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Somehow I can't equate myself to my age number, 46. In 25 years there has never been a moment when I wasn't in love with learning the latest cutting edge tech.

by jv22222 12y ago

Somehow I can't equate myself to my age number, 46. In 25 years there has never been a moment when I wasn't in love with learning the latest cutting edge tech. Over the years it's been so much fun... ...to progress from the BBC B to pascal on the mac to pc's to unix boxes to c cgi scripts to perl to php to mySQL to flash actionscript to ruby to javascript to noSQL to node to socket.io to html5 css3 to iOS to android to rabbitmq to laravel. ...to move from crappy first gen-linux boxes serving web pages from my front room to using web hosting companies to the elastic cloud to puppet to salt-stack to containers. And I'm only just getting started. I can't wait to get in to VR, 3D printing, hard core signal processing and so much more. When I'm screen sharing and problem solving with a 25 year old dev on a hardcore problem I feel no different in any way to the person on the other end of the line.

hoboon 12y ago
This is fantastic, and makes me hopeful. I'm almost 40 and no real career accomplishments but there's still time for me, maybe, before I just decide to hang it up and just go home.
- oneweekwonder 12y ago
  What is real career accomplishments?
- switch_bro 12y ago
  The article focuses on the fact that as programmers age past 30 their salaries grow but they have roughly the same skills. But that is not the main dynamic here. The main dynamic is that as a person's brain ages, it improves in some ways and gets worse in others. The improvement is that you have more depth and experience. The loss is that your brain gets slower and less flexible. Unfortunately, in computer programming you will run out of experience and depth that you can accumulate after about 8-10 years of work (say ages 22 - 32). Every new technology is just a variant of the previous 999 technologies. But you still keep getting older every year, and incurring the downsides of getting older! Compare this with, say, being a doctor. A doctor at 32 is just finishing residency, so he or she has just finished formal education. At 42, she has 10 years of experience, and a doctor with 10 years of experience is better than one fresh out of school. The doctor keeps getting better at 52 (20 years of experience) and 62 (30 years of experience). The big picture is that computer programming is a field with low barriers to entry and where young people have a significant advantage. Staying in a field like that for the long run is going to lead to a brutish brutish existence. There are many posts here along the lines of "I'm 39 and still doing ok". That's beside the point, because in the future you will be 49, then 57, then 65. Remember, Social Security full retirement age is 67. It doesn't make sense to wait until you are 40 to switch. Every career field accepts young people easier than old people, which means that the time to start planning your switch is today.
  - archgrove 12y ago
    I'm quite sure there's more to software engineering than can be learned in 8-10 years. I spent 7 years working with one tiny part of formal software verification, and still didn't get to the bottom of it. Perhaps it's true in web development, where it does really seem like the industry is recycling ideas every 18 months. But there's far more depth to the field than just "JavaScript framework n+1" and "Yet another task running tool fundamentally identical to the previous 328, but written by a fashionable company".
    - switch_bro 12y ago
      The point is not that there is nothing to learn after 8-10 years. There is enough to learn for multiple lifetimes. The point is that after 8-10 years additional learning/experience will not give you a competitive advantage compared to younger programmers. Also, I can see why someone would downvote my post above, since it describes an unpleasant reality. But I think it is crucial for young programmers to be aware of this dynamic!
      - archgrove 12y ago
        Sure it does (at least, as much as any other "intellectual" field, like accounting or law). Do you want the guy who knows X (or 3 variants of X, each sequentially in fashion)? Or the guy who knows X, Y and Z? The key is, no matter the age, to keep expanding your knowledge base.
        rndrnd 12y ago
        Well, different intellectual fields have different experience curves. Accounting, medicine, law all have much longer experience curves. Accounting also has significant barriers to entry (though not as high as medicine). Law has lower barriers to entry and you can see them facing a wave of unemployed lawyers and closing law schools right about now. Etc ...
      - jv22222 12y ago
        You're getting down votes because it's simply not true. It's not about age it's about the person. And it couldn't be more wrong to say that there's nothing to learn after 8-10 years, even in web. But let's talk about the competitive advantage part of your argument. Personally, I have spent 20 years collapsing and simplifying "everything" in my work product. IE ui design, coding patterns, and all other aspects of my tech related work product. Whenever I show my code to new devs they usually say "yup I get it, it's easy". But it's not easy, I just spent a crap load of time thinking about those patterns over the years making them easier and easier over every iteration. So, that's one competitive advantage right there. But another competitive advantage polyglot old guys have. They can truly be a full stack developers taking an idea from mockup to web and mobile and completely scaled distributed systems. It's VERY hard for anyone to do that without putting in 10-15 years because each discipline (design, mockup, mobile, architecture, scaling, etc.) takes a lot of time and effort to master. That said I have met 30 year olds who started at 15 who could do that too. I think of it like the CEO who worked his way up from the mail room, he's seen every part of the company inside and out and that's why he's so good at building companies now.
comboy 12y ago
I've also been programming for 20+ years and it seems to me it's only getting better. To be fluent there really is a lot to learn that takes time. From learning how the whole operating system works on the lower level through all design patters and common pitfalls to mastering everyday tools (dvorak, zsh, vim etc.) that shorten the path between ideas and working code. I know some coders in their 60s that just like you have a fresh mind and are still eager to learn new things. I believe association with older people being less capable of mental task and creativity stems from how our society works (or rather worked). People used to do the same job, then become some grandpa with not much input or challenges to keep their brain active. It is quite well documented at this point[1] that when you keep challenging your brain there is not all that much degradation coming with age. It's just that as you get older it's becoming harder to present something really new to your brain - it will tend to view it through existing patterns and use shortcuts that you already have. That's why picking up some new language (not just programming lang) just for the sake of learning something new is a good idea (but what for? could be for fun - dopamine is a lot of fun) * The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science - Norman Doidge ( http://www.amazon.com/The-Brain-That-Changes-Itself/dp/0143113100 http://www.amazon.com/The-Brain-That-Changes-Itself/dp/01431... ), great book

by jv22222 12y ago

hoboon 12y ago

This is fantastic, and makes me hopeful. I'm almost 40 and no real career accomplishments but there's still time for me, maybe, before I just decide to hang it up and just go home.

