5 ms·

Very common when you do tech work in a non-tech industry. Comes up a lot with coding-inclined mechanical engineers. Zed Shaw's words are really true: > Program

Very common when you do tech work in a non-tech industry. Comes up a lot with coding-inclined mechanical engineers. Zed Shaw's words are really true: > Programming as a profession is only moderately interesting. It can be a good job, but you could make about the same money and be happier running a fast food joint. You're much better off using code as your secret weapon in another profession. People who can code in the world of technology companies are a dime a dozen and get no respect. People who can code in biology, medicine, government, sociology, physics, history, and mathematics are respected and can do amazing things to advance those disciplines. https://learnpythonthehardway.org/python3/advice.html https://learnpythonthehardway.org/python3/advice.html

phumbe 7y ago
Great quote -- surprised I've never seen it before! In my limited experience, it's a mixed bag. Good: you get special treatment/opportunities because of a unique skill set and increased visibility on the end results of what you do. Bad: management doesn't really know what you do between software releases, you're paid the going rate for your industry while SWEs make far more, and in-house software quality standards might not be established/followed.
- eyegor 7y ago
  Side ish bonus: you're basically prepared to run a one man show or move into niche consulting (much much higher rates). You also get to set the quality standards/procedures going forward, which can be satisfying. As a tangential bonus, I've accidentally converted my PhD research coworkers to strict git/markdown thanks mostly to typora (windows application). I showed one person what my work flow and version history look like for some internal documentation and now they do the same and convert to word/pdf as a last step. As far as I can tell, no one outside of the math/cs intersection has the patience for latex. Source: in that boat. Edit: In regards to market rates, that can be alleviated somewhat in follow up negotiations (6-12 months in or so). It's hard to convince someone what you're worth / what your value proposition is when they're not used to hiring software people. You need to demonstrate your business effect first, since they typically don't have a clear picture of it.
  - codesushi42 7y ago
    Sounds like a pain in the ass. It's already a huge pain dealing with know-nothings inside of tech firms. Now imagine having to cater to know-less-than-nothings somewhere else.
  - oarabbus_ 7y ago
    I disagree with your edit. Pay is categorically higher in tech than not for engineers.
Enginerrrd 7y ago
Man this is me. Knowing a bit of coding and machine learning in engineering has been such a boon over my career in civil/environmental engineering. But it's like math, if you know it well enough, you'll find ways to use it everywhere. If you don't, you won't. You have to be the type of person that likes to innovate. Its hard to sell to prospective employers, but its great for demonstrating value once you are with an organization. All of my previous employers fight over trying to get me back when I've found myself looking for work. ...Now I work for myself and make my own work and I've priced myself out of their offers, but that's not so bad.
- hiram112 7y ago
  How much machine learning have you been able to pick up and did you learn formally (in school) or just on your own? It's a broad subject, so where would you recommend one begin, assuming I have a decent undergrad math background? Thanks!
  - codesushi42 7y ago
    Study stats and convex optimization. If you understand logistic regression and MLE, you're mostly there.
  - pbhjpbhj 7y ago
    Not the parent, but I did an undergrad maths/physics degree some time back and found https://www.coursera.org/learn/machine-learning https://www.coursera.org/learn/machine-learning to be good as an introduction, unfortunately a new job [unrelated] has prevented my finishing the course but I hope to pick it up again later in the Winter. I would be interested in thoughts from anyone with ML experience who has reviewed said course's materials?
  - Enginerrrd 7y ago
    I've always had way too much math under my belt which helps a lot and have taught myself a lot of genuine computer science out of personal interest. I actually did Andrew Ng's Coursera machine learning class all the way through as a first introduction to that field before realizing it wasn't so mysterious and was just the application of a lot of math I already knew, then ran through a bunch of tensor flow tutorials when that first came out and the like. Then just experimented on my own. I have a knack for data though. Formally from school, I've only had 3 semesters of scientific programming in Fortran and a shitload of math. That and years and years of building models and massaging data in Excel. Mostly I'm just really used to learning a new API/tool and applying it to new things. A lot of the ML stuff hasn't been fancy ML, just basic things but applied in really clever and novel ways.
slowrabbit 7y ago
Same money running a fast food joint? You're underpaid bro or you know some crazy overpaid fast food managers. People from science based fields are coming to computer science because those other fields lack job opportunities at competitive pay.
- eyegor 7y ago
  I assuming running = owning, not managing. Subtle maybe in practice but not in revenue.
- godot 7y ago
  I believe OP means running a fast food joint as the owner, not a manager employee. Granted I don't know anything about that business, a quick google search comes up with an article from 2015 saying running a McDonald's provides an average annual profit of $150k so it sounds about in the right ballpark range: https://www.mymoneyblog.com/mcdonalds-franchise-cost-vs-profit.html https://www.mymoneyblog.com/mcdonalds-franchise-cost-vs-prof...
- fingerlocks 7y ago
  McDonald’s franchise owners make $500k to $1 million a year, in average. That’s profit, not revenue. My source is from the McDonald’s franchise disclosure documents. The money blog mentioned in sibling comments claim it’s less.
  - defen 7y ago
    According to this random quora link: https://www.quora.com/How-much-does-McDonalds-make-in-a-day https://www.quora.com/How-much-does-McDonalds-make-in-a-day the average McDonald's unit in the USA has $2,670,320 in annual sales. 25% - 40% profit margin sounds really high for a restaurant, but I don't know enough about the industry to dispute it. Are you sure those numbers were presented as averages and not the high end of what you could make? Or does the typical owner have multiple locations?
    - fingerlocks 7y ago
kofejnik 7y ago
strongly disagree 1. you _won't_ be happier running a fast food joint - the work is gruelling, and it's so easy to go bust. And you won't bring home six figures 2a. people who _actually_ can code are scarce, even in the tech industry. Source: conducted over 300 interviews 2b. quite logically, your coding skill will be most appreciated and compensated at a Big Tech Co, not at a government department where they will be simply unable to see the difference
- jason0597 7y ago
  >2a. people who _actually_ can code are scarce, even in the tech industry. Source: conducted over 300 interviews As a young person with an interest in software programming (currently studying chemical engineering but still write C code now and then), what do you look for when trying to find out people who can _actually_ code?
  - HeyLaughingBoy 7y ago
    Literally the ability to write working code. You'd be amazed how few interviewees can even put together a working for... loop.
    - kofejnik 7y ago
      yes, exactly this
    - andrewnc 7y ago
      This absolutely blows my mind. I have a hard time even believing it. But having never conducted interviews, I just don't know.
    - jason0597 7y ago
      I've heard this story before, but it sounds absolutely insane and I can't begin to imagine (let alone expect!) that such a thing occurs. Is it really true?
  - kofejnik 7y ago
codesushi42 7y ago
I don't buy it. There are tons of software "engineers" who try to escape fintech for FAANGs or even startups, coming from top tier firms like Goldman and McKinsey. Likewise, bioinformatics generally pays a lot less than traditional SWE roles. So what I have seen is the exact opposite in practice: people with minimum coding skills in other fields trying to jump into tech firms.
- jacobwilliamroy 7y ago
  I suppose it's hard to match the salaries at The Big Corps working in other industries. Still, outside of software companies, people think I'm basically a wizard for doing simple things, like automatically generating climographs from JSON files. I just don't get that kind of positive reinforcement from software people. I think it's just more enjoyable to be the hacker rather than a hacker.
  - codesushi42 7y ago
    That's great, but I prefer to work with people who can teach me new tech knowledge.

