadmin right in your face the only offers you get will be sysadmin. Try emphasizing your coding experience more
Correct, but it's also a common [false] view that sysadmins can't code. Even if I emphasize my limited) experience in code and leave out details about my sysadmin work, I get asked what did I do, etc. "Oh you're a sysadmin" and that's where the conversation ends. But let's gloss over the fact that I can set-up the testing and production environment on my own along with the DB, schema, do the routing, proxy and everyt…
It took me 3 tries to get myself right where I wanted to be but when work doesn't really feel like work despite being at $BigCorp, life is enjoyable.
I find a version of this even with fresh out of college programmers. They just know how to type Java on an IDE, maybe some SQL (using some graphical front end), some HTML/CSS. They can't operate in a Linux dev environment at all, can't use the command line or exit vi or perform any kind of simple shell based automation or use git without a plugin for their IDE. And they also are reluctant to learn because they are se…
What kind of college grads don't know how to operate in a linux dev environment? That'd be an immediate no-hire from me.
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Umm, most professional programmers probably don't know how to operate in a linux dev environment bro... That is also an extremely stupid requirement. You can be a good programmer (Especially as a junior) without knowing all the linux command line tools.
I haven't met a good professional programmer working in webdev who didn't know their way around linux. I've met plenty of bad programers who got into this field for money, didn't know how their way around unix, were barely able to do fizz buzz and would be better doing something else. I haven't hired them though. Not knowing one's way around linux is a sign of lack of curiosity and passion for the topic. It's obvious…
As for markdown I showed it to my girlfriend and this is now what she uses for everything. She is a designer and loves that here she does not have to bother with design, just with markup. She hates Microsoft Word with a passion. People who used formatting in any 2000s internet forum know in principle how to use markdown. That aside, I see it as a problem that tech people fail to anticipate the needs of their peers. I…
I got her hooked on markdown for note-taking, I just had to find the right editor to convince her to let go the few hours of Word she 'learned' at school.
Thank to all Joplin SWE, managers and designers. Great product.
And BTW, I still think org-mode is overall better, but sometimes worse is best, and to me Markdown won.