30 years ago, when I started working as a professional software developer, I encountered people in their 40's who had been professional software developers for

30 years ago, when I started working as a professional software developer, I encountered people in their 40's who had been professional software developers for 20 years. So no, software development is NOT young. FORTRAN was released almost 60 years ago, in 1957. Cobol was released 55 years ago in 1960. It's been half a century since thousands of people have been programming professionally. How old is a 60 year old industry? It's the time it took to go from the first Write brothers airplane to jet airliners and rockets into orbit. It's less than the time from the discovery of DNA to full sequencing of the human genome. Between 1850 and 1910, steamships went from barely worthwhile to gigantic ocean-going liners (RMS Olympic) and battleships (HMS Dreadnought). The software industry is not young. The third generation of developers are entering the workforce. Some of them have grandparents who were professional software developers. The industry has completed (or failed at) 100's of thousands (if not millions) of major projects. IMO, far far too many people working in the industry simply refuse to learn from the past. But that's a rant for another day :-)