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Been coding since 82 but never professionally. I love coding but could never be able to handle the stress of deadlines and constantly changing requirements. And besides, I would rather be farming.
Within you lies the power for good - Use it!
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PJ Arends wrote: And besides, I would rather be farming.
Amen!
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
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PJ Arends wrote: could never be able to handle the stress of deadlines and constantly changing requirements
I think most people can't which is why it's important to find a job where there are no impossible deadlines and you have the freedom to create systems in a manner that allows for changing requirements.
I am lucky to work in a situation where I get to set the deadlines with my clients and I help draw up the requirements. That said there are times when I have done a lot of work for a request and the user never makes use of what I have created - after the cussing and gnashing of teeth I do however eventually realise that even those projects that are shelved have enabled me to learn something new.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
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Deadline: an arbitrary promise one makes when the labor itself will be delegated to someone else (and putting the burden of meeting it on the same person oc.)
Unless I'm doing what I have done before (which DRY forbids) it'll be hard to say when it is done.
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
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PJ Arends wrote: never professionally
  No kidding ? And I thought you were one of the many great professionals out there !
What are you doing for a living then, if I may ask ?
And who is that super cute lil'girl in your bio ?
~RaGE();
I think words like 'destiny' are a way of trying to find order where none exists. - Christian Graus
Entropy isn't what it used to.
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Farming. Milked cows in my past life, now I raise chickens.
And that is my daughter.
Within you lies the power for good - Use it!
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PJ Arends wrote: Farming. Milked cows in my past life, now I raise chickens.
I'm sure I have a book on C++ written by you hiding somewhere under my desk. Wouldn't that be considered professional programming?
Michael Martin
Australia
"I controlled my laughter and simple said "No,I am very busy,so I can't write any code for you". The moment they heard this all the smiling face turned into a sad looking face and one of them farted. So I had to leave the place as soon as possible."
- Mr.Prakash One Fine Saturday. 24/04/2004
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That would be considered amazing as I have never written a book.
Within you lies the power for good - Use it!
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PJ Arends wrote: That would be considered amazing as I have never written a book.
I'm now going to have to dig the book out and have a look at it. Positive it was written by someone here on CP (before CP existed) and for some reason your name sprang to mind last night.
Michael Martin
Australia
"I controlled my laughter and simple said "No,I am very busy,so I can't write any code for you". The moment they heard this all the smiling face turned into a sad looking face and one of them farted. So I had to leave the place as soon as possible."
- Mr.Prakash One Fine Saturday. 24/04/2004
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I know there are a bunch of book authors here. Nish Sivakumar and Tom Archer come to mind immediately. So do Christopher Duncan and Sacha Barber. I am sure there are many more.
Within you lies the power for good - Use it!
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I started coding proper in 1983 when I got my first computer a 48K ZX Spectrum.
I wrote my first database engine which was able to save all of 12 records due to the lack of memory.
I now work as a developer and know what you mean about being a 'manager' - I have always been a 'technician' wanting to do the work myself rather than telling others how to do it.
My professional career started in 1990 when I cut my teeth as a COBOL programmer.
Also 80+ hour weeks sounds a bit much.
Having said that in a sense I am working most of the time as I am frequently thinking of how to solve issues when I am not working at the computer.
However I could never work 80 hours flat out. I find my 45 minute lunchtime walk is one of my most productive times when I am away from the computer thinking of how to solve particularly knotty problems.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
modified 17-Jun-14 16:33pm.
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Well compared to the others (and you) I'v just started.
But still I had moments (the past 6 months) where I truly didn't like my job, but that's because I was doing more support / project management than programming (If I wrote 10 lines of code in the past 6 months not including this week, it's a lot).
But then I get a project in winforms / wpf and I start to enjoy it again.
Hell I even started to enjoy doing MVC (untill it all went down hell and the whole support / project management thing came up)
I'v had a few jobs in my professional life (not all programming but most) and I'v learned one thing, no matter what job you do or company you work for their will always be something that bugs you. All you can do is try to limit the amount of things that bug you.
Anyway my 2 cents (not worth that much compared to the experienced old guys around here). 
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I've been coding since early 2010 (so more or less five years). I love it at 25, and hope I still love it at 52 
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As I posted just last week, I've been at the same company (sort of) for 36 years.[^]
However, I had two summer jobs before that where I:
worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) programming data analysis for the Viking Mars Orbiter, and then
did Operating System (TOPS-10/Tops-20) support at Digital Equipment Corp.
A positive attitude may not solve every problem, but it will annoy enough people to be worth the effort.
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With 25 years of earning a living by coding I'm about ready to hang it up, as I didn't start coding till my mid 30s that make me an official old fart. The only time I would work 80hrs in a week is if it was self imposed and I agree with others that your PM needs to be sacked if you need to regularly work those sort of hours to meed deadlines.
After 10 year in the same, very lucrative, contract it is finally coming to an end and I am dammed if I can figure out what to do next. I enjoy coding and mentoring others but with the demise of Silverlight I have lost my web expertise and MVC is a dog so it will be either WPF or retire or a complete change.
I think I fancy being a small tour bus driver in one of the Oz wine regions.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity
RAH
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_WinBase_ wrote: I've been writing & supporting code for commercial and bespoke (mainly business) systems since 1978 on many different platforms and languages, and 36 years later I still love it, still do it for a living
Me too - coding professionally since Jan 1978.
I went through the project management stuff, became CIO, didn't enjoy it so went back to development.
