4 ms·

How I Found a Job That Makes Me Feel Good as a Developer and a Person

14 points by DinahDavis 10y ago

marmot777 10y ago
I like this personal story. It has a point, is long enough to develop the story, yet well written enough not to be any longer than necessary.
petagonoral 10y ago
wtf?
- sctb 10y ago
  Please don't do this here.
  - petagonoral 10y ago
    I feel very strongly that my comment was justified after reading the linked collection of words. A comment of surprise some might say.
fatjokes 10y ago
I applaud the writer. Their achievement is not easy. One nit that struck me as a bit odd: they felt that a MacBook Air was necessary for their development. I'm not a front end engineer, so maybe I'm biased, but is that so? Personally I love my MBA, but I wouldn't buy it if I had trouble affording it and I think there are plenty of more affordable computers out there that would help someone learn to code.
- cheez 10y ago
  No, not necessary. I do front end stuff with Windows just fine. I'd bet Linux is even better.
- pawadu 10y ago
  I shed a tear every time I see something like this: > I got a Macbook Air even though I couldn’t afford it, (believe it or not, my intern salary was pretty low) Why? Because somewhere someone is not reaching to his/her full potential because it has beaten in to his/her mind that a $200 windows laptop is not enough to start learning. I know of a successful startup that started on a 10" netbook...
  - imagist 10y ago
    A $200 windows laptop is enough to start learning, but it's definitely going to slow you down compared to a better tool. You can make up for it with hard work, but I think investing the extra $800 in an MBA is well worth the money if it's even remotely feasible.
    - pawadu 10y ago
      > but it's definitely going to slow you down I see two flaws in your argument: First, you assume that the $200 laptop is slower than the macbook Air. You would be amazed how much horsepower $200 can get you these days. Second, lets say my cheap laptop is 30% slower than your MBA. How many serious projects were abandoned because the hardware was 30% slower than the MBA? How large is that number compared to projects that got abandoned due to, say, lack of motivation? If you want to buy an MBA, fine do it. But don't try to convince others they wont be successful unless they too have an MBA (or a ThinkPad Yoga or a Microsoft Surface or whatever people consider a sign of success in your neighborhood).
      - imagist 10y ago
        > First, you assume that the $200 laptop is slower than the macbook Air No, I didn't assume that at all--hardware speed has literally nothing to do with my reasoning. Hardware speed slows you down slightly, but it's a negligible factor next to crappy tooling. The programming infrastructure available for free for Windows is far, far behind that available on Unix systems. And if you use Linux, the tooling is there, but you're going to be fighting with software/firmware that doesn't support Linux for a good portion of your time. > If you want to buy an MBA, fine do it. But don't try to convince others they wont be successful unless they too have an MBA (or a ThinkPad Yoga or a Microsoft Surface or whatever people consider a sign of success in your neighborhood). I specifically said "A $200 windows laptop is enough to start learning". You can definitely be successful with a $200 windows laptop. But, as compared to working with more effective tools, it's going to slow you down. Your comment is a child post to mine, but you haven't responded to anything that I actually said.
- imagist 10y ago
  You can learn to code on a lot of machines, and indeed I've used a lot of machines in the past few years. However, I'd assert that a Macbook Air is the ideal machine for development because: 1. Unlike most default configurations, the out-of-the-box OSX installation on a Macbook is a full Unix environment. Indeed, it's possible to do a lot with the Unix environment that comes preinstalled, and the rest is easy to install with Homebrew. 2. Unlike most systems where the default configuration has been overridden with i.e. Linux, an MBA with OSX just works. When my livelihood is at stake, I cannot be messing around with wireless drivers, trying to get whatever video conferencing to work, fixing misconfigured displays, trying to print, etc. I don't blame the open source community for this: I think that it's on the hardware/firmware manufacturers that they refuse to provide open source drivers that support Linux for their products. 3. There are other alternatives that fit 1 and 2 but they are all either underpowered for the price (a lot of laptops that come with Linux preinstalled) or much more expensive, for no real benefit to a developer (other Apple laptops besides the MBA). Yes, there are cheaper machines to code on, but what it comes down to is, you get what you pay for. I think that if you can afford it, the MBA is the best balance of needs for a developer. If money is more limited for you, your priorities would obviously be different. I also have to say, I hope this does change. I have no love for Apple. I want nothing more than to see an affordable laptop that is as good as the MBA and comes with free software preinstalled. I'm also worried that with Jobs dead, Apple has been making some very bad decisions with their product lines (bad for developers--arguably bad for Apple, too, but I don't care to argue that). While they haven't ruined the MBA yet, I don't believe the MBA is somehow immune. So it may be that the MBA will fall out of its current position.

