3 ms·

Great article! > I have read a lot of long spiels about craft that frequently end in something like, software work isn’t like other work, and we shouldn’t be j

Great article! > I have read a lot of long spiels about craft that frequently end in something like, software work isn’t like other work, and we shouldn’t be judged the same way. We are entirely unique. We are the special ones. It might comfort the author to know that even within the realm of software engineering, there are insiders and outsiders. Some of the most important engineering work was made by these outsiders. Growing up poor, self-taught, as the only programmer I knew around me, I felt like an outsider my entire life. When I finally began to associate with other programmers... I still felt like an outsider. Here were people from structured family units with solid life skills, a college education, large support networks, a lack of systemic trauma, and a fundamentally different understanding of the world. I've begun to find my place in this world, but the feeling of being an outsider will never fully go away. It's of little coincidence that my favorite kinds of music and other art are often categorized as Outsider Art. My advice... find a way into that makerspace. Open up a REPL. Software engineering might entail a specific rigid and deep understanding of engineering principles, but software craftsmanship is for everyone. Personal computers were made for the average person to enhance themselves and the world around them, and we should never forget that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outsider_art https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outsider_art

LanternLight83 3y ago
As a self-taught programmer and resident of a town well under 20k pop (most of whom are well out of my age group), i really identify with this. it's helped a bit to learn deeply and engage with others who have done so, and in some ways is an extension of a broader void in my network (or lack there-of). it't influenced the tochnologies i've chosen and hence made me who i am today, but i hope the "zoom-native" generations broadly engage more in open online spaces and feel less of this
- soulofmischief 3y ago
  There are dozens of us!! Where do you typically hang online? Maybe we should think about how we could contribute specifically to young rural programmers in similar situations.
avg_dev 3y ago
i remember my third year of coding as a pro, i had just taken a job in palo alto and was settling in after moving. i was at my new job and a bunch of the coders at the company i was working at went out for lunch and i was getting to know them. one guy who was younger than i was was talking about how he had a degree from a liberal arts college, and had just been coding on his own for a while, and that when he moved out there for work and was interacting with other coders in real-life for the first time (previously it had been only over the internet) he was learning how to pronounce the names of various daemons, libraries, projects, etc., and that he had understood the pronunciations differently when he was physically on his own. in my head i silently said to myself, "this guy is a junior coder and won't amount to too much" and made a note to try to associate with some of the heavy hitters to try and boost my career and status (and i guess if i'm being charitable to myself, also to learn). that guy left the company maybe a year later. the company he went to, i think he started as a dev, later became CTO, and eventually CEO. while he was CEO, the company sold for over a billion dollars. and even when we were still working together, i did learn quite a few things from him. so yeah, i think it is easy for people to pigeonhole others, or to think that they are in a place of skill that others perhaps can't easily get to, but sometimes that kind of thinking is quite wrong. (also, at his new company he wrote some great blog posts on software development and operations practices that i really enjoyed and learned quite a bit from)
- epolanski 3y ago
  I had some similar experiences with few self taught junior devs. I didn't look down on them, but was heavily surprised to see how much they could teach me about software or work or life.

LanternLight83 3y ago

As a self-taught programmer and resident of a town well under 20k pop (most of whom are well out of my age group), i really identify with this. it's helped a bit to learn deeply and engage with others who have done so, and in some ways is an extension of a broader void in my network (or lack there-of). it't influenced the tochnologies i've chosen and hence made me who i am today, but i hope the "zoom-native" generations broadly engage more in open online spaces and feel less of this

soulofmischief 3y ago
There are dozens of us!! Where do you typically hang online? Maybe we should think about how we could contribute specifically to young rural programmers in similar situations.

avg_dev 3y ago

i remember my third year of coding as a pro, i had just taken a job in palo alto and was settling in after moving. i was at my new job and a bunch of the coders at the company i was working at went out for lunch and i was getting to know them. one guy who was younger than i was was talking about how he had a degree from a liberal arts college, and had just been coding on his own for a while, and that when he moved out there for work and was interacting with other coders in real-life for the first time (previously it had been only over the internet) he was learning how to pronounce the names of various daemons, libraries, projects, etc., and that he had understood the pronunciations differently when he was physically on his own. in my head i silently said to myself, "this guy is a junior coder and won't amount to too much" and made a note to try to associate with some of the heavy hitters to try and boost my career and status (and i guess if i'm being charitable to myself, also to learn). that guy left the company maybe a year later. the company he went to, i think he started as a dev, later became CTO, and eventually CEO. while he was CEO, the company sold for over a billion dollars. and even when we were still working together, i did learn quite a few things from him. so yeah, i think it is easy for people to pigeonhole others, or to think that they are in a place of skill that others perhaps can't easily get to, but sometimes that kind of thinking is quite wrong. (also, at his new company he wrote some great blog posts on software development and operations practices that i really enjoyed and learned quite a bit from)

epolanski 3y ago
I had some similar experiences with few self taught junior devs. I didn't look down on them, but was heavily surprised to see how much they could teach me about software or work or life.