oneweekwonder 12y ago
What is real career accomplishments?
switch_bro 12y ago
The article focuses on the fact that as programmers age past 30 their salaries grow but they have roughly the same skills. But that is not the main dynamic here. The main dynamic is that as a person's brain ages, it improves in some ways and gets worse in others. The improvement is that you have more depth and experience. The loss is that your brain gets slower and less flexible. Unfortunately, in computer programming you will run out of experience and depth that you can accumulate after about 8-10 years of work (say ages 22 - 32). Every new technology is just a variant of the previous 999 technologies. But you still keep getting older every year, and incurring the downsides of getting older! Compare this with, say, being a doctor. A doctor at 32 is just finishing residency, so he or she has just finished formal education. At 42, she has 10 years of experience, and a doctor with 10 years of experience is better than one fresh out of school. The doctor keeps getting better at 52 (20 years of experience) and 62 (30 years of experience). The big picture is that computer programming is a field with low barriers to entry and where young people have a significant advantage. Staying in a field like that for the long run is going to lead to a brutish brutish existence. There are many posts here along the lines of "I'm 39 and still doing ok". That's beside the point, because in the future you will be 49, then 57, then 65. Remember, Social Security full retirement age is 67. It doesn't make sense to wait until you are 40 to switch. Every career field accepts young people easier than old people, which means that the time to start planning your switch is today.
- archgrove 12y ago
  I'm quite sure there's more to software engineering than can be learned in 8-10 years. I spent 7 years working with one tiny part of formal software verification, and still didn't get to the bottom of it. Perhaps it's true in web development, where it does really seem like the industry is recycling ideas every 18 months. But there's far more depth to the field than just "JavaScript framework n+1" and "Yet another task running tool fundamentally identical to the previous 328, but written by a fashionable company".
  - switch_bro 12y ago
    The point is not that there is nothing to learn after 8-10 years. There is enough to learn for multiple lifetimes. The point is that after 8-10 years additional learning/experience will not give you a competitive advantage compared to younger programmers. Also, I can see why someone would downvote my post above, since it describes an unpleasant reality. But I think it is crucial for young programmers to be aware of this dynamic!
    - archgrove 12y ago
      Sure it does (at least, as much as any other "intellectual" field, like accounting or law). Do you want the guy who knows X (or 3 variants of X, each sequentially in fashion)? Or the guy who knows X, Y and Z? The key is, no matter the age, to keep expanding your knowledge base.
      - rndrnd 12y ago
        Well, different intellectual fields have different experience curves. Accounting, medicine, law all have much longer experience curves. Accounting also has significant barriers to entry (though not as high as medicine). Law has lower barriers to entry and you can see them facing a wave of unemployed lawyers and closing law schools right about now. Etc ...
    - jv22222 12y ago
      You're getting down votes because it's simply not true. It's not about age it's about the person. And it couldn't be more wrong to say that there's nothing to learn after 8-10 years, even in web. But let's talk about the competitive advantage part of your argument. Personally, I have spent 20 years collapsing and simplifying "everything" in my work product. IE ui design, coding patterns, and all other aspects of my tech related work product. Whenever I show my code to new devs they usually say "yup I get it, it's easy". But it's not easy, I just spent a crap load of time thinking about those patterns over the years making them easier and easier over every iteration. So, that's one competitive advantage right there. But another competitive advantage polyglot old guys have. They can truly be a full stack developers taking an idea from mockup to web and mobile and completely scaled distributed systems. It's VERY hard for anyone to do that without putting in 10-15 years because each discipline (design, mockup, mobile, architecture, scaling, etc.) takes a lot of time and effort to master. That said I have met 30 year olds who started at 15 who could do that too. I think of it like the CEO who worked his way up from the mail room, he's seen every part of the company inside and out and that's why he's so good at building companies now.

comboy 12y ago

I've also been programming for 20+ years and it seems to me it's only getting better. To be fluent there really is a lot to learn that takes time. From learning how the whole operating system works on the lower level through all design patters and common pitfalls to mastering everyday tools (dvorak, zsh, vim etc.) that shorten the path between ideas and working code. I know some coders in their 60s that just like you have a fresh mind and are still eager to learn new things. I believe association with older people being less capable of mental task and creativity stems from how our society works (or rather worked). People used to do the same job, then become some grandpa with not much input or challenges to keep their brain active. It is quite well documented at this point[1] that when you keep challenging your brain there is not all that much degradation coming with age. It's just that as you get older it's becoming harder to present something really new to your brain - it will tend to view it through existing patterns and use shortcuts that you already have. That's why picking up some new language (not just programming lang) just for the sake of learning something new is a good idea (but what for? could be for fun - dopamine is a lot of fun) * The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science - Norman Doidge ( http://www.amazon.com/The-Brain-That-Changes-Itself/dp/0143113100 http://www.amazon.com/The-Brain-That-Changes-Itself/dp/01431... ), great book