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I agree with the author on patience, but I wonder if you can become a software developer without it. Sure some people will have more than others, but learning h

by jaabe 8y ago

I agree with the author on patience, but I wonder if you can become a software developer without it. Sure some people will have more than others, but learning how to make code work is a terrible, terrible process and I’m not sure you can go through it without massive amounts of patience. I have a side job as an examiner for Danish CS students, and a noticible difference between first years and final project students is how they tolerate the frustration of having code not work. If you can’t sit through hours of not knowing why something just doesn’t work, you probably find a different field.

swsieber 8y ago
I think you can have different types of patience. Patience with getting something to work could be very different from the patience to build something correctly, which could be different from the patience to deal with people... But I agree - you probably won't become a dev without having or learning some degree of patience.
- jaabe 8y ago
  The thing about people is an excellent point. The ability to work in teams would be on my personal list, but the author seemed to direct it at patience with a technical focus.
- dahdum 8y ago
  In most situations I'm a pretty impatient person, but coding never seems to try my patience. Getting into the flow and working the problem is what I enjoy doing.
- mr_toad 8y ago
  Some people are far too patient to be great programmers. They are content with the daily drudge of slow, manual tasks, whereas a truly good programmer would become frustrated and desire to improve things. http://threevirtues.com http://threevirtues.com
JustSomeNobody 8y ago
> Sure some people will have more than others, but learning how to make code work is a terrible, terrible process and I’m not sure you can go through it without massive amounts of patience. I think this is more about being diligent than being patient. There are plenty (too many?) devs who will diligently try and figure out something but that have no patience when dealing with others.
- wool_gather 8y ago
  Good clarification: "diligent" is definitely a more accurate word for what's being described.
ravenstine 8y ago
It does require a certain level of patience. Then again, I've known a fair share of developers who will do just about anything to "make it work" even if it means copy/pasting snippets they don't understand.

by jaabe 8y ago

swsieber 8y ago

I think you can have different types of patience. Patience with getting something to work could be very different from the patience to build something correctly, which could be different from the patience to deal with people... But I agree - you probably won't become a dev without having or learning some degree of patience.

jaabe 8y ago
The thing about people is an excellent point. The ability to work in teams would be on my personal list, but the author seemed to direct it at patience with a technical focus.
dahdum 8y ago
In most situations I'm a pretty impatient person, but coding never seems to try my patience. Getting into the flow and working the problem is what I enjoy doing.
mr_toad 8y ago
Some people are far too patient to be great programmers. They are content with the daily drudge of slow, manual tasks, whereas a truly good programmer would become frustrated and desire to improve things. http://threevirtues.com http://threevirtues.com

JustSomeNobody 8y ago

> Sure some people will have more than others, but learning how to make code work is a terrible, terrible process and I’m not sure you can go through it without massive amounts of patience. I think this is more about being diligent than being patient. There are plenty (too many?) devs who will diligently try and figure out something but that have no patience when dealing with others.

wool_gather 8y ago
Good clarification: "diligent" is definitely a more accurate word for what's being described.

ravenstine 8y ago

It does require a certain level of patience. Then again, I've known a fair share of developers who will do just about anything to "make it work" even if it means copy/pasting snippets they don't understand.