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Why Programming is Difficult

joearms.github.io

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Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#141

Post by EddSeabrook »

dllthomas wrote: post #140
lutusp wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Well, apparently it is not clear, because it seems "clearly" to me to mean the other. Let's look at the original exchange. The person to whom I replied said, "I've never used my IQ as justification for anything, granted, but I had no idea it wasn't considered a solid measurement." I replied, "It isn't remotely a "solid measurement", in fact it's a field surrounded by justified controversy on multiple grounds" ... a…

Again, "I had no idea it wasn't considered a solid measurement" does not mean "I am asserting it is a solid measurement". It is quite obviously not the same statement (use of the past tense, for one - they make no claim about what ideas they have now), "from the words in the exchange". It is true that sometimes "I had no idea that X" is used to mean "I don't believe you that X." It is also frequently used sarcastical…

wow.

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#142

Post by SiVal »

benched wrote: post #40

I think programming is easy. When I sit down to code something, it feels deterministic, and everything falls into place. I attribute this to: 1) IQ 3 standard deviations above. If I hadn't been this way when I started, I probably wouldn't have started. 2) I've been practicing hard, 25 years. That's a lot of time to try a lot of ways to do a lot of things, and find what works. Here's what's difficult for me, and what…

Look, I'm so bright that people can't look at me without wincing. (At least I assume that's why they can't bear the sight of me.) But even after decades of experience, I still find programming difficult. It's not just people issues; it's technically demanding, too.

It wouldn't be if I had just gone on writing orbital mechanics software in Fortran decade after decade, getting more automatic with each passing year, but that's not what "programming" means to me. Every decade or so there is a sea change: corporate mainframes > personal computers > database-backed websites > online economy > mobile > ?

Within each paradigm, there are new platforms with new languages, APIs, libraries, and tools that matter. Yes, I learned years ago how to manually lay out the logic for looping and branching and recursing and callbacking. Like manual-focus Nikon lenses, they're all still useful today.

But it's maddening that the advanced skills that give me leverage in one era are built into the APIs, libraries, and frameworks of the next and no longer give me any advantage. It's maddening that no matter how much I learn, every new team seems full of people half my age who know far more than I do about the tech stack we're using, and I have to wait for the next technology pivot (sometimes more than a year!) to obsolete their advantage and reset the game yet again.

Having to rebuild your skillset over and over is both a technical and emotional challenge that makes software development ("programming" in the real world) hard.

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#143

Post by RussianCow »

SiVal wrote: post #133
gaius wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, and I value that, it's how I got started myself. But the experience of working on your own projects only translates to a fraction of the work a professional programmer does. 10 years experience would put you at the level of a lead programmer, or an entry-level architect.

Well, sure, and ten years' experience working for some other company with their technologies and in-house legacy code, libraries, design methodologies, and idiosyncratic ways of using even open source tools is not ten years' experience anywhere else. A 22 year old with ten years of programming experience has ten years of experience doing what he's been doing. He may have built a Mongo-based sports statistics website…

Part of the "corporate experience" is working with teams on existing code under strict deadlines. That's not something you can just learn on your own, unfortunately. I would, hands down, take the 32-year-old in this scenario (all else being equal).

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#144

Post by rbanffy »

fit2rule wrote: post #9

Programming is difficult because people are profiting from the difficultability of it. For as long as you can give someone a money-making machine, but say that it will be 'a lot of esoteric work' to make it, grease it, keep it clean .. there will be development work. By the very nature of the business, if you are not improving something, some human-describable human activity, by using esoteric magic, you're probably…

> Anyone can 'program computers'

Often with the most hilarious results.

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#145

Post by Pacabel »

SiVal wrote: post #133
gaius wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, and I value that, it's how I got started myself. But the experience of working on your own projects only translates to a fraction of the work a professional programmer does. 10 years experience would put you at the level of a lead programmer, or an entry-level architect.

Well, sure, and ten years' experience working for some other company with their technologies and in-house legacy code, libraries, design methodologies, and idiosyncratic ways of using even open source tools is not ten years' experience anywhere else. A 22 year old with ten years of programming experience has ten years of experience doing what he's been doing. He may have built a Mongo-based sports statistics website…

Regardless of age, I'd much rather take the developer with experience using one or more relational database systems. It's much easier and effective for them to downgrade their knowledge and experience to the MongoDB level than it is for somebody with only MongoDB experience to upgrade to a proper understanding of database systems.

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#146

Post by Pacabel »

isuraed wrote: post #56
pattisapu wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Art is never finished, only abandoned." -Leonardo da Vinci

This is a great metaphor for software. There is diminishing returns to refactoring and elegance. Sometimes the open source community goes too far (ever try submitting patches to big OSS projects.. Some are ridiculously picky with minor details like code style.)

Code style is extremely important. A lack of consistency with existing code makes both the new and old code harder to work with in the future. And neglecting to maintain a consistent coding style often indicates neglect in other areas, such as correctness and robustness.

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#147

Post by martingoodson »

truthteller wrote: post #84
lutusp wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I attribute this to: 1) IQ 3 standard deviations above. (...) A person with an IQ at or above 145, who is also fully conversant with reality, would know that IQ testing has a reputation nearly as bad the field of psychology that popularized the activity in the first place. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mismeasure_of_Man > 2) I've been practicing hard, 25 years. A person of your age should know better than to use…

"the mismeasure of man" is a garbage book by the noted fraud and liar steven jay gould. it certainly should not be used as any sort of reference on intelligence testing.

You might disagree with him but calling him a fraud is uncalled for. He was a respected biologist and has had over 65 thousand citations to his work.

http://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=kALUT54AAAAJ&hl=e....

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#148

Post by benched »

EddSeabrook wrote: post #141
dllthomas wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, "I had no idea it wasn't considered a solid measurement" does not mean "I am asserting it is a solid measurement". It is quite obviously not the same statement (use of the past tense, for one - they make no claim about what ideas they have now), "from the words in the exchange". It is true that sometimes "I had no idea that X" is used to mean "I don't believe you that X." It is also frequently used sarcastical…

wow.

Yeah. I want everyone give themselves a pat on the back for the quality of this discussion. Jeezas.

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#149

Post by barrkel »

truthteller wrote: post #119
lutusp wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The American Psychological Association's report Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns stated that in the United States IQ tests as predictors of social achievement are not biased against African Americans since they predict future performance ... The flaw in the reasoning should be obvious to anyone but a psychologist -- the test outcome becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, rather than an unbiased predictor of future pe…

the point is that they predict future performance equally for different groups, not just that they predict performance. your language is alarmingly exaggerated and pompous for someone who lacks basic reading comprehension skills and is entirely ignorant about the subject of intelligence testing.

FWIW, you're replying to Paul Lutus: http://www.arachnoid.com/administration/ ; I think you can assume he can read.

Re: Why Programming is Difficult

#150

Post by flywheel »

bluedino wrote: post #109
gaius wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why, when I see 22-year-old kids in interviews claiming 10 years of programming experience, that's a negative signal for me. Commercial programming is solving problems you didn't choose, in a language that's not your favourite, using existing code you didn't write, for people you would never have met outside the job, in less time than you would like. In most real situations writing the code is the easy part,…

As long as you're creating something, what's the difference? Are you not an artist if you've only painted things for your own enjoyment, and never any commissioned worrk?

The differences is that an artist doesn't have to worry about maintainability, scalability, orthogonality, or any other such concerns.

Art is art, code is code. Art is beautiful, code is clever. They are different.

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