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Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

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Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#281

Post by bpicolo »

momento wrote: post #124
donatj wrote: post #49

I don’t hear much about it these days, but circa 2004 when I was going into computer science I had multiple teachers and a guidance counselor warn me that all the jobs would be going to India and tell me I should pursue something else. This seemed to be very much the prevailing wisdom of the time. I pursued it anyway as it was my passion. I was one of five students in my program that had been a huge multi-campus prog…

My father was very strongly against my decision to get into web development (2012) and he echoed this sentiment heavily. I distinctly remember him yelling at me as a teenager; "you'll be living under a bridge in 5 years if you do this! India has this market!". He eventually kicked me out for not listening, forcing me to to borrow money from a friend to pay tuition in my final semester. Needless to say he was complete…

I've found that working with outsourced technical teams usually makes me feel even more confident in job security in the industry, rather than less

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#282

Post by hughrr »

Tycho wrote: post #210
hughrr wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there’s anything I’ve learned it is that you should always make your own mistakes. Your parent’s mistakes don’t even make sense any more 30-40 years down the line. My father pushed me into EE. I burned 5 years in industry being paid crap and then discovered it was actually a fairly low paying profession in the UK. Ended up supporting a bunch of Sun machines for other EEs which was more fun. So i learned Perl one w…

Why is EE so bad? On the surface it looks like a degree with a strong grounding in mathematics, exposure to programming, the discipline of engineering, and a diverse range of applications across industry. It kind of seems like the ideal degree if you want to hire someone. I'm always baffled when I hear stories like this.

Well for me the degree was of mediocre usefulness. The job I had to sit in an office on a factory floor with no windows, fully airgapped on my own 7 hours a day doing test automation and designing test fixtures mostly. That was the entry position for us back then really. I had to wear full static gear head to toe which was hot and uncomfortable and smelled weird. This was broken up twice a day by some shitty machine coffee and to sit in the canteen and stare out the two small windows at people outside at the company over the road all smoking. All while being paid just about enough to eat for the month and keep up with my games habit. There were also 9 layers of bureaucratic nightmare everywhere and as the company was large everyone knew or was related to everyone else as they all lived in the same area so it was politics galore.

It was just sooooo depressing.

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#283

Post by __s »

getlawgdon wrote: post #271
varjag wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have similarly endless opportunities for arbitrage today, which will only become clear in a decade or two.

Sorry? I'm not understanding -- arbitrage in what market(s)?

Any. They're pointing out that markets are priced with predictions of future value, but some of those predictions are wrong

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#284

Post by superflit »

raducu wrote: post #172
momento wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My father was very strongly against my decision to get into web development (2012) and he echoed this sentiment heavily. I distinctly remember him yelling at me as a teenager; "you'll be living under a bridge in 5 years if you do this! India has this market!". He eventually kicked me out for not listening, forcing me to to borrow money from a friend to pay tuition in my final semester. Needless to say he was complete…

I'm really sorry for the relationship you have with your father. I've had similar experiences, but not as drastic as yours -- my father didn't allow me to use my bike for YEARS as a punishment for smashing my bike as a 10 year old (faulty chain, impulsive child). I guess this I would call the real toxic masculinity. Unfortunately there's nothing much you can do, except build your life around it, keep your boundaries…

Your life is very personal and has its own challenges as everyone.

As a father let me add a perspective.

A father role is Not to be a friend. He *may* be a friend but its most important role is to prepare the kid to the real world.

No kid ever, ever thinks of itself as spoiled. The ego of a kid is always *Me*.

That is how they are and it is normal.

Now Imagine that *maybe* you as a normal kid were kind of spoiled and impulsive.

If you don't "tame" or take down what will be this kid be?

*impulse* control is on almost all indicators of success.

Does it look harsh YEARS of not using bike?

Maybe?

Does it worked? Seems like, you appear to be well educated and working.

I know you may have anger and feel bad.

But how many others things you Did Not smashed because of that? Projects? Relationships? Jobs?

Being a parent is very hard your sons have their own destiny and mind and still you have to navigate the ever changing scenario of modern world. Yesterday was a bike, today is a Nintendo Switch/ipad, tomorrow will be levitating hover.

/EndRant

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#285

Post by me_me_me »

raducu wrote: post #258
me_me_me wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> my father didn't allow me to use my bike for YEARS as a punishment for smashing my bike as a 10 year old Seriously, being so strict to punish a 10yrs old kid for years is not a sign of a toxic personality? Parents suppose to build theirs kids character and not stomp on it to make them 'tough'. toxic masculinity is not being manly man man. Its being insecure and lashing out at anyone who disagrees with you or is no…

The last bit fits the bill the most in his case -- he took it as a huge personal attack that I smashed the bike he bought, and the tough discipline he was raised in is why I labeled it as toxic masculinity.

