Several years ago, I did a short contract for Apple Retail Software Engineering. They build all the software and systems that are used to communicate between Re

Several years ago, I did a short contract for Apple Retail Software Engineering. They build all the software and systems that are used to communicate between Retail HQ and the stores, handle all training, etc.... Apple employees know that they’re not allowed to even acknowledge the existence of this software, unless you’re in a secure location, like the store back-of-house. More than a few times, I would go into a store for personal reasons, and as part of the regular chit-chat they would ask where I worked, and I would tell them. They would smile at me and maybe a little wink, but that was always as far as it went. My first task was to automate the build process for all their iOS and macOS front-end software, as well as the Linux-based back-end support systems. They didn’t want their Engineers to have their laptops taken over for thirty minutes to an hour or more, every time they did a build. So, I delivered a Jenkins CI/CD system for them. And although I’m not a developer, I was able to find and fix the problems in their code base that kept it from building in a server environment instead of on their laptops. I also added a lot of static code analysis tools, and they developed a lot more regression suite tests, once the builds were automated on the server. And then I found out I had automated myself out of a job, and my contract ended. I was a DevOps Engineer, with a heavy emphasis on the Ops side of the house, and because I wasn’t a Developer, they didn’t have any more work for me. After finding out that my contract would be ending, the first thing I did was to call my wife and tell her the good news — I would be moving back to Austin, and I would be there in time for Christmas. As a contractor, I had a high hourly pay rate, which meant I was just barely able to afford to get a 1BR apartment in the Cupertino/San Jose area. But if they had offered me a full-time position, they would have had to offer to pay me at least $250k-$350k per year, for me to be able to afford to keep that same apartment. And that doesn’t include what they would have had to pay me to be able to afford to have anything remotely like our house here in Austin. I really enjoyed most aspects of working there, and it was a really good experience, but I do feel like I really dodged a bullet there. Or maybe it was a grenade.