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All programmers have different output. How is it even a debate? Some people are more productive than others. Just like one novelist takes 10 years to finish his

by erikbye 10y ago

All programmers have different output. How is it even a debate? Some people are more productive than others. Just like one novelist takes 10 years to finish his novel another writes 2 every year.

Insanity 10y ago
Also not unimportant, the quality of said novels. 2 shitty novels a year versus one praised novel every 10 years.
- bryanlarsen 10y ago
  Actually, I think it's the inverse. Most 2/year novelists are professionals, and it shows. Stephen King consistently wrote at about that rate. 6 months full-time is a good amount of time for a professional writer: 1-2 months for writing, and then another year or so of polishing and editing that happens in parallel with other efforts. 10 year novelists are often amateurs. That novel your next door neighbour asked you to read? He's probably been working on it for years. Even notoriously slow George R. R. Martin takes less than 10 years to write a novel.
  - Insanity 10y ago
    I did not mean to imply that they have to be bad because of a higher frequency. But I am saying that it is possible that they are. All I wanted to do was point out that quality matters as well, and not draw a correlation between frequency and quality. (I do agree that 10 years sounds too extreme for a professional writer of course ^^)
  - Nimitz14 10y ago
    Two novels off the top of my head with far greater significance that anything GRRM or SK have or ever will write that took ~10 years to write: Dispatches (1968-1977) and Infinite Jest (1986-1996). Feel free to think that a novel is something one cranks out as if it's just an object that carries no meaning, requiring no sacrifice from the author. But that's an opinion, and not fact.
zzzcpan 10y ago
"How is it even a debate?" Because having different output has nothing to do with being more productive. It's just different, that's it. And productivity is very hard if not impossible to quantify. Relevant experience and knowledge might boost productivity on a specific problem, just like it might make code nearly defect-free with little to no effort, or make someone much better at quickly understanding large code bases. But it doesn't mean that a person is going to be motivated and rested enough to leverage it for the benefit of their employer or that another person is going to be just as unmotivated or that it's not going to change for a different problem, etc.
- erikbye 10y ago
  To clarify what I meant by "how is it even a debate?": I just find it a bit "surprising" that many people in this industry refuse to believe that many programmers are 5x or 10x more productive than others (and write just as good code).
  - zzzcpan 10y ago
    I should clarify too, that I do think it's incorrect to believe in so over generalized concept, these things are much more complicated to claim something like that. I also believe that nobody is going to be a very productive programmer working for an employer. It's just unhuman to work hard and make choices pursuing somebody else's success.

by erikbye 10y ago

All programmers have different output. How is it even a debate? Some people are more productive than others. Just like one novelist takes 10 years to finish his novel another writes 2 every year.

Insanity 10y ago

Also not unimportant, the quality of said novels. 2 shitty novels a year versus one praised novel every 10 years.

bryanlarsen 10y ago
Actually, I think it's the inverse. Most 2/year novelists are professionals, and it shows. Stephen King consistently wrote at about that rate. 6 months full-time is a good amount of time for a professional writer: 1-2 months for writing, and then another year or so of polishing and editing that happens in parallel with other efforts. 10 year novelists are often amateurs. That novel your next door neighbour asked you to read? He's probably been working on it for years. Even notoriously slow George R. R. Martin takes less than 10 years to write a novel.
- Insanity 10y ago
  I did not mean to imply that they have to be bad because of a higher frequency. But I am saying that it is possible that they are. All I wanted to do was point out that quality matters as well, and not draw a correlation between frequency and quality. (I do agree that 10 years sounds too extreme for a professional writer of course ^^)
- Nimitz14 10y ago
  Two novels off the top of my head with far greater significance that anything GRRM or SK have or ever will write that took ~10 years to write: Dispatches (1968-1977) and Infinite Jest (1986-1996). Feel free to think that a novel is something one cranks out as if it's just an object that carries no meaning, requiring no sacrifice from the author. But that's an opinion, and not fact.

zzzcpan 10y ago

"How is it even a debate?" Because having different output has nothing to do with being more productive. It's just different, that's it. And productivity is very hard if not impossible to quantify. Relevant experience and knowledge might boost productivity on a specific problem, just like it might make code nearly defect-free with little to no effort, or make someone much better at quickly understanding large code bases. But it doesn't mean that a person is going to be motivated and rested enough to leverage it for the benefit of their employer or that another person is going to be just as unmotivated or that it's not going to change for a different problem, etc.

erikbye 10y ago
To clarify what I meant by "how is it even a debate?": I just find it a bit "surprising" that many people in this industry refuse to believe that many programmers are 5x or 10x more productive than others (and write just as good code).
- zzzcpan 10y ago
  I should clarify too, that I do think it's incorrect to believe in so over generalized concept, these things are much more complicated to claim something like that. I also believe that nobody is going to be a very productive programmer working for an employer. It's just unhuman to work hard and make choices pursuing somebody else's success.