What’s the end goal for you programmers? • Hacker News Board

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#71

Post by tmountain » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 1:56 PM UTC

Pretty simple. Live a life that I enjoy. So many people have a binary view of work; meaning, "I am working" or "I am not working". For me, it's about working the right amount, having the quality of life I desire, living where I want, and having the flexibility to do the things that I want.

I say this as someone that has "made money"; meaning, a substantial amount to retire if I want to, I enjoy the psychological safety that continuing to earn income provides. That said, I'm doing that on my own terms, and I've fully steered away from an employee/boss relationship to business partnerships.

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#72

Post by waffles2021 » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 1:57 PM UTC

I don't think there is an end goal. Programmers do seem to have an abundance of Ego, so maybe best to keep that under control? Personally, seniority comes with opportunity. If you keep stretching and learning, you can work in pretty much any industry you want.

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#73

Post by nurettin » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 2:06 PM UTC

I thought that the entire goal was to retire early and do whatever you want after. Did that somehow change over the past 30 or so years?

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#74

Post by ushakov » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 2:16 PM UTC

phantomathkg wrote: post #67

ushakov wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> for most of the applications we build we definitely are going to make the world slightly better no you won’t what you will be doing instead is help make some stakeholders richer (and they don’t give a F about making the world better) if you really want to try make the world better, then start volunteering and start helping those in need

> if you really want to try make the world better, then start volunteering and start helping those in need Yes and no. Some of the issues can be solved by volunteering, but some of the technical progress have to done by software.

of course, but the type of software that can make the world better and solve some of the world's problems (like hunger and climate change) is not the software the majority of the people on HN are working on, me including

maybe we should stop lying to ourselves and admit that what we're doing is not something special, will most definitely not make the world better and in many cases makes things even worse (social media and advertising industry)

don't believe companies when they tell you you're working on a very important problem that will change the world

this is all made to distract you from the fact you're being exploited for profit

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#75

Post by Brian_K_White » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 2:19 PM UTC

unnouinceput wrote: post #31

DanUKs wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s great at your parents house but when you have kids to feed and a mortgage to pay, doing it for free is off the cards, no matter how much you love it.

I would never stop programming. It is a joy for me to do little utilities that makes my life easier. Even with billions of dollars in bank account I would still hack away at an ESP32 to stick it in a flying helicopter toy for example. And lucky for me this field is highly dynamic, I would never get bored learning new technologies. For me programming is like a kid with his shiny toys, every day another one. And I am p…

Makery stuff is still fun, but the work stuff used to be fun and now is not.

I did a lot of sysadmin so it was a lot of individual unix servers and different kinds of integration problem solving getting printers or networks to work or rigging up weird edi's over modems or ftp etc, getting some bespoke backend software to talk to some weird machine where nether the OS, nor app, nor apps language, nor wierd machine vendors provided that last bit of help needed to connect them together, mini-proto-HA by just making a better more redundant ordinary server,.. basically "IT rigging"

That was for me all just great fun. But now 99% of that is just cloud services and they are all soul sucking to me, probably more because of the corporate environment they get used within more than the tech itself, where you and everyone else are hardly treated any different than the machine. Everything is so managed that I don't feel like the modern tools are expressive and empowering like the old tools. Everything is services with predefined limits and potentials based middle of the bell curve assumptions about what people need vs languages and hardware where you rigged up your own interesting solutions to each new problem.

So I too now play with arduino/esp32 toys and open source projects for fun, and am pretty glad I already made enough money that it doesn't matter that no one would pay me for this.

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#76

Post by kojeovo » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 3:09 PM UTC

powerhour wrote: post #66

kojeovo wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean - you don't have 30 mins per day to go walk / jog? Does it not worry you that you may never able to actually retire and have bad physical health on top?

30 minutes isn't much contiguous time and would probably be a net-negative in my goals, even when considering health benefits. It does worry me that I may retire in bad health but I'm saving as fast as I can to avoid that. I'm also speed-running to ensure I will have the time I need to help my parents as they get older. In any case, I am confident I will be able to retire (I nearly have the funds). To be clear, I'm d…

I'm just saying you can start with a small amount of time, not sure why you think you need more. It will compound and the benefits surely wont be a net negative, especially if mentally burned out. It's much easier to start now than when you're older. To each their own though.

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#77

Post by ghoward » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 3:12 PM UTC

I am not working in industry; I'm such a loner programmer that I struggle in industry. But since my wife likes her work, I have space to write the software I want to write.

My first goal is to make that software good enough and useful enough to create an engineering-only company like Hwaci, the company that does SQLite and Fossil.

If I succeed at that, I'll see about trying to pull in enough money to retire early and do charity work through my church.

But I have another goal for while I'm still in industry. I want to change our industry such that it is a professional industry, with a code of ethics, to where we create software that serves users, not our employers or government.

This means fighting against slurping up user data, serving ads, and other ways that software disobeys users in favor of obeying its creators. I even created a Twitter account to show some of those things. [1]

Yes, that means an uphill battle against basically all of Big Tech, and I don't expect to win. But if I make people think about it, I'll take that as a win.

But regardless, I feel strongly about it because users depend on us to make software that will serve them. If we don't, no one will.

Uncle Bob Martin talked about this. [2] (That link starts at a good point, but the whole talk is worth watching.)

So that's my goal: make good software and change the industry for the better. Lofty, yes, but I'll be satisfied by completing one of those goals.

[1]: https://twitter.com/software_crimes

[2]: https://youtu.be/ecIWPzGEbFc?t=3557

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#78

Post by powerhour » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 3:21 PM UTC

kojeovo wrote: post #76

powerhour wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

30 minutes isn't much contiguous time and would probably be a net-negative in my goals, even when considering health benefits. It does worry me that I may retire in bad health but I'm saving as fast as I can to avoid that. I'm also speed-running to ensure I will have the time I need to help my parents as they get older. In any case, I am confident I will be able to retire (I nearly have the funds). To be clear, I'm d…

I'm just saying you can start with a small amount of time, not sure why you think you need more. It will compound and the benefits surely wont be a net negative, especially if mentally burned out. It's much easier to start now than when you're older. To each their own though.

It seems like every time I want to get away for some period I am called back. My bosses work mornings and evenings so they're seemingly always around needing something. And if I don't take care of things right away they just push tasks I'm working on, so my task list never shrinks, only grows.

It's definitely a bad situation but every job I've had ends up like this so I dunno, feels like my only option is to get out ASAP. (And FWIW I'm well in to middle age.)

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#79

Post by ramesh31 » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 3:52 PM UTC

I ask myself this question every day. I'm pretty sure the answer is not to be slinging Javascript when I'm 40. Maybe I'll just buy a goat farm.

Re: What’s the end goal for you programmers?

#80

Post by nextweek2 » Mon, Jul 25, 2022, 5:48 PM UTC

I'm GenX and have an outlook different from my younger peers. I work hard 60-80 hours a week to earn as much as I can. Programming is something I do well but I'm happiest outside in the woods or on water.

The difference is I have never taken more than a two week holiday or a break from work. Whereas younger generations seem to drop out of the workforce. This is something I can't fathom as I track my pension and investments on a weekly basis, I'm literally working to retire in relative luxury.

People tell me I may not make it and I should live more for the now, but I fear being old and still having to sit at a desk more. By 60 I want to have f#ck you money.