Okay I'm actually annoyed now.
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I probably won't ever fully retire. I'll be like Gene Winfield, loving what i do so much I'll be doing it until I'm 90 (if I'm lucky) It's just who I am.
Check out my IoT graphics library here: https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx And my IoT UI/User Experience library here: https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix
honey the codewitch wrote:
I probably won't ever fully retire
One needs to find something that they will like to do 40, 60 or even more hours in a week. And it cannot be something that they are already doing, because of course then there are even more hours to fill up.
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honey the codewitch wrote:
I probably won't ever fully retire
One needs to find something that they will like to do 40, 60 or even more hours in a week. And it cannot be something that they are already doing, because of course then there are even more hours to fill up.
truth. Had a long conversation with my "boss" of 30 years. It's one thing to get to "I want to retire" - whatever that means, and entirely another to have something to do when you get there. I'm in the analysis part right now deciding what I want to do. Something different or a little less of what I do now? I love engineering and writing software, but I'm getting less tolerant of the pricks 20 years my junior.
Charlie Gilley “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759 Has never been more appropriate.
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truth. Had a long conversation with my "boss" of 30 years. It's one thing to get to "I want to retire" - whatever that means, and entirely another to have something to do when you get there. I'm in the analysis part right now deciding what I want to do. Something different or a little less of what I do now? I love engineering and writing software, but I'm getting less tolerant of the pricks 20 years my junior.
Charlie Gilley “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759 Has never been more appropriate.
charlieg wrote:
getting less tolerant of the pricks 20 years my junior.
lol I won't advise you but myself I do realize there are only two possibilities going forward. Either I die before my friends or they die before me. For the first that could mean quite a few years with no friends. Work (those juniors you mention) provides a pool of youngsters that allow me to go for the first option.
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charlieg wrote:
getting less tolerant of the pricks 20 years my junior.
lol I won't advise you but myself I do realize there are only two possibilities going forward. Either I die before my friends or they die before me. For the first that could mean quite a few years with no friends. Work (those juniors you mention) provides a pool of youngsters that allow me to go for the first option.
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OriginalGriff wrote:
WinForms to WPF
Most of the tools I write must run in a pure Win32/WinPE environment (I can't even rely on .NET). The UI design tools available for this are bad to non-existent, by today's standards.
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows. -- 6079 Smith W.
Daniel Pfeffer wrote:
Most of the tools I write must run in a pure Win32/WinPE environment (I can't even rely on .NET). The UI design tools available for this are bad to non-existent, by today's standards.
You just made me realize I hadn't even thought about this for a very, very long time. Win32 is still a thing. Last time I wrote against it directly, there pretty much weren't any tools to build UIs interactively (at least not from MS); the closest, from MS, might have been the MFC designer, but then...MFC. So, writing straight to Win32, in 2024, still doesn't have any viable options, huh? I guess that's an indicator it's really not the way to go...
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This is just pretty sad. MFC actually just sits in the corner and gets the job done. It's not flashy. But at the time, it was the only thing Microsoft had above win32 (and coding at that level for a UI was just stupid). I was coming from XWindows/Motif, etc and those were finished UI libraries, UIL (father to XAML). Then someone let the marketing people and project managers and senior people at MS have a free supply of heroin, meth, crack, cocaine, etc. and the entire elephanting organization just went off the rails. I've looked at Winforms (I think maybe a path from mfc) but Wpf and xaml just no. It's simply incomplete, too complicated and unfinished. I lived in the CE world as was about to migrate to .net - because universal and all that - then MS tossed us under the bus. They've never recovered. I would challenge any MS senior person to put together a 1 page strategy to explain what MS intends to do in the UI space. This is why the rise of the html interface exists.
Charlie Gilley “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759 Has never been more appropriate.
charlieg wrote:
then MS tossed us under the bus. They've never recovered. I would challenge any MS senior person to put together a 1 page strategy to explain what MS intends to do in the UI space. This is why the rise of the html interface exists.
So much this. I feel the same way. MS lost interest in WinForms, but it's still, to this day, the quickest way to get things done, IMO. And they've never offered a decent, just-as-simple, alternative ever since. If not WinForms, what UI library is one supposed to rely on in 2024? I still don't feel confident any of their current offerings won't get abandoned and replaced with something completely different yet again, a year from now. As a desktop developer, I very much feel ignored by MS. I get what you're saying about the rise of the HTML interface, but if you need to interact with Win32 or "the system" as a whole in any way, shape or form (which I do rather extensively), there's *nothing* in there to help you out...in fact, you're intentionally getting blocked every step of the way, 'cuz hey, browser means device independence...
