5 ms·

> I don’t know a single developer that thinks “googling stuff means you’re not a proper engineer.” I've met lots of younger devs who have varying degrees of im

by _bxg1 7y ago

> I don’t know a single developer that thinks “googling stuff means you’re not a proper engineer.” I've met lots of younger devs who have varying degrees of impostor syndrome, so anecdotes like this probably help people like that feel less bad about not knowing everything.

setr 7y ago
I'm of the opinion that not googling stuff means you're not a proper engineer. And from what I've seen, those who don't google consistently also fail to understand the answers they find when they do google things. It is, in fact, an essential skill.
- Bang2Bay 7y ago
  Why not Yahoo?
  - bdcravens 7y ago
    Because Yahoo isn't a search engine; the results are powered by another search engine (at this time, Bing)
    - hk__2 7y ago
      The definition of what is a search engine doesn’t change based of its internal implementation (here, Bing).
      - bdcravens 7y ago
        Sure, maybe a better term is "virtual search engine" (in the sense the Mobile Virtual Network Operators are just mobile service resellers)
    - autoexec 7y ago
      Bing gets their results from other search engines too. https://www.wired.com/2011/02/bing-copies-google/ https://www.wired.com/2011/02/bing-copies-google/ As far as I can just about every search engine uses results from Google directly or indirectly by using a source like Bing that in turn gets some of their results from Google. If you won't call something a search engine unless it doesn't use anyone else's search results you might have a hard time naming more than one. You can't escape Google.
      - bdcravens 7y ago
        Perhaps, though I suspect much has changed in the 8+ years since that article was written.
    - cosmos14 7y ago
      I’ve tried Bing. Many of the result were unrelated to my question.
      - manifestsilence 7y ago
        Bing has issues with not scraping dynamic content very well if at all. We had to eliminate libraries that render important content after page load with javascript because they'd show up on Google but not Bing.
      - cbsks 7y ago
        Google does such a good job with personalized results, that we have have forgotten how to search. Remember the old days when using a search engine effectively was a specialized skill? Search engines have gotten a lot better since then, but a lot of the improvements have been due to personalized results. It’s not easy to transition from Google to Bing or DuckDuckGo. That being said, Google is also a good search engine, so it’s difficult to compete with them regardless of personalized results.
        perl4ever 7y ago
        Using a search engine is a more specialized skill than ever. What "Google getting better" actually means is that it is more likely to return what most people want as the first page hits. That is a tradeoff, because it obscures everything else whenever what most people want is wrong. As a programmer, you're only going to be doing searches for things that are non-obvious, so there is a vastly higher chance of Google giving you the wrong answer than for the average search. There is a fundamental contradiction between a search engine that tries to show you only what it thinks you want, and the fact that you don't know exactly what you want when you search, until you see some results. I think there's something like a conservation law, that the more you make it easy to find some things on the Internet, the harder you make it to find others. Kind of like the proof that you can't compress all strings.
- wil421 7y ago
  I’ve asked pre-internet programmers and they said they used to keep reference books at their desk or even a small library/book room at their employers. I’ve heard some government contractors can’t google because they work on non-internet connected computers. They probably keep a lot of books.
  - RHSeeger 7y ago
    That's what I did at the time. I only got rid of my series of Java 2, Motif, Xlib/Xt, etc programming books when I moved a few years back.
    - jplayer01 7y ago
      But what if you need them again?
  - InitialLastName 7y ago
    A friend works at a military contractor doing (effectively) windows GUIs for power system controls. His only access to an internet-connected computer is on his breaks, where he has to wait in line to use one of a very small number of computers in a special room to google things. I don't think he has books, but he has an enormous amount of documentation (something like the whole MSDN library, a bunch of internal documentation and reference info, and other documentation) installed on his computer.
    - dharmab 7y ago
      I hope they can get a StackOverflow offline archive https://archive.org/details/stackexchange https://archive.org/details/stackexchange
  - jamil7 7y ago
    I worked for a few months without an internet connection, I'd go to public wifi spots and load up on all the documentation and packages I needed. I wouldn't recommend it but it definitely teaches you to be resourceful.
  - 7y ago
celticninja 7y ago
I have this all the time, but to counter it I think about this time last year and it wouldn't have worked at all, now it works but it may be ugly, even better I almost understand why it works.
weavie 7y ago
Not just younger devs, I've been a professional coder for 24 years now and I still have imposter syndrome.
- nhebb 7y ago
  I saw Scott Hanselman speak, and he said he has impostor syndrome. I thought to myself, great, if Hanselman has impostor syndrome, I'm not even qualified. I must be an impostor-syndrome impostor.
  - james_s_tayler 7y ago
    Maybe that's Hanselman's ploy. Run mind games on you to make your imposter syndrome worse. Muahahaha.
LeftHandPath 7y ago
It really does. I've been a professional developer/programmer for a few years - since I was 18 - and I'm only just going back to college (at the behest of my employer). Really enjoy taking advantage of it and reassuring the younger kids (only two or three years younger than me) that they're more than capable of this shit. And it helps me be more confident when I'm at work - at school they see me as the guy with all the answers (ha, I wish - but it's a good reminder that we're all our own worst critics).

by _bxg1 7y ago

setr 7y ago

I'm of the opinion that not googling stuff means you're not a proper engineer. And from what I've seen, those who don't google consistently also fail to understand the answers they find when they do google things. It is, in fact, an essential skill.

