I’m almost the same age as the author, programming for 40 years. Languages don’t make much difference, it’s not that hard to keep up. The main advantage of star

I’m almost the same age as the author, programming for 40 years. Languages don’t make much difference, it’s not that hard to keep up. The main advantage of starting out so long ago comes from adding skills incrementally. I learned internet/web technologies as they dribbled out. I sometimes wonder how someone coming at web development today, fresh out of school, could get a handle on all of it. But it wasn’t always so complicated. Learning a little SQL may be handy, but learning everything about relational databases is good job security. I’ve survived multiple waves of layoffs because I was the only “database person” in the place. My Unix skills (my career slightly predates Unix) translated perfectly to Linux and modern cloud deployments. If you want to survive as a programmer you have to learn new things and expand domain expertise. You want to be in the position of selling yourself as a problem solver, not with a grab-bag CV of languages and tools.