“Developers are special. They are prima donnas willing to quit their job if the coffee machine is broken. They also earn above average salaries and some of them are even rich. A lot of them are depressed and some or them are doing meaningful work.”
Not sure what to make of that. Especially the depressed part. A little nutty.
It's very vague. I'm guessing that some of it is hyperbole and i don't know what to make of it.
However, I'd be willing to bet that the stereotypical geek who enjoys spending more time in front of a screen rather than in the real world, who is lacking in the physical and social is more prone to mental health issues than those who don't have these traits
As someone trying to switch back into full time development after pivoting from it some years ago, I have to say I'm depressed at the landscape. 90% of jobs are some form web development in JS or Python which require experience with the framework du jour. It's not clear to me if by the time I'll learn them they won't be already obsolete. They seem very poor targets to specialize yourself in and unlikely to be recognized as senior level positions. The remaining jobs usually demand highly specialized experience with a very tiny subset of what I consider IT technical skills, but at a senior level, for example: Linux kernel module developer - a job I could certainly do but only after 3-6 largely unproductive months.
Companies don't seem to hire "computer programmers" anymore: people with a broad horizontal skill set that can write code and quickly learn a new imperative language or framework as required by the current project, that can understand the principles of the underlying hardware, of the entire network stack, of the OS that ties everything together and delivers some high level abstraction like a web service etc. It's all a fragmented mess of very specialized islands.
Perhaps companies are no longer willing to invest in specialization of external talent or internally fulfill all needs for a broad skill set, because such jobs are the most fun and desirable. What's left over for outsiders are just the script monkeying and deep niches.
As someone who is a web developer but has taught myself a lot of deeper skills and concepts in math and cs, I find it frustrating that there are no middle of the road roles that use those skills. Being a backend web dev is about all I can hope for. Perhaps I’ll get a masters at some point? (Very unlikely)
I quit a dev job and went to university and studied robotics (I didnt want to study CS directly as I felt knowing some parts and not others would mean id struggle for motivation). I don't regret it at all, and having strong dev skills has helped me greatly in robotics industry jobs as well - just recently in a new job I was able to take on an app project that the company was relying on but whose sole maintainer had left months ago. It wasn't part of my core role, but I instantly embedded myself as someone who is valuable
Ah this is a great point. I have pretty broad interests so pursuing something that uses code but would be a more niche degree might actually be more up my alley. Was your robotics degree a secondary degree (grad degree here in the US)?
I actually didn't have a degree before so I went and did both a batchelors degree and then a masters. The university I studied in was quite good so I stayed at the same uni for both (I think that maps onto undergrad + grad). Took me 6 years in total - the maths foundation for robotics is different and kinda intense so im glad to have done the batchelors, I think I would have been quite lost on the masters directly. That being said, I did move to a country where tuition is free (denmark) so a longer degree only cost me time
> 90% of jobs are some form web development in JS or Python which require experience with the framework de'jour. It's not clear to me if by the time I'll learn them they won't be already obsolete.
I don't work with JS, and haven't used Python professionally in a few years but still I think you are overthinking this.
Yes, JS has a bunch of flavour-of-the-month issue with frameworks and libraries, I have seen it go full circle in a few regards for the past 15 years. Python much less, it's been Django and a few other frameworks (including some microframeworks, unsure how popular they are the past 8 years).
That doesn't mean that if you learn one of them and people switch to their new hyped approach in 6-12 months you'll be dead in the water. Major concepts don't change much, they might evolve but the web is the web.
If you have the disposition, just learn the bigger ones right now and be happy, this fear is quite unfounded as, if you are experienced, it shouldn't take a year or more to learn them, it will be a month or two of applied effort to create some toy project, expand the project with more complexity so you can understand/learn some gotchas and quirks.
> Companies don't seem to hire "computer programmers" anymore: people with a broad horizontal skill set that can write code and quickly learn a new imperative language or framework as required by the current project, that can understand the principles of the underlying hardware, of the entire network stack, of the OS that ties everything together and delivers some high level abstraction like a web service etc. It's all a fragmented mess of very specialized islands.
They absolutely do, I interview people all the time and I don't really care if they know all the nit-gritty aspects of our tech stack, I want smart people who can learn something if they need to, even better if they don't have to do that in their free time and can pick it up as we go during the usual office hours. The thing is that a lot of candidates have some experience with a similar stack or framework in use, of course they will have an advantage, but if you have a broad horizontal skill set that's still more valuable than a React expert...
I say that because my skillset is quite broad but not extremely deep in any aspect, I'm pretty T-shaped in my knowledge and I haven't learned the framework de'jour at any point in almost 20 years of career. I've got jobs and when needed learned what the company used in their tech stack.
> if you have a broad horizontal skill set that's still more valuable than a React expert...
It would help if the job posting would say that, as opposed to the boilerplate "we are looking for someone who LOVES Docker, Kubernetes and containerized microservice-based APIs". It sounds like a sinister cargo cult, or even worse, an actual cult. I mean, what sane person could possibly love Kubernetes? It's just a tool with pros and cons that will morph into something else 10 years from now, perhaps I'm not yet ready to sacrifice my firstborn to the K god. It all makes me feel so much older than I am.