I am sorry you had a bad luck with your father, but as they say you don't chose your family. Its not your fault he was a shitty parent.

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#286

Post by madengr »

graycat wrote: post #191

1987? How could the poor students have known? Gee, 1987, I was at IBM's Watson lab as a researcher in their effort at the time in artificial intelligence. So, at the lab we had an ambitious computer services group, and they had for our general use six mainframes, I believe all single processor machines, running the operating system software Virtual Machine/Conversational Monitor System (VM/CMS). For access from home,…

Play FarmVille and watch porn.

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#287

Post by sergiomattei »

macspoofing wrote: post #277
lordnacho wrote: post #64

My biggest issue with education is the whole "study this, get a job doing that" idea. It's plainly wrong, and it sucks in people who drink the koolaid and think there's an easy route to work. Very little is learned in college that is necessary for general employment. By general I mean just about everything that isn't licensed, like being a doctor. What college does is it throws a bunch of hard but irrelevant subjects…

>Very little is learned in college that is necessary for general employment. Obviously for a programming job you don't necessarily need a 4-year university degree, but I wouldn't diminish its value either. >What college does is it throws a bunch of hard but irrelevant subjects at you that you slog through No. That's not the right way to look at university education. The golden rule is "You get out what you put in". I…

I agree. If you're in college spending who-knows-how-much for your education, make it worth the money...

Take some electives on stuff you're into. Music theory, humanities, social sciences... Take the time to go deeper on your passions. Study the broad amount of subjects: you're going to have more structure than self-study.

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#288

Post by hughrr »

murgindrag wrote: post #261
Tycho wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is EE so bad? On the surface it looks like a degree with a strong grounding in mathematics, exposure to programming, the discipline of engineering, and a diverse range of applications across industry. It kind of seems like the ideal degree if you want to hire someone. I'm always baffled when I hear stories like this.

An EE degree IS awesome. It gives a generalizable mathematical foundation which applies in just about any other field of work. It gives a huge competitive edge. For example: * Circuits are physical implementations of differential equations, and EE gives a unique way to intuitively think about dynamics, which applies to finance, epidemiology, and just a really diverse range of domains. * With a rigorous EE background,…

I think you over promote the utility of the formal methods taught in the degree.

Not once did I use Laplace in EE. It was all cheat sheets or applying data sheets and doing some adhoc calculations in excel or taking a wild guess and iterating.

After twenty years of doing IT related stuff I’ve forgotten how to even differentiate stuff.

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#289

Post by liquidpele »

Tycho wrote: post #210
hughrr wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there’s anything I’ve learned it is that you should always make your own mistakes. Your parent’s mistakes don’t even make sense any more 30-40 years down the line. My father pushed me into EE. I burned 5 years in industry being paid crap and then discovered it was actually a fairly low paying profession in the UK. Ended up supporting a bunch of Sun machines for other EEs which was more fun. So i learned Perl one w…

Why is EE so bad? On the surface it looks like a degree with a strong grounding in mathematics, exposure to programming, the discipline of engineering, and a diverse range of applications across industry. It kind of seems like the ideal degree if you want to hire someone. I'm always baffled when I hear stories like this.

Market shrank as it matured and software generally took over most workloads.

Re: Students flee field as computer 'fad fades' (1987)

#290

Post by ChuckNorris89 »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #272
murgindrag wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An EE degree IS awesome. It gives a generalizable mathematical foundation which applies in just about any other field of work. It gives a huge competitive edge. For example: * Circuits are physical implementations of differential equations, and EE gives a unique way to intuitively think about dynamics, which applies to finance, epidemiology, and just a really diverse range of domains. * With a rigorous EE background,…

EE is one of those "engineering is really applied physics" disciplines. There's a slant towards standardised EE-specific solutions for PDEs, but it's still much more abstract and mathematical than any field of CS, apart from maybe cryptography and data science. But career-wise, it's a mediocre choice in most Western countries. (Possible exception is Germany, where engineers have a similar status to doctors and lawyer…

>Germany, where engineers have a similar status to doctors and lawyers

Errr, no they don't. In terms of pay and status Doctors and Lawyers trump Engineers every day of the week in Germany, the only exception being the engineers with PhDs who are tech leads in some well known research institute or big-brand company like Audi or Porsche.

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