edw519

22 ms·

151.
by edw519 9y ago
Commercial programmer, full-time, some remote, some office. No alarm clock, watch, or cell phone. I don't know what time it is except for outlook meeting reminders or SO telling me it's time for dinner, Jeopardy, or Penguins or St
152.
by edw519 9y ago
Turn lemons into lemonade. Data + Process = Results Data is your current job. Process is what you do with that data. Most people will want to change the Data; that is, change job, change career, take vacation, etc. Sounds like you're a
153.
by edw519 9y ago
Root is a lightweight bank account designed to be accessible through code. Wait, what? Code you write yourself? Sounds like they may have accidentally provided the perfect solution to different problem: technical recruiting and screening.
154.
by edw519 9y ago
I cared. Still do. Been here over 10 years. I'd wager for every person helped by YC, another 1000 were helped by HN. There are lots of us programmers in the diaspora whose closest encounter to Silicon Valley is virtual, in places just
155.
by edw519 9y ago
My first co-founder was a brilliant engineer. One day I borrowed his car (a fancy late model sports car) for an errand because mine was blocked in. But the speedometer didn't work which made for some strange driving. When I asked him a
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by edw519 9y ago
I started a prayer group for people dissatisfied with mainstream religion and hosted it in my conference room on weekends. The response was overwhelming. Although it was a group effort, I ended up doing every job at one point or another: sc
157.
by edw519 10y ago
After 38 years of commercial programming, 15 of them remote, here's the thing that almost no one talks about: working remotely actually benefits the company much more that the programmer. Here's why: 1. Profitability manufacturing
158.
by edw519 10y ago
I gave anything related to what I was actually working on 5 stars. I gave everything else 1 star. This has always been pretty binary for me. When I have loved working on what I was working on, nothing else could have screwed that up. I just
159.
by edw519 10y ago
Insist on it! I can't tell you how sorry I hadn't done this sooner. If they won't comply, that's a big red flag. Run the other way.
160.
by edw519 10y ago
I look at their code. Deeply. To me, this is more important than everything else put together. I don't like jerk bosses, difficult customers, unrealistic deadlines, lack of specs, reqs, or schedules, tough commutes, or unreasonable pay
161.
by edw519 10y ago
There’s no keyboard shortcut you can use to get rid of them. Sure there is: 1. Alt-F4 2. Ctrl-Alt-Del
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by edw519 10y ago
Nice post. Short, sweet, and presented to avoid endless debates over particulars. (I know, I have plenty of my own.) I especially like: I’ve found it’s often easier to keep a few broader ideas in mind. Funny, OP doesn't mention the b
163.
by edw519 10y ago
I've been doing this for 30 years. Why? Because I work in such a way to make it happen. What you call a problem, I embrace as a gift. Of all the things I've discussed here at Hacker News over the years, this is probably the #1 sub
164.
by edw519 10y ago
A soviet village with only a bull purchased a cow from Irkutsk. But the cow would not let the bull mount her. No matter what the bull did, the cow moved the other way so that mating was impossible. The villagers brought in an expert governm
165.
by edw519 10y ago
free Thanksgiving lunch (where we have to listen to executives talk) free Christmas lunch (where we have to listen to executives talk) free Years of Service Lunch (where we have to listen to executives talk) free Company Picnic (
166.
by edw519 10y ago
I'm in my 30's doing marketing and am starting to feel like the old man of the teams I work with. Ha Ha, you'd be a baby on my team. I'm 61, on a team of 20 people in a department of 100 people. Age range 21 to 72. I f
167.
by edw519 10y ago
What's frustrating for me is I tend to choke in high-stress situations like this. I'd rather find this out in an interview than during a critical sprint. That's part of the reason I do it this way. I'm interested in yo
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by edw519 10y ago
This could have also been entitled, "A Story of an Incompetent Screener". I have interviewed over 2500 programmers and have never looked at their previous work, on github or anywhere else. Never. - I don't know if it&#x27
169.
by edw519 10y ago
I've had 80 bosses. 77 of them sucked. I would march through hell to help the other 3 get something done. For me that pretty much sums it up. All the rest is fluff. FWIW, OP's 3 metrics: 1. Clarity of Thought and Communication
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by edw519 10y ago
To me, it's extra empowering. Who better to share, "You are not alone."
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by edw519 10y ago
Truth be told I was planning on quitting at 3pm during my bi-weekly one-on-one with the CTO, so I'm taking it in stride/happy. Happy? You should be ecstatic . You just won the lottery! What you would have received if you had qu
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by edw519 10y ago
Stand-up comic. I would never have to write a thing. After all these years in enterprise I.T., I have enough material for life. I'll just tell them stories from real life at work. I doubt I could write anything nearly as funny as what
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by edw519 10y ago
Assuming that good process fixes bad people Corollary: Assuming that good process doesn't restrict good people. This is one of my biggest pet peeves: management decisions that don't account enough for outliers; that is, their be
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How terrible code gets written by perfectly sane people(linkedin.com)
2 points by edw519 10y ago|3 comments
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Leonardo Da Vinci’s To Do List (circa 1490)(openculture.com)
274 points by edw519 10y ago|68 comments
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by edw519 10y ago
Thank you for this, kristerv. At first I agreed with many of the other posters, that this just had more overhead than it needed, so I didn't take it seriously. But when I saw this comment, I got it. It's an MVP! You launched it be
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When It Comes to Success, Age Really Is Just a Number(nytimes.com)
2 points by edw519 10y ago|0 comments
178.
by edw519 10y ago
I'm definitely valuing that over "being in the industry". You ARE in the industry. For every programmer in Silicon Valley, there are x of us not in Silicon Valley. And there's probably little correlation between whethe
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My Nephew Brought Home This Menacing Maths Problem(medium.com)
2 points by edw519 10y ago|0 comments
180.
by edw519 10y ago
This is what inevitably happens when you have a solution looking for a problem. I have 2 "systems" at work... One includes email and a white board with index cards taped to the wall next to it. The other includes Jira, Confluence,

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