As a bootcamp and self taught alumn, one of 3 in my class of 25 to have made the switch, I can say that patience and actually enjoying the process are most important. I think this is true for most endeavors though.
I have also tutored several people and I've found the article misses the point slightly. Some people pick things up, some don't. It is often to do with motivation, which comes from stuff like how engaging they find the process.
I'm always highly skeptical of claims that you just need to push through and do things you hate. The people who are running in the olympics aren't the people that did the most horrid awful things they hated. They just like training! Learning to like something is difficult and can't really be forced, and it really matters who your teachers/role models are and how well you relate to them. I imagine the kind of person who is into this whole tough guy hustle grindset stuff is the kind of guy that is successful under this guy's tutelage, in a similar way to how the students that are quiet and thoughtful, unconfident and a little lazy are successful in my own experience
If every step of a journey has to be "fun" for me to make it, I'm likely to fail in every endeavour. Tolerance for discomfort and the ability to show up and do the work even when you're not fully enjoying it is a valuable personal trait regardless of what you're trying to do.
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[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 47.9 ms ] threadNot sure what to make of that. Especially the depressed part. A little nutty.
However, I'd be willing to bet that the stereotypical geek who enjoys spending more time in front of a screen rather than in the real world, who is lacking in the physical and social is more prone to mental health issues than those who don't have these traits
Le sigh.
Source: I’m a bad programmer with balls.
Companies don't seem to hire "computer programmers" anymore: people with a broad horizontal skill set that can write code and quickly learn a new imperative language or framework as required by the current project, that can understand the principles of the underlying hardware, of the entire network stack, of the OS that ties everything together and delivers some high level abstraction like a web service etc. It's all a fragmented mess of very specialized islands.
Perhaps companies are no longer willing to invest in specialization of external talent or internally fulfill all needs for a broad skill set, because such jobs are the most fun and desirable. What's left over for outsiders are just the script monkeying and deep niches.
I don't work with JS, and haven't used Python professionally in a few years but still I think you are overthinking this.
Yes, JS has a bunch of flavour-of-the-month issue with frameworks and libraries, I have seen it go full circle in a few regards for the past 15 years. Python much less, it's been Django and a few other frameworks (including some microframeworks, unsure how popular they are the past 8 years).
That doesn't mean that if you learn one of them and people switch to their new hyped approach in 6-12 months you'll be dead in the water. Major concepts don't change much, they might evolve but the web is the web.
If you have the disposition, just learn the bigger ones right now and be happy, this fear is quite unfounded as, if you are experienced, it shouldn't take a year or more to learn them, it will be a month or two of applied effort to create some toy project, expand the project with more complexity so you can understand/learn some gotchas and quirks.
> Companies don't seem to hire "computer programmers" anymore: people with a broad horizontal skill set that can write code and quickly learn a new imperative language or framework as required by the current project, that can understand the principles of the underlying hardware, of the entire network stack, of the OS that ties everything together and delivers some high level abstraction like a web service etc. It's all a fragmented mess of very specialized islands.
They absolutely do, I interview people all the time and I don't really care if they know all the nit-gritty aspects of our tech stack, I want smart people who can learn something if they need to, even better if they don't have to do that in their free time and can pick it up as we go during the usual office hours. The thing is that a lot of candidates have some experience with a similar stack or framework in use, of course they will have an advantage, but if you have a broad horizontal skill set that's still more valuable than a React expert...
I say that because my skillset is quite broad but not extremely deep in any aspect, I'm pretty T-shaped in my knowledge and I haven't learned the framework de'jour at any point in almost 20 years of career. I've got jobs and when needed learned what the company used in their tech stack.
It would help if the job posting would say that, as opposed to the boilerplate "we are looking for someone who LOVES Docker, Kubernetes and containerized microservice-based APIs". It sounds like a sinister cargo cult, or even worse, an actual cult. I mean, what sane person could possibly love Kubernetes? It's just a tool with pros and cons that will morph into something else 10 years from now, perhaps I'm not yet ready to sacrifice my firstborn to the K god. It all makes me feel so much older than I am.
Anyway, thanks you for the insightful response.
I'm always highly skeptical of claims that you just need to push through and do things you hate. The people who are running in the olympics aren't the people that did the most horrid awful things they hated. They just like training! Learning to like something is difficult and can't really be forced, and it really matters who your teachers/role models are and how well you relate to them. I imagine the kind of person who is into this whole tough guy hustle grindset stuff is the kind of guy that is successful under this guy's tutelage, in a similar way to how the students that are quiet and thoughtful, unconfident and a little lazy are successful in my own experience
If every step of a journey has to be "fun" for me to make it, I'm likely to fail in every endeavour. Tolerance for discomfort and the ability to show up and do the work even when you're not fully enjoying it is a valuable personal trait regardless of what you're trying to do.