Aging in tech?
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Programming tiny connectable gadgets - "Internet of Things or IoT gadgets" is an absolute joy. No frameworks to muddy the water - with 520kB of RAM you can't afford them, no abstractions to complicate the process, just you and the bare metal. Building them is fun too. But part of me wonders if it isn't because I'm getting old, and learning all these technologies feels more and more like a waste of what time I have left. I mean, I love to learn, and I love to be challenged but it has to be on my terms. In some ways, that has kept me from moving forward - designing the backend of a website these days? Get someone else - I'd be using 10 year old designs. I like these little things in a way because they're a throwback to when I learned to code. Part of me feels like I get a mulligan only I get to go back with what I know now. =) But still, the parser generators and other projects have also been newer technology avoidant outside this one particular arena. A lot of it was developed using theories that were emergent in the 1990s in computer science, so it's not a huge deal these days. I'm also struggling to wrap my head around the way people are going about machine learning. It's entirely different than how I would have and how I used to build learning systems, however unsophisticated they may have been compared to today's tech. Anyone else ever feel that way?
Real programmers use butterflies
My first professional dev job was as an embedded programmer at a fire alarm company. The best project I ever worked on there, was an interface between the devices of an earlier generation system (smoke & heat detectors, pull stations, etc.) and the latest generation system. We still used the waterfall methodology back then. My manager trusted me and gave me basically complete control of every phase. I ended up creating a state machine in C on an 8057 microcontroller. I will never forget that day the new gen system began talking to the older gen devices. It was still at the in-circuit emulator stage, of course, but that damn pull station over there, lit that damn LED on the front panel here! lol Good times. Now, to your point, the only thing constant in life is change. Nowhere is that more apparent than in software. I realized it very early on and made a commitment to lifelong learning. But that isn't to say there is only one path through the forest. I essentially followed my heart. At that fire alarm company back in the late 80's, I worked with nascent "expert system" dev environments to help the service techs in the field. I bought one of the early releases of BrainMaker from California Scientific (I think I still have the 3.5" floppys somewhere) around 1989. For you young'uns, life is too short to become trapped in the matrix! Take the red pill! Hack your own path through the forest. It's more dangerous, but by far more interesting. So, a little off topic. But I had fun. :)
Cheers, Mike Fidler "I intend to live forever - so far, so good." Steven Wright "I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met." Also Steven Wright "I'm addicted to placebos. I could quit, but it wouldn't matter." Steven Wright yet again.
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Quote:
But part of me wonders if it isn't because I'm getting old, and learning all these technologies feels more and more like a waste of what time I have left.
If you are wondering you probably are :D. This is one of my pet peeves: apart from whatever is taught in CS curriculum, we should have been taught to manage our careers like professional athletes. No professional tennis player expects to play in his forties. They move to coaching or live from whatever have accumulated. Same applies to programmers and specially to 10x ones: by the time you are 40 you start becoming a 5x, 3x,.. 0.1x :) You still can do useful things and be gainfully employed but the fun is over. Just my 0.02$
Mircea
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The reason one gets "old" is due to "time compression": when you don't learn anything new, one day is just like the rest. I once said to myself I was too old to learn that (something); then looking back, after x years, it now seems is ridiculous. I've stopped thinking about where a path might lead and if I have enough "time". It only got more interesting. It's the new domains you have to learn along the way.
It was only in wine that he laid down no limit for himself, but he did not allow himself to be confused by it. ― Confucian Analects: Rules of Confucius about his food
I have had a theory about this time compression too. One day like the rest is a big part of it. Nothing important for the brain to keep a vivid record about so it seems like the time is short. I notice the effect disappear when I go on vacation overseas where there is so much new to take in. There is also some effect of each year being a smaller portion of the total. So in wide retrospect, things seem to be going faster. Moral of the story: do new and interesting things!
