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And I try not to admit it either, because then people ask me if I can fix their computer.
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I hate having to listen to the story about so-and-so who does "exactly" what I do and is such a genius he can fix anything. When I meet a Mechanical Engineer I don't ask him to change the oil in my car or tell him about my nephew Bob who changes tires at Walmart.
Need a C# Consultant? I'm available.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know. -- Ernest Hemingway
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PIEBALDconsult wrote: And I try not to admit it either, because then people ask me if I can fix their computer.
Oh man, you hit the nail right on the head. And I love those "my computer is acting wierd, do you think you could help me?" ARGH! I need a portable billing meter, a battery powered equivalent of what the have in taxicabs.
Marc
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PIEBALDconsult wrote: because then people ask me if I can fix their computer.
This is one of the most amazing concepts. I can't imagine doing that for any other career. But it is like this magical miracle capability. "oh wow, you understand computers!! can you fix mine I ruined because I did not??"
_________________________
Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau.
Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
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I expect most physicians and lawyers get asked such things.
One of our friends is a podiatrist; I look forward to asking him about my toe when next he visits. 
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...or help them with a problem in Excel or Word, or take a look at why their system starts up and says "You have spyware on your system!! upgrade to ReplaceYourSpywareWithOurs Now", or help them with their Web searches, or...just about anything else under the sun that has to do with computers.
I do use one solution that at least keeps them at bay until I have time to help them or they get tired of waiting and nag someone else into doing it - I simply mention that ten years ago my time was getting billed at $190/hour by my employer, and that the last time I worked as a consultant I billed a minimum of $50/hour...not bragging so much as throwing up a wall. That still doesn't prevent my family from getting after me (for instance, tonight I have to take a look at my stepson's keyboard port, which I hope will reveal either a short or a broken lead that I can fix, as the new keyboard didn't work any better than the old keyboard  ).
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I'm happy to be doing something i enjoy. I'm happy to be making a living doing something i enjoy.
But proud?
I've tried and failed many times to explain to people in other professions what i do.
I've tried and failed many times to explain to my own family what i do.
I haven't yet tried to explain to my employers what i do, assuming they at least should know. I'm starting to re-think that assumption.
Pretty sure doctors and elephant herders don't have this problem. Lawyers probably do, but lawyers are pretty much just hack programmers without computers. But they can at least inspire grudging respect born of fear.
---- ...the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more...
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I was once VERY proud of my profession. But, after seeing many friends lose their ability to pay their mortgages because they were outsourced, I lost the love for the profession (even though I still did it).
Luckily, I stuck with it long enough to get a contract where I definitely made a difference. It was for a city service that helped children with special needs. Working on that project gave me back the pride I once had, and I am thankful to be a part of it.
I knew too many people with children that have special needs, and since I'm not a doctor, this was something I could do to truly help ease the children through the processing stage.
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"wow, you know, your system has increased our profits by 25% because the girls and the floor managers can't skim off the top when the customer hands over the cash for a dance", yeah, I'm damned proud I'm a software developer! 
Marc
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Back in real life, as a Chemist using lasers to sepeate Uranium Isotopes, people were in awe (really) of a real scientist - and would proceed to ask questions about their prescriptions.
Now, there is still a degree of awe that I am a computer programmer - and they proceed to ask me questions on what's wrong with their PC.
The pride is not so much in the programming (or blasting the hell out of molecules with a laser) - but that I haven't let myself become one of the ignorant swarm of humanity.
The sports section and entertainment-news* sections are parts of a newspaper to be skipped over. The world is too interesting, and demands too much attention, than to waste it on jibber. Yet - sometimes one can admire the swarm - interested in the trivial - feeling no pain during humanities head-long rush towards cataclysm or catastrophy. Ignorance is bliss. Chemists study how to make aspirins; computer programs concentrate on expertise with Microsoft Office.
Oh Brave New World!
*beautiful models with abundant cleavage visible, excepted.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
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So true ...so true. I know that the "civilization" we enjoy today is doomed. What it may morph into does not look real promising, it only matters to mankind if mankind survives.. and apparently not to many of us really care. I say do what you can to make a difference, live your life as you would have others live theirs.
When prediction serves as polemic, it nearly always fails. Our prefrontal lobes can probe the future only when they aren’t leashed by dogma. The worst enemy of agile anticipation is our human propensity for comfy self-delusion. David Brin
Buddha Dave
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I /used/ to be proud to be a software developer back in the days when (a) it was hard work and (b) the software that we wrote was making a fundamental difference. Now, every Tom Dick and Harry seems to think that they're a developer  , and I'm really not proud of being associated with said trio.
--
What's a signature?
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Same here, the term 'Software developer' has been diluted to include script kiddies and such like.
