Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness • Hacker News Board

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#271

Post by nostrademons » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 8:06 PM UTC

twblalock wrote: post #241

bsaul wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you’ve got more insights on the subject since you’ve actually had a job on the tech, but it seems that « private » DLTs , or « b2b » dlts could have some applications where competitors need to share and persist information. Another is with all systems taking the roles traditionnally filled with state actors ( registers of some sorts). But you’re right, so far no « killer app » has been found. That’s what makes…

> But you’re right, so far no « killer app » has been found. That’s what makes it interesting today, imho. How long do we have to wait until the lack of a killer app stops being interesting, and simply means the technology is not useful?

Bitcoin is coming up on its 9-year anniversary. The equivalent point in the web's history was 1998.

How many of today's Internet giants were founded in 1998? Amazon. Plenty of defunct also-rans: Netscape, Ebay, Yahoo, AOL, Geocities, Altavista, Excite, Infoseek, Lycos, Pointcast, Monster.com, RealAudio, Pets.com, Kozmo, AllAdvantage.com, Webvan, DoubleClick. Netflix was in its infancy (~1 year old). Apple was a dying hardware company, a few months from bankruptcy and kept alive by Microsoft's cash infusion.

Google's official founding was several months in the future. PayPal was right around then. Napster was a year in the future. Friendster and LiveJournal were 4 years in the future, MySpace 5 years, Facebook almost 6. SomethingAwful.com, Bodybuilding.com, and Fark.com were a year in the future, 4chan 3 years, Digg 6 years, and Reddit 7. Twitter was 8 years in the future. YouTube was 7. Heroku and Weebly were 8-9 years in the future, which was the same time SquareSpace graduated to more than one employee. Dropbox was 8 years in the future. AirBnb was also 8 years, but didn't catch on for a further 5 years or so. Indeed was 6, Etsy was 7, Indiegogo was 9, Kickstarter was 11, GoFundMe was 11, Pinterest was 12, Patreon was 14.

So to answer your question going by the web's example - probably about 7 years. The "killer app" for the web (communication & coordination, IMHO) started becoming apparent to the mainstream around 2005, with Facebook, Reddit, YouTube, Etsy, Indeed, and Twitter all being founded within +-1 year of that. Interestingly, analogues of all of them existed in 1998 (Classmates.com, DejaNews, RealVideo, EBay, Monster, and...well, nothing really for Twitter), but it took almost 20 years for the underlying infrastructure to get mature enough to get mass consumer adoption.

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#272

Post by GCA10 » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 8:36 PM UTC

jiveturkey wrote: post #255

GCA10 wrote: post #232

t. I think you have to interview them a little bit. Ask hard questions and see if they give direct, insightful answers, or if they're evasive and dismissive.> Actually, letting charismatic founders deliver a triple-scoop of their enchanting story isn't the technique I'd recommend. Both the good ones and the bad ones got this far by being very persuasive. Do reference checks instead. Find people who worked with them f…

i agree with you, interviewing the founders is not a proper way to go about it. paul is full of it. there is no way past 50 or maybe 100 employees that you are going to have or be able to request an interview with the founders. and if you did pull it off, your time allotment to ask questions of them would be 10 minutes. but, how would you do a reference check on larry, sergey, or holmes? none of whom held a job befor…

So in the land of journalists, this is what we do every week. Something like this can be an effective strategy.

Find a couple current employees or associates who come across as stable and thoughtful. Invite them out for coffee, dinner, a long walk, etc. You want to talk alone, outside the office. Spend a little time on social rapport, including taking an interest in them as fully-rounded people. Candor needs a foundation of trust and mutual respect. Then ask open-ended questions that make it easy for people be helpful without feeling that they are on the spot.

Some examples are:

- What attracted you to the company?

- What's the work tempo like?

- What's some advice for the best way of getting along with the founder/CEO? (This is a safe way for flaws to surface)

- We all make mistakes occasionally. What mistakes are forgivable at this company? What's unforgivable? (Think how the Theranos answers would have differed from Google answers.)

- What's surprised you since joining?

- What delights the boss? What gets the boss angry? (Plenty of chances for signaling here, too.)

- What kind of people stay here and thrive? What kind of people quit?

- What would I need to do to be successful here? -

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#273

Post by dsnuh » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 8:37 PM UTC

dionidium wrote: post #246

sulam wrote: post #128

His reason for why he’s a vi guy was funny! (He only had 60M free for his Linux partition and emacs wouldn’t fit). It did sound mildly apocryphal but so did most of it. My reason for vi is equally random. I learned Unix at college, but I wasn’t allowed on the systems because I wasn’t an engineering student. I had to resort to nefarious means to get online, so I needed to keep a really low profile. The easiest way to…

I had a prof in college who demonstrated stuff in vi and I knew immediately that I wanted to do what he was doing. If he'd have been an emacs guy, then I probably would be, too, but instead I still prefer vi over anything else ~15 years later.

I feel like the first time you see a vim/emacs power user is one of those eye-opening moments in your learning.

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#274

Post by pm90 » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 8:41 PM UTC

pvarangot wrote: post #170

mendelk wrote: post #168

Welp, now that my Imposter Syndrome has returned in full force, any concrete advice on leveling up in engineering skill (other than getting hired at Google circa 1999)? Edit: I now see that Paul coined the "Don't be Evil" slogan[0]. I'm curious what his thoughts on its removal and what that portends for Google today. u/paul? [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22540

Get hired at any place where good engineering is done, or at a startup where no engineering is really done and you get to make the calls about how engineering is done. Work for 10+ hours a day, and on your free time read about engineering from blogs or books, see conference videos, and go to conferences. After 4 or 5 years of doing this you'll maybe know enough about how "everthing works" and what books says how to d…

This is hard, but fair advice for anyone who wants to get "really good". Perhaps there are those who are born gifted with the critical thinking and analytic skills which makes this unnecessary. I am not one of them, and the past year has been intense but a great learning experience. And Paul says as much: you don't start of being good, but you work intensively on your skills over a period of time and get really good.

