8 ms·

I've been a programmer for 20+ years. For the longest time I didn't see any discrimination in tech, probably because everybody I worked with was also a young wh

I've been a programmer for 20+ years. For the longest time I didn't see any discrimination in tech, probably because everybody I worked with was also a young white guy. Except those over the hill freaks with their comb overs and sandals with socks. Fortunately their skill sets were rapidly obsolete, so we got rid of them. On the other hand, my wife (a senior Oracle DBA with close to 20 years of experience) sees it on a regular basis. It's disheartening to hear her talk about it because I realize I'm guilty of many of the same behaviours. I guess I could try to protect my ego and claim it's not sexism, but that's not who I want to be. I don't want to be the guy denying something I know to be true. I went into an interview a couple of years ago and realized I was about 20 years older than everybody in the company. I don't have a comb over and I don't wear socks with sandals, but it was pretty obvious I was too old to work there. That's the day I realized my job opportunities are becoming limited. I should have seen it coming. Hmm, maybe it's possible women don't want to be in tech because of the sexism they face.

ManFromUranus 12y ago
I think that's the easy answer. "but it was pretty obvious I was too old to work there" Who said that? Did they say that to you? If they did that was definitely wrong. However it sounds more like you imposed that criteria on yourself, and then attribute the blame to them. If gender diversity in tech is a good thing, why not age diversity? Sounds like they needed you there.
- terrywilcox 12y ago
  I certainly didn't impose that criteria. I wanted the job. I certainly had the experience they were looking for. And no, nobody came out and said I was too old. They just reacted like I used to react when old people told me they understood computers. Pleasant, but patronizing. How could an old guy possibly handle any modern technology when he's got COBOL and FORTRAN on his resume? Discrimination is rarely blatant. I'd guess that most people are never aware they're doing it. That doesn't mean it's not happening.
  - ManFromUranus 12y ago
    Well for starters, COBOL and FORTRAN are effectively ancient technologies are far as much of modern business programming is concerned. I would omit them from your resume. State them for interest sake only. Also they are not a charity organization, the business goal is to get value out of you. Perhaps you did not demonstrate sufficient value, or seemed out of touch with current technology. I have found that programmers are a fairly meritocratic group of people, but you do have to stay up to date with tech, and that is a battle that gets harder and harder as you age.
    - vonmoltke 12y ago
      Fortran, while it might be ancient in computing terms, is still an actively-developed language[1] with multiple open-source and commercial compilers. I started writing Fortran professionally when I was 26, nine years ago. In certain scientific realms it is still used heavily, and it generally still kicks everything else's ass at linear algebra. Kind of a tangent, but I have a soft spot for that language. [1] Most recent standards rev was 2008, current draft standard slated for release in 2016.
      - ManFromUranus 12y ago
        Fortran is not used at most businesses. I doubt Fortran is used much anywhere outside of possibly engineering. Even then Engineers probably use some type of AutoCad like software that does modelling, and therefore nobody needs to know FOrtran anyway.
        bigger_cheese 12y ago
        Engineer here. I work at a large industrial plant Fortran is used quite a bit. We have numerical simulation code which runs and feeds back into our operating process written in Fortran (mostly Thermodynamics and Chemical kinetic's simulations). Plant Operators make descions based on the output of Fortran models all without knowing or caring that the things are written in Fortran. You can trace the herritage of the code back to the 80's but it has been more or less constantly maintained since then there is a lot of company IP wrapped up in the code. You certainly don't need to know Fortran to use or understand the models (it's wrapped in a 'modernish' C++ GUI) but the engineers working on improvements to the backend definately need to know Fortran. I suspect there is a lot of reasons for the prevalence of Fortran in Engineering code. Industrial plants tends to operate continously you can't exactly replace all the infrastructure without large downtime. A large part of our plant was built in 1996, so the technology is very much what you'd expect from that era (RS/6000 Unix boxes everywhere in the control system). The Libraies and compilers etc all have to link against that vintage. It's not slated to get upgraded until 2018 and we will probably try to push that as far back as we can. When the upgrade happens I suspect we will be on Wintel (and in another 20 years that will probably be just as outdated). The other reason for Fortran is that Engineering processes tend to be stable. A chemical reaction does not change so once some code is written and it works very low incentive to replace it. At my plant our models were first written in the 80's (when personal computers began to become ubiquitous) by senior engineers in the company - these were guys who grew up in the 70's and were raised on Fortran. Eventually the code was handed to the junior engineers to maintain. The juniors passed up the ranks to become seniors and when it came time to write the next generation of models "I'll base it on this existing Fortran Model which I know inside out and works really well" became the mantra and so Fortran become self perpetuating and entrenched across the industry. If it had been a decade later would probably have been C