WPF - Imagineers Wanted
Follow your nose using DoubleAnimationUsingPath
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Just a few days ago, there was a message in the Lounge. I couldn't recall it verbatim here. However, the content goes like this:
"If you know typing, you are a programmer. If you have seen Visual Studio, you are a developer".
I think the poster is cent per cent correct considering the crappy state currently.
Vasudevan Deepak Kumar
Personal Homepage
Tech Gossips
A pessimist sees only the dark side of the clouds, and mopes; a philosopher sees both sides, and shrugs; an optimist doesn't see the clouds at all - he's walking on them. --Leonard Louis Levinson
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There are a lot of people out there who want things to be better. At Scottish Developers we give people feedback forms to fill in. The requests for talks on "patterns and practices" is typically in the 70-80% for every event. On one occasion is was 100%. We are concentrating on this sort of thing for the next year.
Upcoming FREE developer events:
* Developer! Developer! Developer! 6
* Developer Day Scotland
My website
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Same as the term 'IT'. I hate that abbreviation!
Anonymous: "So, what do you do?"
Developer: "I work in IT."
Anonymous: *rolling eyes*
Christo
Software Developer
http://www.linkedin.com/in/christogreeff
http://christogreeff.blogspot.com
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I am very proud of being a software developer myself. However, I can understand your view because there is a lot of dross out there.
Upcoming FREE developer events:
* Developer! Developer! Developer! 6
* Developer Day Scotland
My website
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Colin Angus Mackay wrote: I am very proud of being a software developer myself. However, I can understand your view because there is a lot of dross out there.
EeeYAH, how true that is. Sometime tomorrow I will have to have a discussion with my boss (who got his B.S.C.S. prior to the advent of OOP) and my co-developer (who degreed in Mechanical Engineering) why having a different copy of a component for each of several web applications is NOT good engineering practice. I like and respect both of them on many levels, but hate the battles I have to fight because they are from the "get it working, and if it ain't broke don't fix it" school of thought, and my own thought process says "If it isn't engineered right, even if it doesn't look broke it's going to be sooner or later."
Oh, well.
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Pete Appleton wrote: Now, every Tom Dick and Harry seems to think that they're a developer
But we know they are only web monkeys (aka HTML/Javascript/CSS people).
xacc.ideIronScheme a R5RS-compliant Scheme on the DLR
The rule of three: "The first time you notice something that might repeat, don't generalize it. The second time the situation occurs, develop in a similar fashion -- possibly even copy/paste -- but don't generalize yet. On the third time, look to generalize the approach."
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I don't even need to comment.
Need a C# Consultant? I'm available.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know. -- Ernest Hemingway
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When I went to school, CIS 300 was the hardest class at the college. Only 5 of the 60 or so enrolled passed. Every single one of those people I would love to have working with me. The next semester, too many people complained that it was too hard, so they made it easier to get by without having to write programs that met the requirements, compiled and ran in the environments. Someone could get a C without even having a program that compiled once! That's why we now have Technical screenings.
Web site for self promotion experiencing heavy delays. Will be out in the next release.
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I completely agree with you. I went to Missouri State and experienced the same thing. I skipped the first VB class and went into part 2. I had never had VB before, but convinced them due to prior programming experience. The first few weeks were programming review. The instructor taught us how to create a program using only drag and drop to an Access database. Most people got this right, but it was way too easy! They were cranking out graduates, but the degrees didn't mean much. I would have preferred more expensive smaller classes with actual programming based on skill. The same way they place people in English and Math classes. Every student would get more out of it and the graduates would be worth more out of college.
Hogan
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So true. I still think software development is above average in terms of satisfaction and prestige, but nothing special anymore (there are rare exceptions of course). It's too much of a commodity now. A lot of it has been reduced to worker drone types of work.
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...proud of the software we make.
Don't get me wrong, I'm very happy that I can sit in a darkened room in my bathrobe working from home and write code for a living, but pride? I don't know about that. Pride seems to be something that needs other people to fully enjoy.
It's a profession no average person can fully or even partly understand so it's a bit pointless to be proud of it; you're either in the company of other software developers in which case pride doesn't enter in to it (you just *know* you're a better coder than the rest of them  ) or you're in the company of average ordinary everyday people who will never understand or care to understand any bit of it, or simply equate it with the most technical thing they know about their computer so they assume you make web sites or something. In which case pride is equally as irrelevant.
I am, however, very proud of the fact that my company makes truly useful and important software with thousands of users in over 60 countries around the world; we not only make respectable money for ourselves but equally make a lot of money for our customers who often use our software as the heart of their business. That's something I can be proud of.
More people died from worry than ever bled to death. - RAH
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