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#275

Post by obstacle1 » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 8:58 PM UTC

jsutton wrote: post #207

pvarangot wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get hired at any place where good engineering is done, or at a startup where no engineering is really done and you get to make the calls about how engineering is done. Work for 10+ hours a day, and on your free time read about engineering from blogs or books, see conference videos, and go to conferences. After 4 or 5 years of doing this you'll maybe know enough about how "everthing works" and what books says how to d…

This seems like generally good advice, except for having to spend every waking moment using your brain for work. Balance is important. Spending some of that free time on learning engineering is good advice, just not all of it. Make sure you spend some free time with friends/family, physical activities, and relaxation.

> Balance is important.

Not for everyone.

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#276

Post by sjg007 » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 9:03 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #242

existencebox wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was literally talking about this exact phenomena with the wife last night. It's almost impossible for me to be bored if I'm doing nothing. I could fill years of daydreaming, just in my own head. However, give me work tasks that I have no interest in, and I'll feel so bored/lethargic/unmotivated that just keeping my eyes on task and moving forward requires mental exertion. When I was young, apparently this meant I h…

Yeah, I feel the same way you do. Please, leave me with nothing to do; I'll manage. Left to my own devices, I have 20 ideas 5 trains of thought to explore per minute. > I see in a side comment you were concerned about undiagnosed ADD, I'll admit I'm somewhat concerned with _overdiagnosing_ ADD. I get it. Child AD(H)D seems definitely overdiagnosed in the west; from what I read, giving medication seems to be the easie…

ADD is not over diagnosed. It's probably more prevalent in the population than we think it is. The medications are not specifically harmful in a potential misdiagnosed case... they are just not effective. And there's multiple medications which have difference efficacies for different people. That being said 80% of people with ADHD find medication effective.

Dr. Russell Barkley has a book on it and also several talks on youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7QuWchHvOY http://www.russellbarkley.org/

But you should get screened if you feel it would be beneficial. Find a doctor that specializes in ADHD/ADD. The way most adults find out they have ADHD/ADD is when they take their kids in for screening, usually due to school issues.

Depression, anxiety are co-morbid with ADHD/ADD as well.

Here's a good talk on one women's experience with ADHD. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiwZQNYlGQI

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#277

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 9:50 PM UTC

matwood wrote: post #264

crdoconnor wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And just like that, the just world fallacy kicks in :) I certainly don't think it's a bad thing to make your teammates look good, but in general it's more effective to give the lion's share of the credit to the boss rather than them. And credit is a limited resource. I say that like it's a bad thing because it kind of is. I believe there are some companies where coworkers rather than management decide promotions and…

Since you're talking about 'credit' you have completely missed the point. I'm talking about making the whole team look good by making them better. That means helping team members get better. That means helping your boss get better. If the whole team looks good, guess who benefits the most from that? Your boss. And, who cares who decides promotions. If every team you end up on becomes great, you will end up where you…

[deleted]

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#278

Post by Izkata » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 9:53 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #103

username3 wrote: post #42

Anyone have videos of someone programming fast or a video of a 10x engineer working or a comparison output of a 10x vs above average?

I'm reminded of the "Feynman Algorithm": 1. Write down the problem. 2. Think real hard. 3. Write down the solution. This is a joke of course, but much of the real 10xness is invisible. It certainly doesn't look like typing. Perhaps quite a lot of it occurs off screen, in conversations, whiteboards, on the computers of colleagues. I'll give you two analogies: In some ways it's like one of those "bullet hell" shoot-em-…

Heh, I've "bug sniped" co-workers before. They'd be stuck on something and eventually ask for help, then while looking over their shoulder and before they can explain the problem, I'd notice something just looks off and mention it. About half the time it turns out to be a second bug they know about but haven't gotten to yet because of the first one.

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#279

Post by TulliusCicero » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 10:17 PM UTC

baccheion wrote: post #50

sigi45 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

oO you didn't like anyone there? Sounds like a problem with yourself. Can't imagine that you were sourrounded by assholes.

It didn't matter if they had an off-putting personality or were "OK." Either way, I just wasn't feeling it. On the other hand, the same happens wherever I go. Maybe Google's reputation of attracting certain personalities led me to believe there would be others that were similar or like-minded. Instead, they were mostly unhealthy judger types (though I'm not sure if the source is reliable, a few years ago 23.6% were s…

> I also couldn't settle in, didn't like anyone, and was continually interrupted/harassed/>>followed> On the other hand, the same happens wherever I go.

Is that you, mchurch?

Re: Paul Buchheit on Joining Google, How to Become a Great Engineer, and Happiness

#280

Post by 33a » Fri, Oct 19, 2018, 10:23 PM UTC

bootsz wrote: post #102

> I didn't have to work that hard, and one day I had this realization while sitting in my gray cubicle (I was in a sea of gray cubicles surrounded by gray walls, listening to white noise and all alone): I'm like, “Man I am so tired. I need to go home and take a nap.” I went home, but as soon as I got there I realized, “I'm not tired anymore.” Is there a name for this type of fatigue (or perception thereof)? I'm curio…

Office air quality maybe?