ManFromUranus 12y ago

I think that's the easy answer. "but it was pretty obvious I was too old to work there" Who said that? Did they say that to you? If they did that was definitely wrong. However it sounds more like you imposed that criteria on yourself, and then attribute the blame to them. If gender diversity in tech is a good thing, why not age diversity? Sounds like they needed you there.

terrywilcox 12y ago
I certainly didn't impose that criteria. I wanted the job. I certainly had the experience they were looking for. And no, nobody came out and said I was too old. They just reacted like I used to react when old people told me they understood computers. Pleasant, but patronizing. How could an old guy possibly handle any modern technology when he's got COBOL and FORTRAN on his resume? Discrimination is rarely blatant. I'd guess that most people are never aware they're doing it. That doesn't mean it's not happening.
- ManFromUranus 12y ago
  Well for starters, COBOL and FORTRAN are effectively ancient technologies are far as much of modern business programming is concerned. I would omit them from your resume. State them for interest sake only. Also they are not a charity organization, the business goal is to get value out of you. Perhaps you did not demonstrate sufficient value, or seemed out of touch with current technology. I have found that programmers are a fairly meritocratic group of people, but you do have to stay up to date with tech, and that is a battle that gets harder and harder as you age.
  - vonmoltke 12y ago
    Fortran, while it might be ancient in computing terms, is still an actively-developed language[1] with multiple open-source and commercial compilers. I started writing Fortran professionally when I was 26, nine years ago. In certain scientific realms it is still used heavily, and it generally still kicks everything else's ass at linear algebra. Kind of a tangent, but I have a soft spot for that language. [1] Most recent standards rev was 2008, current draft standard slated for release in 2016.
    - ManFromUranus 12y ago
      Fortran is not used at most businesses. I doubt Fortran is used much anywhere outside of possibly engineering. Even then Engineers probably use some type of AutoCad like software that does modelling, and therefore nobody needs to know FOrtran anyway.
      - bigger_cheese 12y ago
        Engineer here. I work at a large industrial plant Fortran is used quite a bit. We have numerical simulation code which runs and feeds back into our operating process written in Fortran (mostly Thermodynamics and Chemical kinetic's simulations). Plant Operators make descions based on the output of Fortran models all without knowing or caring that the things are written in Fortran. You can trace the herritage of the code back to the 80's but it has been more or less constantly maintained since then there is a lot of company IP wrapped up in the code. You certainly don't need to know Fortran to use or understand the models (it's wrapped in a 'modernish' C++ GUI) but the engineers working on improvements to the backend definately need to know Fortran. I suspect there is a lot of reasons for the prevalence of Fortran in Engineering code. Industrial plants tends to operate continously you can't exactly replace all the infrastructure without large downtime. A large part of our plant was built in 1996, so the technology is very much what you'd expect from that era (RS/6000 Unix boxes everywhere in the control system). The Libraies and compilers etc all have to link against that vintage. It's not slated to get upgraded until 2018 and we will probably try to push that as far back as we can. When the upgrade happens I suspect we will be on Wintel (and in another 20 years that will probably be just as outdated). The other reason for Fortran is that Engineering processes tend to be stable. A chemical reaction does not change so once some code is written and it works very low incentive to replace it. At my plant our models were first written in the 80's (when personal computers began to become ubiquitous) by senior engineers in the company - these were guys who grew up in the 70's and were raised on Fortran. Eventually the code was handed to the junior engineers to maintain. The juniors passed up the ranks to become seniors and when it came time to write the next generation of models "I'll base it on this existing Fortran Model which I know inside out and works really well" became the mantra and so Fortran become self perpetuating and entrenched across the industry. If it had been a decade later would probably have been C