14 points by DinahDavis 10y ago

I like this personal story. It has a point, is long enough to develop the story, yet well written enough not to be any longer than necessary.

petagonoral 10y ago

wtf?

sctb 10y ago
Please don't do this here.
- petagonoral 10y ago
  I feel very strongly that my comment was justified after reading the linked collection of words. A comment of surprise some might say.

fatjokes 10y ago

I applaud the writer. Their achievement is not easy. One nit that struck me as a bit odd: they felt that a MacBook Air was necessary for their development. I'm not a front end engineer, so maybe I'm biased, but is that so? Personally I love my MBA, but I wouldn't buy it if I had trouble affording it and I think there are plenty of more affordable computers out there that would help someone learn to code.

cheez 10y ago
No, not necessary. I do front end stuff with Windows just fine. I'd bet Linux is even better.
pawadu 10y ago
I shed a tear every time I see something like this: > I got a Macbook Air even though I couldn’t afford it, (believe it or not, my intern salary was pretty low) Why? Because somewhere someone is not reaching to his/her full potential because it has beaten in to his/her mind that a $200 windows laptop is not enough to start learning. I know of a successful startup that started on a 10" netbook...
- imagist 10y ago
  A $200 windows laptop is enough to start learning, but it's definitely going to slow you down compared to a better tool. You can make up for it with hard work, but I think investing the extra $800 in an MBA is well worth the money if it's even remotely feasible.
  - pawadu 10y ago
    > but it's definitely going to slow you down I see two flaws in your argument: First, you assume that the $200 laptop is slower than the macbook Air. You would be amazed how much horsepower $200 can get you these days. Second, lets say my cheap laptop is 30% slower than your MBA. How many serious projects were abandoned because the hardware was 30% slower than the MBA? How large is that number compared to projects that got abandoned due to, say, lack of motivation? If you want to buy an MBA, fine do it. But don't try to convince others they wont be successful unless they too have an MBA (or a ThinkPad Yoga or a Microsoft Surface or whatever people consider a sign of success in your neighborhood).
    - imagist 10y ago
      > First, you assume that the $200 laptop is slower than the macbook Air No, I didn't assume that at all--hardware speed has literally nothing to do with my reasoning. Hardware speed slows you down slightly, but it's a negligible factor next to crappy tooling. The programming infrastructure available for free for Windows is far, far behind that available on Unix systems. And if you use Linux, the tooling is there, but you're going to be fighting with software/firmware that doesn't support Linux for a good portion of your time. > If you want to buy an MBA, fine do it. But don't try to convince others they wont be successful unless they too have an MBA (or a ThinkPad Yoga or a Microsoft Surface or whatever people consider a sign of success in your neighborhood). I specifically said "A $200 windows laptop is enough to start learning". You can definitely be successful with a $200 windows laptop. But, as compared to working with more effective tools, it's going to slow you down. Your comment is a child post to mine, but you haven't responded to anything that I actually said.
imagist 10y ago
You can learn to code on a lot of machines, and indeed I've used a lot of machines in the past few years. However, I'd assert that a Macbook Air is the ideal machine for development because: 1. Unlike most default configurations, the out-of-the-box OSX installation on a Macbook is a full Unix environment. Indeed, it's possible to do a lot with the Unix environment that comes preinstalled, and the rest is easy to install with Homebrew. 2. Unlike most systems where the default configuration has been overridden with i.e. Linux, an MBA with OSX just works. When my livelihood is at stake, I cannot be messing around with wireless drivers, trying to get whatever video conferencing to work, fixing misconfigured displays, trying to print, etc. I don't blame the open source community for this: I think that it's on the hardware/firmware manufacturers that they refuse to provide open source drivers that support Linux for their products. 3. There are other alternatives that fit 1 and 2 but they are all either underpowered for the price (a lot of laptops that come with Linux preinstalled) or much more expensive, for no real benefit to a developer (other Apple laptops besides the MBA). Yes, there are cheaper machines to code on, but what it comes down to is, you get what you pay for. I think that if you can afford it, the MBA is the best balance of needs for a developer. If money is more limited for you, your priorities would obviously be different. I also have to say, I hope this does change. I have no love for Apple. I want nothing more than to see an affordable laptop that is as good as the MBA and comes with free software preinstalled. I'm also worried that with Jobs dead, Apple has been making some very bad decisions with their product lines (bad for developers--arguably bad for Apple, too, but I don't care to argue that). While they haven't ruined the MBA yet, I don't believe the MBA is somehow immune. So it may be that the MBA will fall out of its current position.