phumbe 7y ago

Great quote -- surprised I've never seen it before! In my limited experience, it's a mixed bag. Good: you get special treatment/opportunities because of a unique skill set and increased visibility on the end results of what you do. Bad: management doesn't really know what you do between software releases, you're paid the going rate for your industry while SWEs make far more, and in-house software quality standards might not be established/followed.

eyegor 7y ago
Side ish bonus: you're basically prepared to run a one man show or move into niche consulting (much much higher rates). You also get to set the quality standards/procedures going forward, which can be satisfying. As a tangential bonus, I've accidentally converted my PhD research coworkers to strict git/markdown thanks mostly to typora (windows application). I showed one person what my work flow and version history look like for some internal documentation and now they do the same and convert to word/pdf as a last step. As far as I can tell, no one outside of the math/cs intersection has the patience for latex. Source: in that boat. Edit: In regards to market rates, that can be alleviated somewhat in follow up negotiations (6-12 months in or so). It's hard to convince someone what you're worth / what your value proposition is when they're not used to hiring software people. You need to demonstrate your business effect first, since they typically don't have a clear picture of it.
- codesushi42 7y ago
  Sounds like a pain in the ass. It's already a huge pain dealing with know-nothings inside of tech firms. Now imagine having to cater to know-less-than-nothings somewhere else.
- oarabbus_ 7y ago
  I disagree with your edit. Pay is categorically higher in tech than not for engineers.