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I've been a programmer for over 40 years, and here's what I've learned. Every advancement in development that promised to extend the life or improve performance of a given application, or make development faster and easier, will eventually be rendered ineffective under the weight of interference from management. Why bother even learning the new stuff if it's not going to matter in the end. I have three more years before I can retire. I'm glad. I'm pretty much done with my Entity Factory code, and have been struggling to maintain interest in writing the accompanying article. I'm simply tired of typing the text. I have to explain 26 screen shots, and I've only managed less than half that in the last two weeks. I haven't even started part 2, which is to explain the thousands of lines of WPF code. And I was intending to write a 3rd part that talked about converting the code to .Net Core, but... well... you know.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013 -
Programming tiny connectable gadgets - "Internet of Things or IoT gadgets" is an absolute joy. No frameworks to muddy the water - with 520kB of RAM you can't afford them, no abstractions to complicate the process, just you and the bare metal. Building them is fun too. But part of me wonders if it isn't because I'm getting old, and learning all these technologies feels more and more like a waste of what time I have left. I mean, I love to learn, and I love to be challenged but it has to be on my terms. In some ways, that has kept me from moving forward - designing the backend of a website these days? Get someone else - I'd be using 10 year old designs. I like these little things in a way because they're a throwback to when I learned to code. Part of me feels like I get a mulligan only I get to go back with what I know now. =) But still, the parser generators and other projects have also been newer technology avoidant outside this one particular arena. A lot of it was developed using theories that were emergent in the 1990s in computer science, so it's not a huge deal these days. I'm also struggling to wrap my head around the way people are going about machine learning. It's entirely different than how I would have and how I used to build learning systems, however unsophisticated they may have been compared to today's tech. Anyone else ever feel that way?
Real programmers use butterflies
One of the things I've noticed aging is I very rarely write programs for fun versus profit, i.e. my job. When I look at things like IoT, machine learning and AI, I don't feel the motivation to get involved. It's not an inability to learn as I'm often learning and incorporating new things in my work, but it's more that I've limited the scope of the learning to what is practical for me. I suppose it's like a doctor with a specialty they've practiced for 20 years. The newest things outside of your specialty are interesting, but you probably won't use them.
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One of the things I've noticed aging is I very rarely write programs for fun versus profit, i.e. my job. When I look at things like IoT, machine learning and AI, I don't feel the motivation to get involved. It's not an inability to learn as I'm often learning and incorporating new things in my work, but it's more that I've limited the scope of the learning to what is practical for me. I suppose it's like a doctor with a specialty they've practiced for 20 years. The newest things outside of your specialty are interesting, but you probably won't use them.
I can't relate yet, because while I've narrowed the scope of what I'm willing to learn somewhat, I'm still eager about things that capture my interest. IoT was one such thing, and then fun became work as my hobby landed me a gig designing some of these things. Fun fun. Sometimes I find it funny what I can get people to pay me to do. :laugh:
Real programmers use butterflies
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My first professional dev job was as an embedded programmer at a fire alarm company. The best project I ever worked on there, was an interface between the devices of an earlier generation system (smoke & heat detectors, pull stations, etc.) and the latest generation system. We still used the waterfall methodology back then. My manager trusted me and gave me basically complete control of every phase. I ended up creating a state machine in C on an 8057 microcontroller. I will never forget that day the new gen system began talking to the older gen devices. It was still at the in-circuit emulator stage, of course, but that damn pull station over there, lit that damn LED on the front panel here! lol Good times. Now, to your point, the only thing constant in life is change. Nowhere is that more apparent than in software. I realized it very early on and made a commitment to lifelong learning. But that isn't to say there is only one path through the forest. I essentially followed my heart. At that fire alarm company back in the late 80's, I worked with nascent "expert system" dev environments to help the service techs in the field. I bought one of the early releases of BrainMaker from California Scientific (I think I still have the 3.5" floppys somewhere) around 1989. For you young'uns, life is too short to become trapped in the matrix! Take the red pill! Hack your own path through the forest. It's more dangerous, but by far more interesting. So, a little off topic. But I had fun. :)
Cheers, Mike Fidler "I intend to live forever - so far, so good." Steven Wright "I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met." Also Steven Wright "I'm addicted to placebos. I could quit, but it wouldn't matter." Steven Wright yet again.
I am not sure why, but I absolutely love designing, coding and/or generating state machines.
Real programmers use butterflies
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Try working with the young crowd, they will learn from you and you will feel refreshed..
I'd consider it, if the young crowd didn't all work for other people. :laugh: I don't like working for others, and I don't like being an employer. The former goes against what's good for me, and the latter goes against my personal beliefs. So I'm kind of stuck as a freelancer, but it's a niche I enjoy. That kind of keeps most of the young people away except as clients sometimes. I do have a much younger friend who has been using my place to teach her 5th grade classes from due to the coranavirus. So I keep one handy. :laugh:
Real programmers use butterflies
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32kb effective is the least I've ever had to deal with. 4kb is rough! I agree with your comment, generally.
Real programmers use butterflies
First real programming job I had the machine took up 3 racks, the CPU was 4U, the 2 Mb disk 4U. We had 16K ( but I _think_ that was 16 bit words ) and that because both banks had been "knitted" together. Before someone caught that we had ordered 12K. ( PDP 11-15 ).
