First programming job – a 4 month reflection

> I've made sure that my code was secure

> has just always been embedded into my programming philosophy

> So their environment was broken to me.

> I've began to realize that I'm a much better programmer than all of them

Good code quality, and security, is something everyone needs a bit more of, but be careful not to fall into dogmatic thinking. They are paying you to do tasks the way they want them done. If you can show them a "better"[1] way they might take your advice, but you should never expect it. Programming is more than just a job skill to me, so I always have to remind myself about the line between "my code", built on my own time, and "their code" for which I am being paid to build/maintain.[2]

> I showed them OSWAP, and they have never heard of it.

> I mentioned MVC pattern, and the manager didn't know what that was.

This is common. Never hearing of something is not bad. No one can keep track of all the tools available, learn them well enough to use them, and still accomplish what they need to do. No matter how much time you spend trying to keep up, you won't.

Also, your coworkers, and manager, might already know what will and won't be approved. So, they are only informing themselves of things that are likely to be important to their tasks.

> I've began wondering if all work environments are like this.

No comment.

[1] There are many definitions of better. (Time, money, complexity, maintenance, ROI, etc.)

[2] Some managers / employers want you to mix the two concepts, but, in my experience, this is just encouragement to focus more attention on the tasks they are giving you. You need to draw a line.

However, at some point it will become obvious that you can/can't effect change in a meaningful timeframe. And if the latter, you should move on.

The sad truth is that often the bad type of programmers the author describes are unwilling to learn, and are especially reluctant to take lessons from a new/young colleague.

My first thought is to have meetings where you and your team make a list of problems that you guys are facing (is logging not enough? is disk filling up quickly? is it getting hard to maintain some part of the code, etc). Don't go overboard. People who are much more senior than you are in this organization have pride. Imagine you worked your way up and did most of the coding and suddenly a new hire called your code shitty and ugly and non-functional, that hurt. Also, some people fear of breaking system. School in particular hates it. They don't care; students don't care. If school's portal is down for more than 1 hour, someone is gonna get an ugly call from some executive admin.

I can say testing, MVC patterns, all that shit (excuse my french here, in your manager's hypothetical voice) are least priority. What are your priority. Prove SQLi. Then fix it. Are there documentations for how to set up a server running the software you guys are working on? Is it done with a shell script. If so, is it working?

Testing and new development patterns shouldn't be your priority. They are cultural. You can't build Rome in one day unless you have all the people behind your back.

Scrum style, sure, but do it slowly. Also, this may sound extreme, but sometimes, you need to play a bit dumb. Don't show off. Some people can't face the fact they are out of the league... sometimes playing dumb/doing things a little slow can make things smoother.

What are examples of companies that have a verifiable 'great software' culture and chose PHP because they prefer the language?