Enginerrrd 7y ago

Man this is me. Knowing a bit of coding and machine learning in engineering has been such a boon over my career in civil/environmental engineering. But it's like math, if you know it well enough, you'll find ways to use it everywhere. If you don't, you won't. You have to be the type of person that likes to innovate. Its hard to sell to prospective employers, but its great for demonstrating value once you are with an organization. All of my previous employers fight over trying to get me back when I've found myself looking for work. ...Now I work for myself and make my own work and I've priced myself out of their offers, but that's not so bad.

hiram112 7y ago
How much machine learning have you been able to pick up and did you learn formally (in school) or just on your own? It's a broad subject, so where would you recommend one begin, assuming I have a decent undergrad math background? Thanks!
- codesushi42 7y ago
  Study stats and convex optimization. If you understand logistic regression and MLE, you're mostly there.
- pbhjpbhj 7y ago
  Not the parent, but I did an undergrad maths/physics degree some time back and found https://www.coursera.org/learn/machine-learning https://www.coursera.org/learn/machine-learning to be good as an introduction, unfortunately a new job [unrelated] has prevented my finishing the course but I hope to pick it up again later in the Winter. I would be interested in thoughts from anyone with ML experience who has reviewed said course's materials?
- Enginerrrd 7y ago
  I've always had way too much math under my belt which helps a lot and have taught myself a lot of genuine computer science out of personal interest. I actually did Andrew Ng's Coursera machine learning class all the way through as a first introduction to that field before realizing it wasn't so mysterious and was just the application of a lot of math I already knew, then ran through a bunch of tensor flow tutorials when that first came out and the like. Then just experimented on my own. I have a knack for data though. Formally from school, I've only had 3 semesters of scientific programming in Fortran and a shitload of math. That and years and years of building models and massaging data in Excel. Mostly I'm just really used to learning a new API/tool and applying it to new things. A lot of the ML stuff hasn't been fancy ML, just basic things but applied in really clever and novel ways.

slowrabbit 7y ago

Same money running a fast food joint? You're underpaid bro or you know some crazy overpaid fast food managers. People from science based fields are coming to computer science because those other fields lack job opportunities at competitive pay.

eyegor 7y ago
I assuming running = owning, not managing. Subtle maybe in practice but not in revenue.
godot 7y ago
I believe OP means running a fast food joint as the owner, not a manager employee. Granted I don't know anything about that business, a quick google search comes up with an article from 2015 saying running a McDonald's provides an average annual profit of $150k so it sounds about in the right ballpark range: https://www.mymoneyblog.com/mcdonalds-franchise-cost-vs-profit.html https://www.mymoneyblog.com/mcdonalds-franchise-cost-vs-prof...
fingerlocks 7y ago
McDonald’s franchise owners make $500k to $1 million a year, in average. That’s profit, not revenue. My source is from the McDonald’s franchise disclosure documents. The money blog mentioned in sibling comments claim it’s less.
- defen 7y ago
  According to this random quora link: https://www.quora.com/How-much-does-McDonalds-make-in-a-day https://www.quora.com/How-much-does-McDonalds-make-in-a-day the average McDonald's unit in the USA has $2,670,320 in annual sales. 25% - 40% profit margin sounds really high for a restaurant, but I don't know enough about the industry to dispute it. Are you sure those numbers were presented as averages and not the high end of what you could make? Or does the typical owner have multiple locations?
  - fingerlocks 7y ago

kofejnik 7y ago

strongly disagree 1. you _won't_ be happier running a fast food joint - the work is gruelling, and it's so easy to go bust. And you won't bring home six figures 2a. people who _actually_ can code are scarce, even in the tech industry. Source: conducted over 300 interviews 2b. quite logically, your coding skill will be most appreciated and compensated at a Big Tech Co, not at a government department where they will be simply unable to see the difference

jason0597 7y ago
>2a. people who _actually_ can code are scarce, even in the tech industry. Source: conducted over 300 interviews As a young person with an interest in software programming (currently studying chemical engineering but still write C code now and then), what do you look for when trying to find out people who can _actually_ code?
- HeyLaughingBoy 7y ago
  Literally the ability to write working code. You'd be amazed how few interviewees can even put together a working for... loop.
  - kofejnik 7y ago
    yes, exactly this
  - andrewnc 7y ago
    This absolutely blows my mind. I have a hard time even believing it. But having never conducted interviews, I just don't know.
  - jason0597 7y ago
    I've heard this story before, but it sounds absolutely insane and I can't begin to imagine (let alone expect!) that such a thing occurs. Is it really true?
- kofejnik 7y ago

codesushi42 7y ago

I don't buy it. There are tons of software "engineers" who try to escape fintech for FAANGs or even startups, coming from top tier firms like Goldman and McKinsey. Likewise, bioinformatics generally pays a lot less than traditional SWE roles. So what I have seen is the exact opposite in practice: people with minimum coding skills in other fields trying to jump into tech firms.

jacobwilliamroy 7y ago
I suppose it's hard to match the salaries at The Big Corps working in other industries. Still, outside of software companies, people think I'm basically a wizard for doing simple things, like automatically generating climographs from JSON files. I just don't get that kind of positive reinforcement from software people. I think it's just more enjoyable to be the hacker rather than a hacker.
- codesushi42 7y ago
  That's great, but I prefer to work with people who can teach me new tech knowledge.