131–140 of 150 posts
Beej taught me networking in c in the early 00s. He will now teach my son computer science in the 20s. The circle of life.
I was so floored to meet him in person, and as you'd probably imagine, he's super kind and relaxed =D
A++ human being who's contributed so much to our field.
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> 7.3 No Copy-Paste Coding > [...] But nowadays they tend to punt to some AI. Beginning developers should not do this. I don't know how I feel about this. I get the sentiment, I really do. But it almost reads like a chess Grandmaster in the 90s telling up-and-coming players to not practice against Deep Blue because it will teach you bad habits.
It's not so much that, although I'd argue that LLMs can certainly teach you some bad habits from time to time, much more so than Deep Blue ever would. Rather, it's because early on, when beginners are learning the basics, they need to do the hard work of figuring stuff out so they develop problem-solving skills. It's not the code-writing skills they need to develop--that's easy. It's the problem-solving skills. If I…
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I have so many disagreements with this post. I know plenty of people in the food industry that are constantly trying new things at home and while staying late/early at work. I even know bartenders that are playing around with things at home. How many grease monkeys work at a shop on other people's cars yet go home and continue to turn a wrench on their own project car? My grandfather was a custom cabinet maker, and w…
Of course you will find some professions where work and hobby overlap, but that does not hold for most professions out there. Most of the working world will clock out and mentally check out as soon as the workday is over. Even when only counting professional work.
I really feel like you personally might have a problem separating work/life if you're this emotional about it. If you really think that software peeps are the only ones that have this issue, it comes across as you not being able to see the forest through the trees, you might be too scoped in, or any other similar saying you want to use. You're definitely painting with a very broad brush, and it's not coming across well as you're now painting me into something I most certainly am not.
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I have so many disagreements with this post. I know plenty of people in the food industry that are constantly trying new things at home and while staying late/early at work. I even know bartenders that are playing around with things at home. How many grease monkeys work at a shop on other people's cars yet go home and continue to turn a wrench on their own project car? My grandfather was a custom cabinet maker, and w…
There is also a huge difference between “hey I am leaving at 5 because I have life outside of the job” and “hey I just collect paychecks here”.
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> it’s (a) going to be harder for you than for people who like it and (b) maybe you should consider a field that you do like? This shit is so infantile. It's like people have never heard of grinding. Do you think big law attorneys "love" their jobs? How about public accountants? How about dentists (famously known for having high suicide rates). > Maybe you hate programming, but you want the money enough. Yes welcome…
Interestingly, the three careers you listed are protected by strict professional credentialing systems that do not exists for programmers, and professionals in law and medicine enjoy a social prestige that is certainly attractive to a group of people who might not innately enjoy the work itself.
On a side note, has anyone noticed the disparity of attitude and level of intensity of dialogue when it comes to AI in different HN posts? Given that there are many threads where 80% act as if AI would cause second coming I suspected that main topic of discussion here would be "is it worth learning CS at all in 2026?". To my (pleasant) surprise the discussion here is much more "normal". Does anyone suspect that some…
> I suspected that main topic of discussion here would be "is it worth learning CS at all in 2026?" Considering the current state of the job market I don't think it is good idea to go into CS in 2026 expecting a lucrative career. People who just love to program will find a job eventually, of course. > Does anyone suspect that some HN posts have a lot of astroturfing from AI-adjacent organisations? Why does it have to…
I use my time off to learn a ton about Erlang/Elixir in the hopes of maybe entering the BEAM domain some day. Way less competition compared to Javascript Python devs.
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> The quality of posts and comments has definitely decreased, in line with the quality of content on blog posts decreasing. I fondly remember the first time I read this comment. I think it was August of 2008.
Do you think its true both then and now, or rather that people are always seeing the past grass as more green?
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> 7.3 No Copy-Paste Coding > [...] But nowadays they tend to punt to some AI. Beginning developers should not do this. I don't know how I feel about this. I get the sentiment, I really do. But it almost reads like a chess Grandmaster in the 90s telling up-and-coming players to not practice against Deep Blue because it will teach you bad habits.
It's not so much that, although I'd argue that LLMs can certainly teach you some bad habits from time to time, much more so than Deep Blue ever would. Rather, it's because early on, when beginners are learning the basics, they need to do the hard work of figuring stuff out so they develop problem-solving skills. It's not the code-writing skills they need to develop--that's easy. It's the problem-solving skills. If I…
The analogy isn't perfect since a compiler will error if it can't create valid output. LLMs hallucinate. But still. Time is limited. I don't think it's a good idea to spend your formative years learning how to manage registers.
I see people argue “But other people hate their jobs in other industries, just push through and grind, money is money” Sure, but I want to point out that software development is kind of unique. I can’t think of too many other professional jobs where the line between hobby and work blends, for so many of its workers. Let us be honest with ourselves, many of the toxic things in this industry are caused by a strong cult…
I have so many disagreements with this post. I know plenty of people in the food industry that are constantly trying new things at home and while staying late/early at work. I even know bartenders that are playing around with things at home. How many grease monkeys work at a shop on other people's cars yet go home and continue to turn a wrench on their own project car? My grandfather was a custom cabinet maker, and w…
I code for free. I get paid to deal with JIRA, Zoom meetings, and the Bay Area.