In the meantime I qualified as a teacher (IT and Science) & would give my left nut to be able to stop working for the man and teach full time - but getting a full time teaching job in Australia is all but impossible unless you are a) willing to relocate to woop-woop or b) just graduating from Uni.
Was actually offered a 6 month teaching contract recently, and just had to turn it down, because I can't afford to gamble on getting work at Xmas time - and can't afford to just not work.
The passion I had tends to die when I am working for a company I don't'feel' for.
If I was braver, I'd give it up and teach, and work outside school hours developing my own stuff - but I'm not a gambling man!
Hopefully I can find a job, ideally with a small company, developing interesting software, where I can learn new things and enjoy the passion again... (I'm waiting for the phone call now!)
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I feel much the same way. I've done all sorts of things since some mad maths teacher introduced me to programming in my sixth form (in 1972!), from working in a bar to senior management, but development has always been my first love.
It is noticeable how the same ideas and 'paradigms' keep re-appearing under different names or guises, but embody the same principles. (We've gone from Procedural, to Object Oriented, through Procedural again to Functional, and now we seem to be creeping back to a less dogmatic version of OO. TDD seems to have peaked, Agile likewise (and these after pushing out all the previous development methodologies that used to be so enthusastically embraced, even by government). I still like to think of myself as a Systems Analyst, as that is what I spend most of my time actually doing, in order to discover what it is the customer actually wants to achieve and with what equipment, but how often do you hear that term used these days?
If there's one thing I've learnt over the years, it is - in very simplistic terms - that programming is programming, all the other paradigms and methodologies are different (sometimes good, sometimes bad) variations on the syntactic sugar so often decried by proponents of one language about another!
I too have reached the point where, whilst still enjoying the work, I feel I would like to do something else, and I'm considering reverting to my original scientific path of chemistry...
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Coding, as in writing a program, was not interesting beyond the first 3 years for me.
Though I occasionally wrote code for another 15 or more years, I found solving the problem (designing and architecting) more interesting. Once I knew how to solve the problem, I had no interest in writing the code.
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Been coding since 1977....started on punch cards, went up to punch tape. First computer was a PDP11 compatible....had to enter bootstrap code in using toggle switches.....therefore learnt machine code first, then went to basic and then C....miss machine code.
As they say old programmers never die, they just de-compile !
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I have about 10 years experience and already am sick of it.
It's not the learning (on the contrary) or the deadlines, but the stupidity of managers who refuse to listen to anything you say. You tell them what is wrong, you tell them why and how, but still they cling on to some superior feeling they know best (and at best try to convince you with a vague argument which (s)he just invented).
There are plenty of good managers, but often they don't last long.
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I had 40 years of it starting in 1966, and that was the main problem throughout my career. And I'm sorry to say the worst offenders were Americans who were managing the UK team that I was part of. Fortunatley I knew plenty of Americans who felt the same way.
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Thanks to all who replied, some interesting stuff & i've read them all . One thing about the 80+ hours is that i've had my own software business since 1991, and to compete with bigger companies have needed to react faster and produce better stuff, so its myself who decides this to launch products quickly, meet deadlines or keep promises (even when the customer has moved the goalpost). my strategy to do what's necessary has provided me an excellent living and kept my families head above water where many business's have failed, and for the most part have loved what I do, but Im not sure if I want to keep doing the same when i'm 60 so looking for a challenge as there's only so much golf I can play lol.
Thanks again
Bob
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Wow ... this read like I could have written it! I, too, have been 'round the block a few times in this field (38). I started just a couple years before you did. ('76). It's been a cool ride, no?
I share your sentiment about moving into management. I feel that it's for the birds, honestly. You've heard the saying: "Those who can't do, manage!" I'm an avid Dilbert fan; the "pointy-haired boss" being the spitting image of a boss I had some years back.
Like you, I still enjoy coding (and also like you a LOT of my work is troubleshooting). As for actual development, I'm spending considerably less time doing that now. My main function with my existing company is the support and troubleshooting of our code. We were bought out about 5 years ago and the parent company needs me to keep it running while they transition our client base to their product. As it is a pretty large system with many clients I'll probably be doing that for quite some time yet. I'm in no hurry to get into another big development project to be honest.
On my own time I write systems for small businesses that could not otherwise afford it. My current project is automation of a co-op farm that we participate in. I do that in exchange for a share in the farm. I also have several programs I've written for automating things for myself which I maintain and improve as I need new features. I tinker with those things as I have the time & inclination. To me, coding was never really about money (I mean, yeah, I had to make a living but I think you understand). It's nice to just write when I feel like it and experiment without having to worry about whether someone else will like it or not.
I'm finding that more and more of my time is being devoted to bike rides, building a chicken coop, stuff like that. I was pretty passionate about software development for a real long time but I'm slowly transitioning away from doing that all the time. Someday maybe (if my health holds up) I'll go drive a bus or do something that doesn't involve burning my brain out. 
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I recently started taking violin lessons again so that if (when?) I get tired of coding, I can hopefully join an orchestra
But while the challenges remain, along with the thrill of solving them, I don't think I'll get tired of coding quickly
Open plan offices, red tape and poor project planning/management, on the other hand... 
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Started coding in grade 3 (81-82) on a TI-99 4/A, though at the time that was mostly from the coding magazines. That was what started it all though. Years later moved onto the C64, then PC. Still love it, but not every day. I still have had weeks of 80+ hours, but not with the same fervor that I did when I was younger! What I tend to enjoy more is the system analysis and design and then passing that on to others to bring the ideas to life.
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