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Programming tiny connectable gadgets - "Internet of Things or IoT gadgets" is an absolute joy. No frameworks to muddy the water - with 520kB of RAM you can't afford them, no abstractions to complicate the process, just you and the bare metal. Building them is fun too. But part of me wonders if it isn't because I'm getting old, and learning all these technologies feels more and more like a waste of what time I have left. I mean, I love to learn, and I love to be challenged but it has to be on my terms. In some ways, that has kept me from moving forward - designing the backend of a website these days? Get someone else - I'd be using 10 year old designs. I like these little things in a way because they're a throwback to when I learned to code. Part of me feels like I get a mulligan only I get to go back with what I know now. =) But still, the parser generators and other projects have also been newer technology avoidant outside this one particular arena. A lot of it was developed using theories that were emergent in the 1990s in computer science, so it's not a huge deal these days. I'm also struggling to wrap my head around the way people are going about machine learning. It's entirely different than how I would have and how I used to build learning systems, however unsophisticated they may have been compared to today's tech. Anyone else ever feel that way?
Real programmers use butterflies
You basically described how I feel just about every day... I have completed a third attempt at selling a software application (the base application is free and anyone can use it) but the finalization process of testing and completing the updater has me wondering why even bother any longer. Software development has not really changed over the years since I really enjoyed learning all the new tools; it has just simply become far more complex to basically accomplish the same things we have always been doing. There is little respect left for the senior engineers and developers in our profession allowing for rampant ageism to run through the field resulting in a loss of a massive amount of knowledge on how things should be done to make things just work. Today, everyone is in a rush to promote the latest tool-sets despite the realities that none of them will really accomplish anything more than what we used years ago. Web development has, as a result, become a horror show where even many younger developers are starting to wonder if all the complexity is any longer manageable or even worth it. As to the latter, it isn't. Subsequently, I have decided to no longer do such development, preferring to remain with simply developing WPF applications since it is much more straight forward. If I decide to move my current project to that of a multi-user one, I have already decided to build it as a client-server application since .NET makes such older endeavors far easier to implement minus all of the added complexities of dealing with a web server. Of course, it may not be considered "cool" but who knows... At 70 years of age and still involved with a field (on my own) I have spent decades in as an employee and senior consultant, I mourn the loss of the lessor complexity of our earlier years. Really, what have we gained with all these upgrades and more complex paradigms and tools? A little extra speed? A purest approach to web development? Who really cares in the scheme of things? Before the deprivations of outsourcing by greedy, self-centered corporations, our profession in the United States was considered a nation treasure, a crown jewel. Now look at us. And if one is approaching their sixties or already in them, unless one is working completely on their own, they can soon expect to be jettisoned from this profession simply because of their age. However, historians have always said that Humans have no generational memory so everything old is simply to be discarded...
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Programming tiny connectable gadgets - "Internet of Things or IoT gadgets" is an absolute joy. No frameworks to muddy the water - with 520kB of RAM you can't afford them, no abstractions to complicate the process, just you and the bare metal. Building them is fun too. But part of me wonders if it isn't because I'm getting old, and learning all these technologies feels more and more like a waste of what time I have left. I mean, I love to learn, and I love to be challenged but it has to be on my terms. In some ways, that has kept me from moving forward - designing the backend of a website these days? Get someone else - I'd be using 10 year old designs. I like these little things in a way because they're a throwback to when I learned to code. Part of me feels like I get a mulligan only I get to go back with what I know now. =) But still, the parser generators and other projects have also been newer technology avoidant outside this one particular arena. A lot of it was developed using theories that were emergent in the 1990s in computer science, so it's not a huge deal these days. I'm also struggling to wrap my head around the way people are going about machine learning. It's entirely different than how I would have and how I used to build learning systems, however unsophisticated they may have been compared to today's tech. Anyone else ever feel that way?
Real programmers use butterflies
I would assume not only that you are not alone, but that any programmer with 10+ years under their belt feels the same way or is a glutton for punishment. The focus has shifted from crafting good code to a tech race ignoring the basics. Even those who focus on good code get lost in the spaghetti of "smell" and patterns.
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Programming tiny connectable gadgets - "Internet of Things or IoT gadgets" is an absolute joy. No frameworks to muddy the water - with 520kB of RAM you can't afford them, no abstractions to complicate the process, just you and the bare metal. Building them is fun too. But part of me wonders if it isn't because I'm getting old, and learning all these technologies feels more and more like a waste of what time I have left. I mean, I love to learn, and I love to be challenged but it has to be on my terms. In some ways, that has kept me from moving forward - designing the backend of a website these days? Get someone else - I'd be using 10 year old designs. I like these little things in a way because they're a throwback to when I learned to code. Part of me feels like I get a mulligan only I get to go back with what I know now. =) But still, the parser generators and other projects have also been newer technology avoidant outside this one particular arena. A lot of it was developed using theories that were emergent in the 1990s in computer science, so it's not a huge deal these days. I'm also struggling to wrap my head around the way people are going about machine learning. It's entirely different than how I would have and how I used to build learning systems, however unsophisticated they may have been compared to today's tech. Anyone else ever feel that way?
