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I recently switched from software engineering on ads and web performance at a FAANG to (meta)genomics at a nonprofit startup; happy to answer questions

by jefftk 4y ago

boppo1 4y ago
From a genomics layperson with decent dev skills: A. What are the broad and medium goals you work on? B. What are your daily activities? How do they fir into (A)? C. What does nonprofit genomics vs for profit look like from a revenue standpoint? D. What specific technologies/stacks are you using? E. The CRUD frontend+backend+database to serve users (and sell ads) is pretty ubiquitous in 'tech', with some branches. How does your field compare?
- jefftk 4y ago
  A: The goal of my current project is to identify novel pandemics, even if they're caused by something we've never seen before, most likely by looking at growth patterns. At a broader scale, I'm trying to learn enough about working in this field that I'll be able to contribute on whatever future projects seem most appropriately important to me. B: unlike my previous work, I'm back to being an individual contributor. Very few meetings, mostly coding and analysis. Current thing is trying to understand what drives per-sample variability in wastewater sequencing data. C. Our group is currently philanthropically funded, and is focused on determining whether/how this is possible/practical. D. I'm mostly working in (bio)python, with a few bits written in C and gluing things together with bash. E. I was most recently working on (a) JS infrastructure to fetch and render ads and (b) working with browsers on platform features that would improve privacy, security, and efficiency.
boppo1 4y ago
F. The parent article mentions solutions are often custom made by one person. Can problems in the field be reduced such that extensible open-source frameworks could be applied? The way we have frameworks for webdev?
- jefftk 4y ago
  I'm very new to this area, and am really not the right person to ask, but I'll try my best ;) In general you have frameworks when lots of people are trying to solve a large number of problems that look similar at the start and then will diverge. That's pretty web specific. I think instead in bio you mostly get (and will keep getting) modular tools and pipeline standardization.
steakknife 4y ago
Are there any open source tools/projects worth contributing to that don't need specialized infrastructure, proprietary data, or a PhD in the field to understand?
- jefftk 4y ago
  Almost certainly yes. For example, lots of things don't have tests and really should. But I'm not too sure about priorities, or about which projects would welcome that work.

I recently switched from software engineering on ads and web performance at a FAANG to (meta)genomics at a nonprofit startup; happy to answer questions

by jefftk 4y ago

I recently switched from software engineering on ads and web performance at a FAANG to (meta)genomics at a nonprofit startup; happy to answer questions

boppo1 4y ago

From a genomics layperson with decent dev skills: A. What are the broad and medium goals you work on? B. What are your daily activities? How do they fir into (A)? C. What does nonprofit genomics vs for profit look like from a revenue standpoint? D. What specific technologies/stacks are you using? E. The CRUD frontend+backend+database to serve users (and sell ads) is pretty ubiquitous in 'tech', with some branches. How does your field compare?

jefftk 4y ago
A: The goal of my current project is to identify novel pandemics, even if they're caused by something we've never seen before, most likely by looking at growth patterns. At a broader scale, I'm trying to learn enough about working in this field that I'll be able to contribute on whatever future projects seem most appropriately important to me. B: unlike my previous work, I'm back to being an individual contributor. Very few meetings, mostly coding and analysis. Current thing is trying to understand what drives per-sample variability in wastewater sequencing data. C. Our group is currently philanthropically funded, and is focused on determining whether/how this is possible/practical. D. I'm mostly working in (bio)python, with a few bits written in C and gluing things together with bash. E. I was most recently working on (a) JS infrastructure to fetch and render ads and (b) working with browsers on platform features that would improve privacy, security, and efficiency.

boppo1 4y ago

F. The parent article mentions solutions are often custom made by one person. Can problems in the field be reduced such that extensible open-source frameworks could be applied? The way we have frameworks for webdev?

jefftk 4y ago
I'm very new to this area, and am really not the right person to ask, but I'll try my best ;) In general you have frameworks when lots of people are trying to solve a large number of problems that look similar at the start and then will diverge. That's pretty web specific. I think instead in bio you mostly get (and will keep getting) modular tools and pipeline standardization.

steakknife 4y ago

Are there any open source tools/projects worth contributing to that don't need specialized infrastructure, proprietary data, or a PhD in the field to understand?

jefftk 4y ago
Almost certainly yes. For example, lots of things don't have tests and really should. But I'm not too sure about priorities, or about which projects would welcome that work.