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truth. Had a long conversation with my "boss" of 30 years. It's one thing to get to "I want to retire" - whatever that means, and entirely another to have something to do when you get there. I'm in the analysis part right now deciding what I want to do. Something different or a little less of what I do now? I love engineering and writing software, but I'm getting less tolerant of the pricks 20 years my junior.
Charlie Gilley “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759 Has never been more appropriate.
charlieg wrote:
It's one thing to get to "I want to retire" - whatever that means, and entirely another to have something to do when you get there
I'm not particularly worried about that. I love to code, but I've burnt overdoing it (evenings, weekends), so nowadays I hardly ever work on pet projects during my free time. But, for decades now, I've been telling myself when I do retire, I'll probably be working on code I've been meaning to write for a very, very long time, but isn't code I can write in my line of work, or get paid for - programs that I'd like to work on, but won't pay the bills. That's what I see myself doing in retirement.
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charlieg wrote:
then MS tossed us under the bus. They've never recovered. I would challenge any MS senior person to put together a 1 page strategy to explain what MS intends to do in the UI space. This is why the rise of the html interface exists.
So much this. I feel the same way. MS lost interest in WinForms, but it's still, to this day, the quickest way to get things done, IMO. And they've never offered a decent, just-as-simple, alternative ever since. If not WinForms, what UI library is one supposed to rely on in 2024? I still don't feel confident any of their current offerings won't get abandoned and replaced with something completely different yet again, a year from now. As a desktop developer, I very much feel ignored by MS. I get what you're saying about the rise of the HTML interface, but if you need to interact with Win32 or "the system" as a whole in any way, shape or form (which I do rather extensively), there's *nothing* in there to help you out...in fact, you're intentionally getting blocked every step of the way, 'cuz hey, browser means device independence...
I have two environments I need to support. The primary one is on the embedded device side. My customer will never go back to anything Microsoft. There are crumbs for legacy products. All it takes is for one big customer to call a VP, and ... you know the drill. I also have to support utilities that support stuff... I see Winforms as useful, but my goto is a lean Mfc. because it works. I just wish Microsoft would get "omfg customers need us to be predictable" in their soul.
Charlie Gilley “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759 Has never been more appropriate.
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charlieg wrote:
It's one thing to get to "I want to retire" - whatever that means, and entirely another to have something to do when you get there
I'm not particularly worried about that. I love to code, but I've burnt overdoing it (evenings, weekends), so nowadays I hardly ever work on pet projects during my free time. But, for decades now, I've been telling myself when I do retire, I'll probably be working on code I've been meaning to write for a very, very long time, but isn't code I can write in my line of work, or get paid for - programs that I'd like to work on, but won't pay the bills. That's what I see myself doing in retirement.
Okay - I have a funny for you :). I'll get to your comment at the bottom. My dad was an EE. Hard core. And as he got older, his buddies at IBM got into side businesses. At the time I did not know this - I was a young teen blundering his way through school, etc. But he bought a little sailboat. And I learned to sail it and race it in regattas. Hold that thought... 15+ years later I was in the middle of nurturing a GIANT family. Ask me offline if you want the details but 5 sons, 6 daughters, 3 combat veterans with a lot of combat tours (they got dirty) - lots of lost sleep. The boys went to war and the daughters are rougher than they are. I need a coat of arms that says "Piss and Vinegar". :) So here I am at the "end" - and I thought it would be very attractive to go fishing and be left alone. I hate fishing. As for the sailboat - I live close to a large lake. I could grow old and die happy .... "I'll probably be working on code I've been meaning to write for a very, very long time" And you say that. I have a customer who really needs there manufacturing system re-written. It's on my list.
Charlie Gilley “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759 Has never been more appropriate.
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Okay - I have a funny for you :). I'll get to your comment at the bottom. My dad was an EE. Hard core. And as he got older, his buddies at IBM got into side businesses. At the time I did not know this - I was a young teen blundering his way through school, etc. But he bought a little sailboat. And I learned to sail it and race it in regattas. Hold that thought... 15+ years later I was in the middle of nurturing a GIANT family. Ask me offline if you want the details but 5 sons, 6 daughters, 3 combat veterans with a lot of combat tours (they got dirty) - lots of lost sleep. The boys went to war and the daughters are rougher than they are. I need a coat of arms that says "Piss and Vinegar". :) So here I am at the "end" - and I thought it would be very attractive to go fishing and be left alone. I hate fishing. As for the sailboat - I live close to a large lake. I could grow old and die happy .... "I'll probably be working on code I've been meaning to write for a very, very long time" And you say that. I have a customer who really needs there manufacturing system re-written. It's on my list.
Charlie Gilley “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759 Has never been more appropriate.
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