Bang2Bay 7y ago
Why not Yahoo?
- bdcravens 7y ago
  Because Yahoo isn't a search engine; the results are powered by another search engine (at this time, Bing)
  - hk__2 7y ago
    The definition of what is a search engine doesn’t change based of its internal implementation (here, Bing).
    - bdcravens 7y ago
      Sure, maybe a better term is "virtual search engine" (in the sense the Mobile Virtual Network Operators are just mobile service resellers)
  - autoexec 7y ago
    Bing gets their results from other search engines too. https://www.wired.com/2011/02/bing-copies-google/ https://www.wired.com/2011/02/bing-copies-google/ As far as I can just about every search engine uses results from Google directly or indirectly by using a source like Bing that in turn gets some of their results from Google. If you won't call something a search engine unless it doesn't use anyone else's search results you might have a hard time naming more than one. You can't escape Google.
    - bdcravens 7y ago
      Perhaps, though I suspect much has changed in the 8+ years since that article was written.
  - cosmos14 7y ago
    I’ve tried Bing. Many of the result were unrelated to my question.
    - manifestsilence 7y ago
      Bing has issues with not scraping dynamic content very well if at all. We had to eliminate libraries that render important content after page load with javascript because they'd show up on Google but not Bing.
    - cbsks 7y ago
      Google does such a good job with personalized results, that we have have forgotten how to search. Remember the old days when using a search engine effectively was a specialized skill? Search engines have gotten a lot better since then, but a lot of the improvements have been due to personalized results. It’s not easy to transition from Google to Bing or DuckDuckGo. That being said, Google is also a good search engine, so it’s difficult to compete with them regardless of personalized results.
      - perl4ever 7y ago
        Using a search engine is a more specialized skill than ever. What "Google getting better" actually means is that it is more likely to return what most people want as the first page hits. That is a tradeoff, because it obscures everything else whenever what most people want is wrong. As a programmer, you're only going to be doing searches for things that are non-obvious, so there is a vastly higher chance of Google giving you the wrong answer than for the average search. There is a fundamental contradiction between a search engine that tries to show you only what it thinks you want, and the fact that you don't know exactly what you want when you search, until you see some results. I think there's something like a conservation law, that the more you make it easy to find some things on the Internet, the harder you make it to find others. Kind of like the proof that you can't compress all strings.
wil421 7y ago
I’ve asked pre-internet programmers and they said they used to keep reference books at their desk or even a small library/book room at their employers. I’ve heard some government contractors can’t google because they work on non-internet connected computers. They probably keep a lot of books.
- RHSeeger 7y ago
  That's what I did at the time. I only got rid of my series of Java 2, Motif, Xlib/Xt, etc programming books when I moved a few years back.
  - jplayer01 7y ago
    But what if you need them again?
- InitialLastName 7y ago
  A friend works at a military contractor doing (effectively) windows GUIs for power system controls. His only access to an internet-connected computer is on his breaks, where he has to wait in line to use one of a very small number of computers in a special room to google things. I don't think he has books, but he has an enormous amount of documentation (something like the whole MSDN library, a bunch of internal documentation and reference info, and other documentation) installed on his computer.
  - dharmab 7y ago
    I hope they can get a StackOverflow offline archive https://archive.org/details/stackexchange https://archive.org/details/stackexchange
- jamil7 7y ago
  I worked for a few months without an internet connection, I'd go to public wifi spots and load up on all the documentation and packages I needed. I wouldn't recommend it but it definitely teaches you to be resourceful.
- 7y ago

celticninja 7y ago

I have this all the time, but to counter it I think about this time last year and it wouldn't have worked at all, now it works but it may be ugly, even better I almost understand why it works.

weavie 7y ago

Not just younger devs, I've been a professional coder for 24 years now and I still have imposter syndrome.

nhebb 7y ago
I saw Scott Hanselman speak, and he said he has impostor syndrome. I thought to myself, great, if Hanselman has impostor syndrome, I'm not even qualified. I must be an impostor-syndrome impostor.
- james_s_tayler 7y ago
  Maybe that's Hanselman's ploy. Run mind games on you to make your imposter syndrome worse. Muahahaha.

LeftHandPath 7y ago

It really does. I've been a professional developer/programmer for a few years - since I was 18 - and I'm only just going back to college (at the behest of my employer). Really enjoy taking advantage of it and reassuring the younger kids (only two or three years younger than me) that they're more than capable of this shit. And it helps me be more confident when I'm at work - at school they see me as the guy with all the answers (ha, I wish - but it's a good reminder that we're all our own worst critics).