Real programmers use butterflies
I can't express how much I feel what you're saying.
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend; inside of a dog, it's too dark to read. -- Groucho Marx
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I recommend using an ESP32 based development board. You can use Arduinos but they are more expensive and less capable, if slightly easier to work with, but that learning curve isn't a big deal. Adafruit makes the huzzah feather which i don't recommend. Hiletgo is a chinese brand I actually trust that makes a decent board and narrower than usual which makes it easier to build with on a solderless breadboard Another good one is the DOIT devkit ESP32. It's a bit wider, but all the pins are labeled, and Random Nerd Tutorials covers them explicitly - it doesn't matter a lot since they are all the same with the exception of what order their pins come in, but still. If you have one, you can code against with The Arduino IDE[^] which is C++ but C-ish in the way people actually end up using it because embedded. (mostly No STL,mostly no heap, etc) As far as getting started, just google anything "Random Nerd Tutorials" They make the best guides on how to build using these ESP32 things.
Real programmers use butterflies
> As far as getting started, just google anything "Random Nerd Tutorials" > They make the best guides on how to build using these ESP32 things. much obliged. what do you think of the [Mongoose OS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongoose\_OS) for working with the ESP32?
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> As far as getting started, just google anything "Random Nerd Tutorials" > They make the best guides on how to build using these ESP32 things. much obliged. what do you think of the [Mongoose OS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongoose\_OS) for working with the ESP32?
I probably wouldn't use it just because I tend to not have the memory for a whole OS/framework plus my code, but bully for them.
Real programmers use butterflies
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But part of me wonders if it isn't because I'm getting old, and learning all these technologies feels more and more like a waste of what time I have left.
If you are wondering you probably are :D. This is one of my pet peeves: apart from whatever is taught in CS curriculum, we should have been taught to manage our careers like professional athletes. No professional tennis player expects to play in his forties. They move to coaching or live from whatever have accumulated. Same applies to programmers and specially to 10x ones: by the time you are 40 you start becoming a 5x, 3x,.. 0.1x :) You still can do useful things and be gainfully employed but the fun is over. Just my 0.02$
Mircea
Mircea Neacsu wrote:
Same applies to programmers and specially to 10x ones: by the time you are 40 you start becoming a 5x, 3x,.. 0.1x :)
Speak for yourself. It's attitude, not age that defines a career. Young people tend to be vibrant, know every modern framework, and open to new idea's, however they are missing the business knowledge, the "why" things are done in a certain way. I've lost count of the number of "up and comers" who are ready to "change the world" who get knocked back within their first year because whilst they knew the technologies, they didn't understand the business need. If you want to continue having a "10x career" after you're no longer young and vibrant, make sure you have that business knowledge as well as the technical, plus the right attitude.
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Programming tiny connectable gadgets - "Internet of Things or IoT gadgets" is an absolute joy. No frameworks to muddy the water - with 520kB of RAM you can't afford them, no abstractions to complicate the process, just you and the bare metal. Building them is fun too. But part of me wonders if it isn't because I'm getting old, and learning all these technologies feels more and more like a waste of what time I have left. I mean, I love to learn, and I love to be challenged but it has to be on my terms. In some ways, that has kept me from moving forward - designing the backend of a website these days? Get someone else - I'd be using 10 year old designs. I like these little things in a way because they're a throwback to when I learned to code. Part of me feels like I get a mulligan only I get to go back with what I know now. =) But still, the parser generators and other projects have also been newer technology avoidant outside this one particular arena. A lot of it was developed using theories that were emergent in the 1990s in computer science, so it's not a huge deal these days. I'm also struggling to wrap my head around the way people are going about machine learning. It's entirely different than how I would have and how I used to build learning systems, however unsophisticated they may have been compared to today's tech. Anyone else ever feel that way?
Real programmers use butterflies
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First real programming job I had the machine took up 3 racks, the CPU was 4U, the 2 Mb disk 4U. We had 16K ( but I _think_ that was 16 bit words ) and that because both banks had been "knitted" together. Before someone caught that we had ordered 12K. ( PDP 11-15 ).