FUCK YES!!!!!
of course I do
Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
221–230 of 260 posts
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#222If I can still build planes in the sky and herd cats when I'm 50, I'll be happy.
I've been building planes for my first 20 years and herding cats for the rest of my career and there is probably nothing in the world I'd be happier doing.
Note: those may be obscure references for some. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7XW-mewUm8 and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_MaJDK3VNE should help.
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#223Programming, by itself, the mechanics of it, isn't something that I find stimulative enough to derive long-term enjoyment. I think the author is right in pointing out that there's an ugly side to programming that includes bugs, bad API's, bad tools, bad documentation, etc. This is what I have come to term "programmer on programmer violence". We certainly can't blame anyone else for these issues. This I don't enjoy. N…
Regarding "programmer on programmer violence", I recommend http://chriswjohnson.blogspot.com/2005/12/programmers-hate-p...
A little old, but it captures the spirit of the thing.
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#224Please note extremely effective demonstration of "privilege". Two employee candidates interview successively. One is 25, the other 53. Both are comparably conversant in technology, evince comparable cognitive capability, are equivalently literate in the problem domain being tackled by the role they're interviewing for. Privilege: the 25 year old is not asked (overtly or subtextually) whether they "want to be doing th…
It's about the rate of change. Luthiers are practicing an art that would be recognizable to Stradivari, three hundred years ago. The tools are made of more modern materials but they're basically the same. The product has a more modern design (both functionally and stylistically) but is basically the same.
More importantly, the culture and business of instrument-making is largely the same. You have a shop in your garage or basement, or in the back of your store. You make instruments by hand a few at a time and sell them, preferably for cash, to individual buyers. You learn by apprenticing with someone who knows, or reading books and practicing like crazy for decades. Maybe you'll scale up to a factory with a few dozen journeymen cranking out instruments… like Stradivari did, three hundred years ago.
The problem with programming is that it's unstable. And I contend that it isn't even the unstable languages and platforms that hurt (as everyone says, experience makes it easier to learn new languages). Nor is it the eternal brokenness and turnover of APIs. This is not a new problem, nor does the patience to deal with it necessarily decline with age. Indeed, to an extent the opposite is true: experience has taught me not to panic when my favorite API is shot out from under me. (The first time it happens is a really awful surprise and a test of your patience, but the fifth time it happens you're probably used to it.)
No, I think the real problem is the constant turnover in culture. Programming in the late 1980s, for example, was a completely different social universe than web consulting in PHP, or iOS development: Different typical org structure, different business model, different way of learning the trade, different communities and communications channels, different career tracks, different project management styles, different constraints, different everything.
Immersing yourself in a new culture is hard. You're going to get schooled by kindergarteners, so check your pride at the door. And you're going to have to relearn your whole approach to the business, not just a new syntax or a new set of APIs. You're even going to need to learn new jokes. And the biggest challenge of all is that your old culture rarely dies cleanly, so you're never quite sure if you're doing the right thing by becoming an expatriate. Why not just go home, where you have the seniority and the contacts, where you know the old stories and can visit the old hangouts? The old way is shrinking, but is it really time for the funeral?
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#22557, programming for 33 years with hardly a day off, and having more fun than ever. My motivation? It's not about the technology, the tools, the apps, the business, the customers, or even the money, although any of those can provide plenty of motivation. And believe it or not, it's not even about the happy dance feeling I get when something I built works for the first time. It's about the achievements of those who use…
Dead right. I'm 60 and I feel the same.
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#226Programming, by itself, the mechanics of it, isn't something that I find stimulative enough to derive long-term enjoyment. I think the author is right in pointing out that there's an ugly side to programming that includes bugs, bad API's, bad tools, bad documentation, etc. This is what I have come to term "programmer on programmer violence". We certainly can't blame anyone else for these issues. This I don't enjoy. N…
Sorry to hear you had to fold up shop like that. It sounds like you have plenty of talents to fall back on but that probably doesn't remove any of the sting of having all your hard work swept away. That said, US Politicians have plenty of misdeeds to answer for, but over-regulating the financial sector is really not among them. The requirement to prove that you have some sort of income before getting a house loan was…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Short
Read it. It's an eye opener.
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#227- But large scale, high stress coding? I may have to admit that's a young man's game.
This statement verges on ageism, which I forgive you for because it is common in the tech industry. Ask Rob Pike (b.1956) if high impact programming is for young men.
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#228Earlier quoted context omitted.
23, programming for, what, 14 years, maybe? And I hope I still have as much fun when I'm 57. I can certainly imagine myself doing so, for much the same reasons; it is partially about the happy dance feeling when something I built works, but long-term happiness and satisfaction come from seeing it getting used. It's really, really cool to see someone's masters thesis and think "I helped make that!" or drive by an elem…
I think it makes more sense to start measuring from the time you started professionally programming ... so if the 57 year old parent has been programming for 33 years that suggests that he's measuring from when he left full time education (24). My apologies if you've been coding professionally since you were 9 though :)
disagree. I have it on good authority that education begins from around year 0. And the folks that begin learning how computers work, and programming, at say age 10 are generally going to be much better off, and better hires, than folks that don't begin that step until age 18 or 22 or what have you. Getting a paycheck doesn't inherently teach you anything more about CS or engineering or development practices. It's just money. Having a job means you do get exposed to a lot more stuff around programming, like politics, bureaucracy, personalities, management, corporate shenanigans, methodologies, clients, customers, etc. Yes maybe even more exposure to certain technical things you might not have had exposure to it. But its more shit than shine.
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#229Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good point, but I'm not really sure how to judge that. I've been getting paid for it for about 5 years, but that doesn't encompass all the stuff that I've built that other people have found useful, which is the metric that I care about. So, 8-ish, maybe? Anyway, the point is that I don't have 33 years under my belt, so maybe I'm wrong about how I'll feel in the future, but based on the experience I do have, I just do…
Yeah totally agree. I've got about 8 years under my belt (first proper coding job in '04 and I'm 32 now, notwithstanding a lifetime tinkering with computers though). Still loving it and learning new things every day, hope it stays that way :) I guess the point I was trying to make is the metric people expect to hear, especially in a work environment is years of experience in the Industry (capital "I") getting paid. I…
I've concluded that the "years of work in [industry|]" meme is a fuzzy, noisy, unreliable and (close to) meaningless metric. Note I said "(close to) meaningless", because it is not completely. It makes the classic error of making an apples-to-oranges comparison. For example, too many people talk about "5 years of Java" as if they were talking about a 5 meter long pole. If pole lengths were measured in the same way as "years of Java", and you went to buy 10 different poles from different stores, each "5 years of Java" in length, you are going to be in for a nasty surprise. Humans are not commodities like a pole, brick or gallon of water can be.
Re: Do You Really Want to be Doing this When You're 50?
#23057, programming for 33 years with hardly a day off, and having more fun than ever. My motivation? It's not about the technology, the tools, the apps, the business, the customers, or even the money, although any of those can provide plenty of motivation. And believe it or not, it's not even about the happy dance feeling I get when something I built works for the first time. It's about the achievements of those who use…
50, programming professionally for 28 years, still loving it, currently enjoying Odesky's FP class in Scala on coursera.